Microsoft leaks details on XBOX 2

P

PYRO-Maniak

Posted on Sun, Feb. 01, 2004

Microsoft leaks details on Xbox Next
PLANS REFLECT HARD-FOUGHT BATTLE WITH SONY FOR GAMERS' DOLLARS
By Dean Takahashi
Mercury News

I cant believe anyone is actualy buying any of this! Its the same as
it always is before a console announcement, endless speculation by
endless numbers of "journalists" who just want to be the first to
guess something right. Sounds like an utter pile of wank to me, ill
wait for the OFFICIAL announcement and ignore speculation
thank-you-very-much.

Matt
 
S

Steven C \(Doktersteve\)

R420 said:
Posted on Sun, Feb. 01, 2004

Microsoft leaks details on Xbox Next
PLANS REFLECT HARD-FOUGHT BATTLE WITH SONY FOR GAMERS' DOLLARS
By Dean Takahashi
Mercury News

Microsoft has quietly circulated the specifications for its
next-generation Xbox video-game console, indicating how the company
plans to carry on its war against dominant player Sony.

The details suggest Microsoft is far more concerned about keeping the
cost of its Xbox Next console low than it is with including dazzling
technological features or driving its rivals out of the business,
according to a variety of industry sources.

People familiar with Microsoft's strategy say the company apparently
believes it can capture a much larger share of the market if it
launches its machine before Sony fields its PlayStation 3 console in
2006.

A Microsoft spokeswoman declined to comment on strategy details.

The new Xbox reflects some tough lessons learned in the current
console battle, in which Sony has outsold Microsoft 5 to 1. The Xbox
has put Microsoft on the map with a generation of gamers. But it has
also been a money loser, albeit a relatively small one for a company
with $53 billion in cash.

Microsoft launched its Xbox console 20 months after the PlayStation 2
debut. By the time Microsoft sold 1.5 million consoles, Sony had sold
more than 20 million PlayStations. To date, Microsoft has sold 13.7
million Xboxes, while Sony has sold more than 70 million. In the
United States alone, console sales amounted to $3 billion in sales
last year.

For gamers, the new Xbox will be impressive, giving them the ability
to play fast-action, realistic 3-D games on a high-definition TV set.
Microsoft's emissaries have told industry developers and publishers
that the next Xbox will be ready to launch in fall 2005 with the
following specifications:

. Three IBM-designed 64-bit microprocessors. The combined power of
these chips means the Xbox Next will have more computing power than
most personal computers. The chips are used in Apple Computer's
high-end G5 PowerMac machines now.

. A graphics chip designed by ATI Technologies with speeds much faster
than its upcoming R400 chip (correction: R420, not R400) for the
personal computer. This chip will help the next Xbox to display games
with the resolution of high-definition TV.

. Compatibility with the original Xbox, which is based on Intel and
Nvidia chips, isn't guaranteed. Microsoft is concerned it would cost
too much money in hardware or in licensing fees to enable the Xbox
Next to play old Xbox games. This is risky in part because Sony's
strategy has been to maintain compatibility with its old consoles.

``I can't imagine that Microsoft would be so insanely stupid as to
make it incompatible,'' said Jon Peddie, an analyst at Jon Peddie
Research in Tiburon.

Microsoft is leaving itself wiggle room to react to competitive moves
by Sony and Nintendo. A few details are to be decided. In contrast
with the current Xbox, the next one will have no hard disk drive --
unless Sony puts one in the PlayStation 3. Instead, the console will
rely on flash memory to store saved games and permanent data, much
like the current PlayStation 2.

The machine also will have about 256 megabytes of dynamic random
access memory. But Microsoft will upgrade that to 512 gigabytes
(correction: 512 MB, not GB) if Sony puts in more. The previous Xbox
had 64 megabytes. And lastly, it isn't clear if Microsoft will include
the current DVD video technology or Blu-Ray, its successor. Blu-Ray
will hold much more data, but it's unclear when it will be ready for
market.

The current Xbox has an eight-gigabyte hard disk drive. That drive is
useful for online games and storing game art, but many developers
chose not to make use of it. As a result, Microsoft seems to have
decided that saving the $50 the hard drive costs outweighs its
benefits.

