Everything you need to know about the xbox 720!!

[EpSoNiight]

http://www.techradar.com/news/gaming...1169?artc_pg=1

The Next Xbox - Everything You Need To Know




I'm unsure to how many of you have heard of this, but Microsoft has already started working on the next Xbox system, the Xbox 720. I found this article on it and thought you guys might want to know more about this machine.

Everything you need to know about the next Xbox
'Xbox 720' could be the hottest gift for Christmas 2011

Will Microsoft launch its next-gen Xbox in 2011? There have been a couple of articles recently that have speculated on just that. We look at whether the 'Xbox 720' will feature a return to Intel chips, the inclusion of a Blu-ray drive, and more storage than you can ever fill.

A PlayStation 4 and potential 'Xbox 720' could arrive as early as 2011, estimates Crytek president and CEO Cevat Yerli. Industry analyst Colin Sebastian agrees, suggesting that "the general consensus amongst industry professionals is that a new generation of home consoles will arrive on the market in 2011 or 2012."

Terabyte storage for the Xbox 720?

We've already speculated about what Microsoft might be planning for its third Xbox – 16 or 32 processing cores (including onboard graphics), 8GB of DDR memory, broadband connectivity and a hard disk that delivers terabytes rather than gigabytes of storage space.

More storage is a given – Microsoft has recently launched the 60GB Xbox 360 Pro, while Sony has rolled out a 160GB PlayStation 3. Both consoles are trying to sell themselves as digital hubs and any future Xbox is going to need a huge amount of space to store downloadable movies and TV shows, demos and Live Arcade games. A 60GB hard drive is nowhere near big enough.

"One of the problems with the 360," Rockstar Games founder Sam Houser told 1UP, "is the fact that they don't have a significantly larger storage medium than the previous systems. It's a slightly bigger DVD disc... If we're filling up the disc right now, where are we going? It's not like our games are going to get any smaller."

The solution isn't just to add a Blu-ray drive to the next Xbox. The developers of Bioshock recently told videogamer.com that: "in terms of specific things, [Blu-ray] hasn't made much difference. The original game fits on a 360 disk so it wasn't like we were in need of room." The ability to run games from a massive hard drive renders the optical drive virtually redundant.

Xbox 720 to feature Intel processor?

Assuming that Microsoft isn't going to dumb-down the next Xbox in favour of a Wii-style family console, the next-generation of processors could give the Xbox 720 the muscle of a turn of the millennium supercomputer. A return to Intel technology might also be on the cards.

Because by 2012, Intel plans to have launched the 22nm die shrink of the Sandy Bridge architecture – that's the next architecture after Core i7 (aka Nehalem). According to TechRadar's resident chip-geek Jeremy Laird, this should see CPUs with at least 16 cores, each with two threads for 32 logical processors. We might even see chips with as many as 24 or 32 cores.

Graphics-wise, the current trend on the PC side is towards outsourcing more of the physics and AI work to the GPU. So a contender for Xbox 720 inclusion might be Intel's Larrabee processor.

With its multi-core x86 approach to graphics rendering, Larrabee is blurring the lines between traditional CPUs and GPUs. "It's not inconceivable that you might have a next gen Xbox with a relatively simple CPU," says Laird, "just a couple of biggish out-of-order cores, and then some Larrabee-like monster handling graphics, physics, AI and so on."

Why Sony's Cell might have got it right

Larrabee isn't just a graphics processor. It's a clever side bet by Intel on a possible future processing paradigm – highly parallel, massive floating point performance. Revolutionary? Not quite.

"The Cell processor was quite prescient," suggests Laird, "as it's philosophically similar to Larrabee. The problem is that the only workload on a console that is currently parallelised is graphics and that's the one thing the Cell doesn't do. Real-time physics and complex AI will become more important on consoles, as will more programmable graphics (ray-tracing is one example). So highly parallel and programmable Larrabee or Cell chips look like the way forward."

Considering that the next generation of processors could pack in several billion transistors, the next generation of consoles should be capable of some truly stunning high-definition games. Any new machine in 2012 will take full advantage of broadband for multiplayer and massively multiplayer gaming, social networking and media sharing.

But what if there is no next-gen console?

Acclaim boss Dave Perry recently suggested that Sony has "pretty much no chance of making money on the PS3" and will have to extend the console's lifespan. While Alex St. John, the CEO of games company WildTangent, predicts that: "we're looking at the last generation of consoles. There's not going to be an Xbox 720 or a PS4, I'll make that bet, not going to happen."

Sure, Microsoft can build a better, faster, more powerful Xbox. As Microsoft's Robbie Bach told 1UP: "people ask me how many people I have working on the next generation. On the one hand, it's everybody. On the other, it's nobody. People are continuously working on new technology."

The next question isn't necessarily 'what will the next Xbox look like?' but 'will there even be one?'

By Dean Evans

[F3AR ChaRLie]

IDK I'm not buying it. And i don't think there going to name it the Xbox 720...If they do they officially win the award for worst console name.

