Microsoft’s new Xbox Series X models have a smaller chip and different cooling

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Va1crist@reddit

Cool two things the system didn’t have an issue with

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SomeoneBritish@reddit

Are you saying you don’t want your consoles to have more power efficient chips which use less electricity and generate less heat?

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PubFiction@reddit

to be fair its irrelevant to most gamers, the consumption difference is negligible. Who this really helps is MS as the smaller chip is probably cheaper to produce / buy.

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SomeoneBritish@reddit

No, it literally provides you with a lower power bill. It’s objectively good for consumers.

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ToadInTheBox@reddit

It’s a much bigger benefit for Microsoft than it is for consumers.

Power consumption while gaming on the Series X is 150W. At 3 hours a day every single day that would translate to like $20/yr worth of electricity. Even if they shaved 20% off the active power consumption it’s saving you $4 a year if you are gaming 21 hours a week. It’s not meaningful.

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SomeoneBritish@reddit

Still an improvement. If Microsoft was marketing this like it’s a game changer, then yeah, I’d get your point, but it’s a stealth improvement which is objectively good for consumers. You’re wrong if you disagree.

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conquer69@reddit

Whatever improvement there is, it will be offset by the higher price of the newer console revision.

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SomeoneBritish@reddit

The RRP is cheaper than the Series-X (I think), although it's missing a disc drive, so I don't know if they can be directly compared.

IF this smaller chip prevented them from reducing the cost of the new console event further, potentially offsetting the power usage savings, I would agree with you, but I don't know if it's possible to confirm that.

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Disregardskarma@reddit

There’s no saving to node shifts these days. It’s a big reason consoles haven’t had price drops

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ToadInTheBox@reddit

The benefit to Microsoft is not just the cost savings of revving the chip, it's the power savings of running these chips in their cloud gaming servers, as the article mentions. a 10% savings in energy consumption at the datacenter level is enough to pay for the new mask set.

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PubFiction@reddit

Most gamers do not care about a jokingly small difference in the power bill they are clearly willing to spends hundreds per year to game. If they save $20 or not is completely meaningless.

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Nicholas-Steel@reddit

And no optical drive, good bye 2nd hand gaming and cheap sales at retailers.

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NoAirBanding@reddit

The 2tb special edition still has the optical drive, and it’s probably a safe assumption that the normal black Series X will remain in production, keep the optical drive, and be built using the updated hardware.

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PubFiction@reddit

For a while but its going the way of the dodo, MS already made a push against disks and Sony has now done it with the pro, its pretty obvious next gen will have no optical drives.

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Nicholas-Steel@reddit

Sony's currently handling the phase out of physical support better than Microsoft, by making the disc drive a modular user-replaceable component they can sell a console without support that can be upgraded to support it. I realize it didn't start like this, it evolved in to the current solution.

Where as Microsoft just don't have any option to add disc support to their digital-only systems and show no signs of following Sony's much appreciated approach.

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Icy-Lab-2016@reddit

I think Sony will support the optional drive for PS6, probably even the same drive but after that my guess is it is a goner.

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gingeydrapey@reddit

I doubt it. Clearly testing the waters with pro. Steamos can't come soon enough

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PubFiction@reddit

does steamos not already exist?

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SohipX@reddit

SteamOS for all handhelds and computers, not just the Steamdeck.

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PubFiction@reddit

Again did you not have the option to put SteamOS on any computer of your liking since a long time ago?

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Conch-Republic@reddit

It's a pain to get it working on anything that isn't the steam deck.

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P1ffP4ff@reddit

Steam os, yes you can but the easy download and install on you pc file is not published. So for the easy and supported way, we wait

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Icy-Lab-2016@reddit

Maybe so, I do hope they keep the option at least.

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teh_drewski@reddit

I think discless conclusively winning on PC has made the console companies feel safer relegating it to a niche option there too.

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PubFiction@reddit

Right and the inly reason discs lasted this gen was because sony had a blu ray conflict of interest. If some random company like toshiba had the rights to blu ray it would probably already be dead

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hackenclaw@reddit

I think the biggest problem with console is the game price & that subscription service.

They are completing with PC now, they need to be cheaper in the long run.

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PubFiction@reddit

I disagree with you, you said they need to be cheaper in the long run but that's not true the ENTIRE console business model has always been cheaper in the short run, more expensive in the long run and that's how they make money, that's why they sell consoles at close to break even and sell games, and accessories for high profits.

That business model has ALWAYS been a successful business mode, ALWAYS. Long term planning and thinking is much rarer for people and being able to keep track of all the costs and calculate it out has never been a common thing people do.

At the end of the day the same people will go see the initial sticker price and that's what will drive people especially parents to buy a console for kids, then they will get hooked on the games.

Also if you look at things realistically the most popular games now are often free2play even on console and again its that low upfront cost to get you hooked in and then the long term higher cost battle passes and "micro"transactions which arent even remotely micro anymore.

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Evans found that the exhaust temperature and noise of these new Xbox Series X models hasn’t changed from the original, though.

It's funny he's still measuring the exhaust despite how much criticism he has received for it.

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CBrainz@reddit

One might see the size of his head and think he was smart enough to understand.

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wowbaggerBR@reddit

Not a smart guy