In telling the developers what will be in the box, Microsoft is
helping them get started on games that will be ready when the console
launches. But it is also soliciting feedback, and some developers are
pushing Microsoft to make changes.

``I would really like to see a hard disk drive in the box,'' said Tim
Sweeney, chief executive officer of Epic Games in Raleigh, N.C., who
has made his opinions known to Microsoft. ``For a console to really
have a useful online component, it has to have the hard drive to store
downloaded maps and other data.''

Sweeney says it is dangerous for Microsoft to wait until Sony reveals
the details of the PlayStation 3 or to pay too much attention to cost
issues.

``Sony isn't as motivated to launch a new console because it is No.
1,'' he said. ``If Microsoft waits for them, it is in effect allowing
Sony to design Microsoft's box.''

Regarding cost issues, a Microsoft spokeswoman would only say,
``Microsoft is in this for the long term.''

Developers like Sweeney say they are pleased it will be apparently
easy to develop games for Microsoft's new box. That was one of the
main advantages that Microsoft has had over its rivals. Current
information about the PlayStation 3, sketchy as it is, indicates that
it could be extremely difficult for developers to master.

The top executives of both Electronic Arts and Activision said this
week that they have not received formal ``software development kits''
from Microsoft yet, but they did say they have begun creating
next-generation games. Internally, Microsoft has begun developing game
prototypes, and it is using G5 systems to do so.

The same developers who have seen the Microsoft specifications say
Sony hasn't shared as much data with them. Sony appears to be willing
to wait until 2006, in part so that it can milk the profits from the
current generation PlayStation 2. In the meantime, Sony is launching
an all-in-one PS 2/video recording box dubbed the PSX and the
PlayStation Portable.

Microsoft's schedule may change -- it has a big meeting coming up for
developers this month. But for now it appears it will release
information about the new box at both the Game Developers Conference
in San Jose in March and at the Electronic Entertainment Expo in Los
Angeles in May.

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/business/7849191.htm
 
S

Sir William

Microsoft does develop apps for Mac's so why shouldn't they be taking
delivery of Mac G5's?

Well, now Apple develops apps for Windows (iTunes)...but they are
competitors in the OS market (if you give Apple enough respect to say they
are competitive).
 
S

Sir William

(e-mail address removed) (R420) wrote in message


I cant believe anyone is actualy buying any of this! Its the same as
it always is before a console announcement, endless speculation by
endless numbers of "journalists" who just want to be the first to
guess something right. Sounds like an utter pile of wank to me, ill
wait for the OFFICIAL announcement and ignore speculation
thank-you-very-much.

Matt

Ok, just so you should know, at the moment Microsoft isn't planning on a HD
or backwards compatibility. It isn't really speculation. That is actually
what is going on...I have my sources after all.
 
Z

Zackman

NutJob#2 said:
Not if Sony has technology in the PS3 to let you play PS1 and PS2
games in High Def with FSAA :)

Um, yippee. That's exactly what I want to buy a PS3 for, to play PSOne
games. And in high-def, so I can REALLY see how low the poly counts are.
MS won't even sell used, outdated Xbox's!!! ROFL

ROFL!!! L@@K at the TROLZOR! HE PWNED U!!!!111

-Z-
 
N

NutJob#2

All MS needs to do is give away Dead or Alive The Ultimate ****ing
Tournament and they will do just fine.
Tits can make a tremendous improvement in sales.

Also, they need to think about 512MB of ram standard, no matter what Sony
does.
As it is the PS2 is doing a fine job of competing against the Xbox with it's
limited and slower 40Mb of ram.

PS3 will probably have some form of hard drive type storage.
My guess is that the PS2 hard drive will be compatible with the PS3. 40GB is
plenty!!!

Xbox needs to invest in new technology other than standard PC technology.

High Def is a nice marketing ploy but it still isn't going to sell consoles
to the average gamer. (average joe gamer = money)

And I'm sure Sony knows that all it needs to do is simply update the PS2 to
PS3 standards and up the cache.

The problem MS will have is money.
They still haven't made a penny off the Xbox and they won't make a penny off
the Xbox 2 if they stick with expensive off the shelf PC technology.

The PS3 will be sold at a profit even if Sony sells them at $200


The hilariously funny part will be if and probably when the PS3 details get
released that it will enhance old PS2 and PS1 games.
This will put nearly all of this generation multiplatform PS2 titles on par
with Xbox. Giving people even less of a reason to invest in Microsoft.

