
Inside the next Xbox: Project Scorpio tech revealed - anorborg
http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-2017-project-scorpio-tech-revealed
======
zaroth
What they really need to do is maybe just start completely over on the whole
Xbox Dashboard. For something that could be so simple and easy, the whole
experience of trying to use the Xbox for anything other than playing a game is
insanely frustrating. Every time I sit down to try to use it I'm just tearing
my hair out!

It's been, what, over a decade they've been working on that Dashboard and it
has always been just a steaming pile of trash.

Everything from initial setup trying to make accounts for the kids, to setting
up payment methods, trying to switch between users constantly as things are
authorized in one place or another, trying to install apps, constantly turning
it on to find its forcing an hour of updates that must be installed to
basically unbrick it. The media player app is insultingly bad. The App Store
is a wasteland. The UI is a total train wreck.

I went to install Amazon's app to stream some Prime shows last week. You would
think probably some other people have tried to do this before, what could go
wrong? What a mistake. App constantly crashing, took over an hour, including
power cycling the Xbox twice before I get it to the point where I was actually
watching a show. This for what is a < 5 minute process on a smartphone.

Every time I try to do anything with that infernal machine, I just end up
tearing my hair out. I really don't understand how they have millions of users
and so much basic shit Just Doesn't Work.

And don't get me started on the UI..... Everything I want to do buried the
absolute maximum amount of clicks away from where I would expect to look for
it.

I try not to complain about it usually because it just gets my blood boiling
how could MS put out such absolute garbage? Please tell me I'm not alone in
feeling this way :-)

The hardware rat race is great and all, but for a platform where they have
Apple-esque control I would have expected two orders of magnitude better
results than what MS has managed to deliver in 2017 for a living room
experience.

~~~
mikestew
_I really don 't understand how they have millions of users and so much basic
shit Just Doesn't Work._

Because those millions of users use the box to play games, like I do. Oh, I've
tried all the other stuff, and as you point out it's generally such a steaming
pile of shit that I feel foolish for having even tried. (If the Kinect weren't
in a box in the garage, I'd be staring in its direction right now.) Frankly,
I'd be happy if they could just bring the Xbone back to the level of usability
that the 360 had. To their credit, they're getting there little by little in
many ways. To their discredit, they shouldn't have to do that in the first
place. MSFT _had_ a working platform, but I'm guessing some PMs needed to make
their mark, so they "improved" things by breaking them.

So I just play games on it, and watch the occasional Blu-Ray. That keeps the
"aggravation footprint" to a minimum. Anything else I want to do is on the
Apple TV. And when the next-gen consoles roll out, I'm going to be taking a
hard look at what Sony has to offer.

~~~
mustacheemperor
>I'd be happy if they could just bring the Xbone back to the level of
usability that the 360 had

My housemates and I purchased an Xbone and realized before long we were using
the 360 more because it was vastly preferable for netflix/youtube/etc. Have
since switched to a chromecast for that stuff, but the Xbone is absolutely a
massive step back in UX. Not to mention the _ads_ on the dashboard. There is
advertising on the dashboard of my $250 console, that requires a paid
subscription for online play. Why is that acceptable?

~~~
jkaunisv1
Because for some reason you keep paying the subscription, buying the games and
playing them?

~~~
mustacheemperor
Ha, fair enough. I don't actually have a Live subscription. The Xbox One is
strictly a couch-coop device for me, which made the last Halo release even
more appalling.

------
nlawalker
If you own a PS4 or an X1 and the money to buy a PS4 Pro or Scorpio, it seems
like the best move is to buy the upgrade of the platform you _don 't_ have.
Then you've got access to both platforms' exclusives, and at least one new-
spec machine for the games that aren't exclusive.