[FIF3]

By the sounds of it this would be the equivalent to a down payment on a car. You can count me out if that's the case... I didn't buy a PS3 because I thought it was two expensive, but that 30 core processor and terabyte storage with 8 gb of ram will make this thing well over 2000 dollars... fuck that. Unless of course this could run as a full blown PC then I may be interested, but I'm not paying that price for sole media entertainment, like some would.

All that technology will be new (especially intels new processor) that year making this virtually unaffordable. I think it would be for the worse to have that kind of power, games don't require a fraction of all that to run...

[skating_jesus]

Originally Posted by FIF3

By the sounds of it this would be the equivalent to a down payment on a car. You can count me out if that's the case... I didn't buy a PS3 because I thought it was two expensive, but that 30 core processor and terabyte storage with 8 gb of ram will make this thing well over 2000 dollars... fuck that. Unless of course this could run as a full blown PC then I may be interested, but I'm not paying that price for sole media entertainment, like some would.

All that technology will be new (especially intels new processor) that year making this virtually unaffordable. I think it would be for the worse to have that kind of power, games don't require a fraction of all that to run...

Thats life though
prices of everything rise over time

[Brok3nMan]

not really. The price of everything lowers over time. It's just that when technology grows all the new shit costs more. A terabite is going to lower in price as time goes on.

The new councels that come out will never reach $1,000. Microsoft and Sony are smart enough to realize that coming withing even $70 of the price of a standard PC will not make sales. PC gaming is superior to counsel and if the prices are even close to each other then it's obvious people will turn into PC gamers.

Like they said above i doubt there will even be a counsel. Everything is going to be virtual. That is the easiest way for these companies to make big profits.

end rant.

[skating_jesus]

Originally Posted by Brok3nMan

not really. The price of everything lowers over time. It's just that when technology grows all the new shit costs more. A terabite is going to lower in price as time goes on.

The new councels that come out will never reach $1,000. Microsoft and Sony are smart enough to realize that coming withing even $70 of the price of a standard PC will not make sales. PC gaming is superior to counsel and if the prices are even close to each other then it's obvious people will turn into PC gamers.

Like they said above i doubt there will even be a counsel. Everything is going to be virtual. That is the easiest way for these companies to make big profits.

end rant.

i thought everything would rise with the cost of living

[Mofogo]

hmm...speculation does not fuel my hype.


IMO, without a console seller like another halo, xbox 720 will not do so well. While there is GOW still, no halo will tank new xbox, especially if sony released at the same time, since they tend to lean toward a stronger spec'd console anyways.

[FIF3]

Originally Posted by Brok3nMan

not really. The price of everything lowers over time. It's just that when technology grows all the new shit costs more. A terabite is going to lower in price as time goes on.

The new councels that come out will never reach $1,000. Microsoft and Sony are smart enough to realize that coming withing even $70 of the price of a standard PC will not make sales. PC gaming is superior to counsel and if the prices are even close to each other then it's obvious people will turn into PC gamers.

Like they said above i doubt there will even be a counsel. Everything is going to be virtual. That is the easiest way for these companies to make big profits.

end rant.

I don't think the terabyte hard drives, or even the 8gb or DDR ram is going to cost that much, it's that processor that will kill them.

That processor is due for launch in the same year as the Xbox 720(so this article claims). The price of a Core 2 Extreme processor(4 cores) from Intel are still in the 1000 dollar range, which is insane. There are other cheaper quad cores from Intel like the Q6600, but those are still around 250 bucks a pop. Those will be much much lower one higher core quantity processors are released, but I don't even want to think of the price for the 12-32 cores...

I don't think this article is legit at all, it doesn't flow with anything shane kim(I think it was him) was talking about when he mentioned the "virtual console".

[Mofogo]

I think they could handle it with say 8 cores. with that much RAM and a strong GPU it could run a game like crysis full out, so it should be pretty good for whatever they can come up with in the future. But who knows, maybe there will be leaps and bounds in the creation that even high PCs won't handle well.

As far as the article goes, it does seem to be a large disconnect, with just lots of random speculation from people not at microsoft or sony.

[WAN73D]

Originally Posted by skating_jesus

i thought everything would rise with the cost of living

Not quite. What you're seeing is an increase in the overall cost of living due to the advancement and progression of the accepted amenities. For instance, take vacuums. Up until recently, most vacuums were relatively similar in design and, thus, were actually getting cheaper. But recently the market has seen the introduction of the more advanced Dyson-style vacuums which carry a heavier price tag essentially because the technology is considerably more advanced. So, basically, while the cost of living does continue to increase, it's not because the prices of certain items are increasing, it's because people are paying for newer and better items that essentially do the same thing. The situation with the next generation of game consoles is pretty much the exact same thing. We've already seen it in this generation, most obviously with the PS3.


Anyways, the article seemed like alot of outside speculation to me, personally, but it was still interesting. I think alot of the advances we'll see will come in the form of user interfacing and connectivity. With that, you'd probably see some pretty significant changes without the massive increase in cost. I think the success of the Wii in comparison to the Gamecube is going to push the other major companies in that direction.