The only hurdle Sony faces is how good developers will be able to use
existing technology in the PS3.

Xbox 2 will still be using Direct X so technology compatibility will be
guaranteed even if backward game compatibility is not.

The PS3 "could" be a different story. However, if development tools cross
over well, as they should, then the PS3 will easily reign supreme in both
Hardware and Software. A very scary situation for any competitor. Even the
mighty Bill Gates.
 
N

NutJob#2

Zackman said:
Fatal error. Xbox2 launches first, Sony looks at it, Sony says "PS3 will
have this and this and this that makes it better than Xbox2, not to mention
Grand Theft Auto 5" and nobody buys Xbox2, a la the Dreamcast. Launching
before Sony will only be good if the lead time is short enough not to give
Sony any time to react and make changes to the PS3.


I can't imagine an analyst is so out of touch as to think this matters. It's
not like buying a new console renders the old one inoperable. And after a
few months, virually no one will want to play old-gen games on a new
console.

Not if Sony has technology in the PS3 to let you play PS1 and PS2 games in
High Def with FSAA :)

MS won't even sell used, outdated Xbox's!!! ROFL
 
N

NutJob#2

Right, and the PS2 already has more raw power than the Xbox since the VU's
can be used in any configuration

EE+VU0+VU1 = over 1 Gflop real world performance.

Xbox Pentium III/Celeron = only 35Mflops real world performance.

Taken from http://arrakis.ncsa.uiuc.edu
 
J

Joe Ottoson

Well, now Apple develops apps for Windows (iTunes)...but they are
competitors in the OS market (if you give Apple enough respect to say
they are competitive).

Dunno why not. Xbox fans claim the Xbox is "competitive". No great
difference there.
 
S

Sir William

Dunno why not. Xbox fans claim the Xbox is "competitive". No great
difference there.

Heh, well, I typed it on an Apple and I think really Apple takes it to
Microsoft in terms of quality. Of course it could be said Microsoft takes
it to Sony for quality as well.
 
M

Mark Leuck

Zackman said:
Fatal error. Xbox2 launches first, Sony looks at it, Sony says "PS3 will
have this and this and this that makes it better than Xbox2, not to mention
Grand Theft Auto 5" and nobody buys Xbox2, a la the Dreamcast. Launching
before Sony will only be good if the lead time is short enough not to give
Sony any time to react and make changes to the PS3.

That will likely not be possible when you factor in the design time of
consoles, you just can't make super-quick changes like that without throwing
everything else off
I can't imagine an analyst is so out of touch as to think this matters. It's
not like buying a new console renders the old one inoperable. And after a
few months, virually no one will want to play old-gen games on a new
console.

I wouldn't count on that
 
M

Mark Leuck

Bobby said:
Interesting that MS is ditching nVidia in favour of ATI. That contract must
be worth $$$ to ATI.

While I'm sure ATI profits from MS remember the goal is to lower the price
and knowing MS they'll renegociate to hell and back just like they did
Nvidia
 
P

Perfect

Sir William said:
Lol, anyone find it...interesting that Microsoft is using Apple computers to
develop the hardware demos? I mean it is only natural given the processor
choice, but still ;)


Microsoft doesn't rely on/use Apple technology to develop hardware demos.
The only people in Microsoft using Apple computers are those in the mac
business unit.
 
T

Tony Hill

Seems to me programming for 3 processors is not THAT easy.

Not that easy, but in my mind it should be easier than programming for
the Cell.
Very few kids have a HTDV (or will have access to one in 2005).

In North America, no. In Japan things are somewhat different though.
Is there ANYTHING MS makes a profit on except copies of WinDOS?

Office. That's about it though.
 
T

Tony Hill

Fatal error. Xbox2 launches first, Sony looks at it, Sony says "PS3 will
have this and this and this that makes it better than Xbox2, not to mention
Grand Theft Auto 5" and nobody buys Xbox2, a la the Dreamcast. Launching
before Sony will only be good if the lead time is short enough not to give
Sony any time to react and make changes to the PS3.

?!? Congrats, you just won the award for the most non-sensical
argument of the thread.