I think the most interesting thing is going to see how compatibility works out
long-term for Scorpio. What will the cross-compat story be for the _next_
console, and the one after that? Will they re-platform and lose compatibility
again (and bring it back via emulation) or keep re-spec'ing the current
platform? When will we see games that will play on Scorpio but not X1?

~~~
snuxoll
> If you own a PS4 or an X1 and the money to buy a PS4 Pro or Scorpio, it
> seems like the best move is to buy the upgrade of the platform you don't
> have. Then you've got access to both platforms' exclusives, and at least one
> new-spec machine for the games that aren't exclusive.

As someone who owns both consoles, after seeing the lack of enthusiasm at the
PS4 Pro launch event I decided to hold off until Scorpio specs became known -
I much prefer the Xbox "experience" but outside of exclusives it never gets
much use since my "high-fidelity" gaming goes on my PC, and "console
exclusives" usually are better on the PS4 (looking at Final Fantasy XV in
particular here).

I'm glad I waited, there are games I want to play that are console exclusives
but not tied to one platform or the other (Kingdom Hearts 3) - it looks like
Microsoft hit this one out of the park. Seeing as the HDD in my OG Xbox One is
going to fail soon (man is it noisy) the Scorpio looks like a good upgrade
path.

> I think the most interesting thing is going to see how compatibility works
> out long-term for Scorpio. What will the cross-compat story be for the next
> console, and the one after that? Will they re-platform and lose
> compatibility again (and bring it back via emulation) or keep re-spec'ing
> the current platform? When will we see games that will play on Scorpio but
> not X1?

I believe the intent is that we are entering an era of smartphone-esque spec
bumps to consoles, and getting rid of the full generational gap that has
historically existed.

From here on out, expect new hardware every couple years that will be
compatible with your existing library - after existing hardware is X
generations old it will stop receiving software support and you'll have to
upgrade. Likely, when the Scorpio+1/2 is out you'll see the original Xbox One
and Xbox One S losing support for some newer titles (but they'll likely
continue receiving support from indie developers and less intense games along
with system software updates for a while after that).

~~~
kbenson
> From here on out, expect new hardware every couple years that will be
> compatible with your existing library

So, basically a computer, but limited, and a lower bar to entry.

I understand the use case for those that might not have a traditional computer
or a very old one, but presumably everyone here would be better served by
either shelling out an extra $100-$200 every couple years for a better video
card in their laptop (if that's the only system them have), or dropping that
on a discrete video card and sticking it in their current desktop?

I'm having trouble finding a case where I'm not better off buying a cheap Dell
desktop and throwing a mid-range video card in there for approximately the
same cost. It's a little bulkier, but I imagine Steam's Big Picture mode
probably does a good job of the interface.

~~~
snuxoll
You're not exactly wrong, but you're not 100% right either.

Consoles have one thing that PC's don't, a streamlined experience tailor made
for your TV. People do more than just play games on a console, they stream
Netflix, interact with their friends through sharing videos and clips, listen
to music on their home entertainment system that's already connected to the
TV.

Valve has been trying REALLY hard to get to this point, but every time they
add something new to the Steam platform it feels half baked in comparison to
Microsoft's offering in particular.

Personally, I'm a PC gamer first - the lack of an integrated experience
doesn't bother me when I just want to play games. My friends all use Discord
for voice/text communication, I can use AMD's software to handle recording
video and share it wherever I please, or use OBS to stream to twitch. But, I'm
also a professional who uses computers all day and know how to put pieces
together to fit my workflow - my friends are at least competent enough to do
the same, but my wife or other groups of friends may not be.

Some people just want to buy a box, plug it in and have everything they want.
That's the selling point, and unless Valve pulls some huge overhaul out of
their butt's that is an advantage that consoles are going to retain.

~~~
kbenson
Yeah, I understand for the general public, and I wasn't trying to imply
there's no place for the new consoles, just that I figure most the people
reading HN could probably get away with putting that money towards their main
computer platform more effectively. That does, of course, assume mostly single
use, and that's a rather large caveat I didn't cover. I have three kids, and
for a set-top box, ease of use is extremely important, since it's not just me
using it.

~~~
to3m
I'd have expected most people to have a laptop at home. Maybe I'm unusual, or
maybe the people I know are unusual, but I don't know many who use a desktop
PC at home any more.

Desktop work PCs are still common, but you're not going to spend your own
money on them.

~~~
khedoros1
I don't know many, either. Even mine has been sitting idle for a while,
because it's in my (toddler) son's room, I don't have anywhere else to put it,
and it's honestly begging for an upgrade at this point anyhow.

