Mr_Furious
Member
Ask yourself this question: would the Xbox be as successful today if it didn't have a built-in HD? If your opinion is no then MS might be making a mistake by not including one in it's successor.
Mr_Furious said:Ask yourself this question: would the Xbox be as successful today if it didn't have a built-in HD? If your opinion is no then MS might be making a mistake by not including one in it's successor.
512MB of flash memory costs more than a 40GB hard drive. Not making at least an optional hard drive available would be completely retarded.BeOnEdge said:yeah when u think about it, cheapy mp3 players have what 128mb? 512 would be fine for all ur custom soundtracks and cheap!
Well there are two problems there. For the Xbox MS pays a lot more that they should for the hard drives. It may have changed but I remember last year when they published how much they paid for the 8/10 Gbytes hard drives the number was quite incredible.BeOnEdge said:ur right. i always wonder about that. i mean people say harddrives would cost MS a bundle yet there are 30-40 gig drives out there that are $30 after rebate! when buying in bulk, wouldnt that make HDs cheaper than the rebate price? adding only like $15-$20 to the overall price of the hardware?
Well, I agree with that to an extent as well. It's fun to see the 180 most Xbox proponents have taken regarding the significance of hardware superiority too, and no doubt having the weakest chipset next gen will take away some of the appeal Xbox enjoyed this generation (and N64 before that)... in some ways it actually seems if Xbox & GameCube have essentially split N64's market (which was a breeding ground for both colorful family games and bloody fps). But that's a little beside the point... in terms of Xenon, I've really just got this gut feeling MS is going to do mostly everything right. Despite the spec difference, I don't think there'll be a noticable visual disparity in Xenon, PS3 or Rev games. Microsoft also seems to have some good momentum going in (at least in English speaking nations) and there's rumblings of developer support already building things for launch... I dunno, I just feel like Xenon will be Microsoft's "Genesis".DrGAKMAN said:Woah...usually I agree with you jarrod, but really, I don't think we know enough about Xenon to say that. MS had the power edge, a built-in HD and LOT'S of advertising dollars to push the X-BOX. I'm sure the advertising will be as big with Xenon, if not bigger, but they lose the power edge and they lose features that they're expected to have...and we still don't know about BC or the HD-DVD situations either. I can see them increasing marketshare if they do the right things, but if they're missing some things then they lose mindshare which will eventually effect their marketshare (see: Nintendo).
Blimblim said:Well there are two problems there. For the Xbox MS pays a lot more that they should for the hard drives. It may have changed but I remember last year when they published how much they paid for the 8/10 Gbytes hard drives the number was quite incredible.
DCharlie said:"One obvious question though. Why have sony gone for the BIG investments, when they could have surely continued down the mips route, maybe multiprocessor, and sign up a graphics chip big boy?"
well, aren't Toshiba providing the non-Cell base GPU?
Just checking, but do 'we' know it's non-cell based for sure now?DCharlie said:well, aren't Toshiba providing the non-Cell base GPU?
Uhmm - unless you're privy to to actual transistor counts on Xenon those observations are kinda hard to make... except for Ram, where it's simple...Dopey said:If you compare to moore's law, Xbox 2 is higher than Xbox was in comparison of the timeframes.
GPU would be the same for the time frame, RAM would be equal for the time frame, but the CPU is way way beyond what it was for the time frame.
HDDs have mechanical parts, size and heat dissipation issue, and their prices don't really scale that well with time. Builtin flash memory should be cheaper to produce in bulk, especially if MS did it themselves, and it would definately scale better over time.BeOnEdge said:ur right. i always wonder about that. i mean people say harddrives would cost MS a bundle yet there are 30-40 gig drives out there that are $30 after rebate! when buying in bulk, wouldnt that make HDs cheaper than the rebate price? adding only like $15-$20 to the overall price of the hardware?
who says you have to have a hard drive to do any of these?No mp3 playback in games, no downloadble content, no instant saves.
Fafalada said:Just checking, but do 'we' know it's non-cell based for sure now?![]()
jarrod said:Microsoft also seems to have some good momentum going in (at least in English speaking nations) and there's rumblings of developer support already building things for launch... I dunno, I just feel like Xenon will be Microsoft's "Genesis".
Nintendo of America's charismatic VP of sales and marketing Reggie Fils-Aime has confirmed that the company is aiming to launch its next home console in the same timeframe as Sony's PS3, and attacked Microsoft's "rush" to the next generation.
"Our focus is this: we will bring Revolution to the marketplace roughly at the same time as the competition," Fils-Aime told US website IGN. "We are driving our timetables based on what we believe Sony will do."
"Not that I want to ignore the Xbox," Fils-Aime qualified, "but certainly we believe that a rush to a new system is a mistake."
MrSingh said:according to "loud mouth" it's not cell-based.![]()
won't happen this generation. The addition of a video input would raise costs. Now network client based video/audio/photos should be on Xenon and PS3.HDTV PVR capture card (could be a combo with the HD)
depends if the addons are for added fuctionality to improve games (faster load times, improved graphics, whatever) or if they are novelty addons to add more space for more save space either for game saves (which don't need specifically a hard drive, just any storage media), custom soundtracks (again any storage media will work), or downloadable content (again, just any storage media).A modular console format would only lead to a segmented user base...
Datawhore said:- 40 to 320 GB hard drives (for saving games, faster load times, large Xbox live downloads + expansions, large mp3 playlists and custom soundtracks, better MMOG performance and compatibility)
- An Xbox backwards compatibility add-on card for $50 (w/ properly licensed tech from Nvidia)
Nos_G said:A modular console format would only lead to a segmented user base...
Something devs appreciate about consoles are the closed specifications and if MS were to go with that, then game would have to cater to the lowest common denominator regarding to configurations of peripherals.
Datawhore said:did you even read my entire post? By making support for the peripherals Technical Game Requirements all devs would have to include some functionality for the peripherals, even at the most base level. Microsoft could easily encourage this functionality itself with its SDK & tools.
Assuming Xenon would have the hard drive as an option, it would not require much more work to NOT support the hard drive (eg game saves, custom soundtrack and content download) than what the developpers already do on the Xbox. They would not have to support anything new, just disable some stuff they already had to code anyway.DopeyFish said:Forcing support on such peripherals when it's not guaranteed would drive devs absolutely crazy. On top of that it would really screw budgets. More coding, more things to implement, more things to take care of. More things to test, more things to go through QA.
Even if Microsoft provides a template, engines vary and work arounds would have to be coded. It would just not make sense from an economical perspective to a business perpective.
Right, usually the work I don't have to do takes me months to finish too...Assuming Xenon would have the hard drive as an option, it would not require much more work to NOT support the hard drive (eg game saves, custom soundtrack and content download) than what the developpers already do on the Xbox.
That's unfortunately much too true (being a programmer myself, just not in games), but we are supposed not to mention thisFafalada said:Right, usually the work I don't have to do takes me months to finish too...![]()
MrSingh said:mimimimimimiimi.
Do The Mario said:I think the hard drive is a must, it's one of the best features of the Xbox i think it would be huge step backwards not to have it!
The Xbox 2 might not be able to handle many PC ports without it! Or porting might be more complex.![]()
maximum360 said:The good thing regarding flash memory is that prices have dropped dramatically in the last few months. In the beginning of the year a 1 GB Secure Digital card was $350 (cheapeast price). Now you can find deals everyday and some have the prices down to even the $60 range (the price drop is quite unreal). Also, Compact Flash cards are even better since you'll probably be able to get a 2 GB card for $100 now. By the time we see Xbox 2 we should start see 4 GB CF cards for $100 and 2 GB SD cards for $60.