Launching the XBox2 (or XBox Next, or whatever) first gives Microsoft
a HUGE advantage! It lets them get a large installed base of
customers out there before Sony even gets out the door. Developers
will already be well on their way to releasing their second or third
games for the XBox by the time they start worrying about the PS3.
Games are what makes a console, and by 2005 everyone is going to want
to be developing for new systems. If Microsoft has a new system
coming and Sony doesn't, guess which platform developers are going to
put their efforts towards? Get it out for what's out there first. If
the PS3 ends up being a hit, you can port the game later.
I can't imagine an analyst is so out of touch as to think this matters. It's
not like buying a new console renders the old one inoperable. And after a
few months, virually no one will want to play old-gen games on a new
console.

Backwards compatibility is not a critical issue, but it a big "nice to
have" item. Lots of people DO like to play older games even after the
new ones come out. Sure you can keep your old console alongside the
new one, but that can be a pain in the ass.
Oh Lord, PLEASE don't let this be true. There goes ripping soundtracks to
the Xbox. There goes downloads from Xbox Live. There goes caching games to
the HDD.

More importantly, there goes the ability to hack an XBox and install
Linux on the thing! :>

While it does seem like a slightly odd move, I always found that
including a hard drive on the XBox in the first place was a really odd
move. Hard drives are incredibly unreliable at the best of times, and
they're only going to get worse if some kid tosses his XBox around
while bringing it over to a friends house. Having 512MB or 1GB of
disk-on-chip type flash memory seems like a better idea to me, and it
probably won't be much different in price by 2005.
Damn, 512 *GB* of RAM would have been awesome. ;)

Awesome perhaps, but *expensive*! 512MB is probably a reasonable
amount of memory though, having only 256MB of memory seems to me like
it would be a bit weak for a relatively small savings in cost.
Most Xbox games don't even fill a standard DVD, so why bother with Blu Ray?

I tend to agree. Packing tons and tons of data onto a DVD will
usually just mean that the game will run slower and it will take
longer to load up. Reading data from the DVD is about the slowest
part of the entire system, so putting MORE data on the DVD isn't
likely to improve much.
 
T

Tony Hill

Lol, anyone find it...interesting that Microsoft is using Apple computers to
develop the hardware demos? I mean it is only natural given the processor
choice, but still ;)

A little ironic perhaps, except that they almost certainly are not
running MacOS. Most likely they're running PPC Windows, which has
existed in the past and likely will come to light again (if only in
the back rooms of Redmond). In fact, my guess is that the Macs are
more likely being used to develop and test the OS for the XBox2 rather
than the games. The games should just be DirectX and Win32 API calls
for the most part, so having a PPC processor shouldn't be that big of
a deal at this stage.
 
G

George

NutJob#2 said:
The problem MS will have is money.
They still haven't made a penny off the Xbox and they won't make a penny off
the Xbox 2 if they stick with expensive off the shelf PC technology.

XBox2 doesn't use off the shelf PC technology. That much is known.
 
G

George

Tony Hill said:
?!? Congrats, you just won the award for the most non-sensical
argument of the thread.

Launching the XBox2 (or XBox Next, or whatever) first gives Microsoft
a HUGE advantage! It lets them get a large installed base of
customers out there before Sony even gets out the door.

I think you underestimate the power of the PS brand and Sony's marketing.

Also historically being first out hasn't always ensured success.
 
Z

Zackman

George said:
I think you underestimate the power of the PS brand and Sony's
marketing.

Clearly he does.
Also historically being first out hasn't always ensured success.

Somebody might want to fill Tony in on a little something called the
Dreamcast. Say what you will about Sega having pissed off fans or not having
a large enough marketing budget, but the Dreamcast had great games and some
very innovative (for the time) ideas -- VMU, online play, etc. But they
launched before the juggernaut that was the PS2, and most people simply
decided to wait for the PS2. At the very least, you're going to get people
who will wait to make their decision on which console to buy after both have
launched, which negates any advantage of going first.

A three month launch lead might do MS some good, especially if they launched
before Xmas 2005 and the PS3 came out in 2006. That would give them a decent
little head start. But they would NEED to back that up with some AAA titles
right out of the gate. If people don't decide they NEED to have an Xbox 2,
they'll just sit on the fence until the PS3 comes out.

Well, excpet for people like me who will buy both machines on their launch
dates. ;)

-Z-
 

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