Which is too bad. It's got a nicer keyboard+mouse, sound system, screen,
storage, network connection, and graphics than my laptop. There's a dedicated
desk and chair. The only place the laptop wins out: Convenience.

~~~
snuxoll
I'm the only person in my family that owns a desktop myself, but my group of
friends is mostly a bunch of desktop users since one of our primary use cases
is PC gaming (although mine is also a workstation for software development and
some light video editing).

Regardless of their quality, you can get a basic no-frills laptop for $400 and
be able to carry it with you - or you can spend that much on an equally no-
frills (though still arguably better specification-wise) desktop and have it
stuck wherever you put it. More people tend to favor the portability, they can
have it at the kitchen table or in front of the TV - some people don't even
own a proper computer and rely entirely on smartphones and/or tablets.

Desktop computing outside of the workplace is increasingly a niche, one that
isn't going away as long as PC gaming remains but to argue it's not shrinking
is delusional.

------
emdowling
I'm glad we're seeing utilisation at the 66% level. That extra power is going
to be mighty useful for VR. It's going to be really interesting to see what
Microsoft reveal there.

I have an Xbox One and a Switch. Personally, I love this combination and
Scorpio could be a great upgrade depending on the VR story. While I do miss
out on some PS4 games I'd love to play, I don't have enough hours to play the
games I already have.

The ideological gap between Switch and the rest of the industry is widening.
No doubt the Switch is a cheaper platform to develop for (4K assets are a huge
burden) but is that enough of a drawcard? Likewise, are consoles like Scorpio
and PS4 Pro becoming too difficult and expensive to develop for, unless you
are a AAA studio? The bar gets set so high that smaller studios will find it
harder and harder to keep up. I can easily foresee a future where the Switch
has an amazing selection of first party, Nintendo games and a killer catalogue
of indies, whereas Xbox and PS4 own the third-party, AAA market.

~~~
nightski
Actually it feels like the trend you are starting to see is that AAA studios
can't even keep up (aka Mass Effect Andromeda, and other recent high profile
releases). The graphics burden just seems too high that everything else
suffers.

But it's not all bad. I feel like, especially on the PC, smaller indie studios
have been flourishing and some of the best games in recent times are not AAA
nor graphical powerhouses.

~~~
snuxoll
> Actually it feels like the trend you are starting to see is that AAA studios
> can't even keep up (aka Mass Effect Andromeda, and other recent high profile
> releases). The graphics burden just seems too high that everything else
> suffers.

The problem with Andromeda was animations, not AAA graphical fidelity. I don't
think many people are unhappy with the current level of flashy effects, we're
mostly just looking at higher resolution assets (which likely exist already).

~~~
mortenjorck
Animations are a big part of graphical fidelity. Games with lower-detail
character models relied more on your mind to fill in the details as characters
spoke or made facial expressions (I still remember an incredible scene in
2001's _Anachronox_ where a character slowly smiles, conveyed with the motion
of three vertices), but when you have a near-photorealistic rendering of a
human face, the animation has to be up to standard. This is every bit a drain
on art budgets as the modeling and textures.

~~~
rbanffy
Wouldn't then be desirable to avoid showing human faces up close and, instead,
explore other ways of telling stories that better match both budget and
technical resources?

Insisting on showing a character in great detail when the costs of doing so
far outweigh the benefit is unwise.

~~~
alvarosevilla95
If your game is a third person shooter which is a sequel to third person
shooting franchise you can't really do that.

------
minimaxir
Note: Eurogamer has the official exclusive for this information.

The tech is incrementally better than the PS4 Pro, but the price is unknown
and could be problematic if released at $499 compared to the PS4 Pro's $399.
And whether developers will take full advantage of that power.

~~~
dontyouremember
On paper it's incrementally better--significantly higher clocks, more RAM and
much more memory bandwidth. But the bigger news is that all existing Xbox One
games get 16x anisotropic filtering, framerate boosts, v-sync, and resolution
bumps (if the game supports dynamic resolution). Not to mention system-wide
downsampling for 1080p TV's.

Should be a pretty big bump in image quality for Xbox One games. They demoed
Forza running at 4k/60 FPS with PC Ultra-equivalent settings at less than 90%
GPU load.

~~~
thoughtpalette
Not sure why but some of your previous comments are showing up [dead] in the
threads.

~~~
thoughtpalette
Replying to the dead comment below, his post history looks great to me, which
is why I felt compelled to point out the dead flag.

~~~
onli
OT, but I'll keep it short, and the user should now it is okay now: you are
right. I vouched for the comment in this thread and that seems to have helped.

Looking at the history, it's probably the anti-trump comment that got flagged.

------
Grazester
Direct X CPU instruction that were handled by the CPU is now handled by the
GPU!

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RE2hNrq1Zxs&feature=youtu.be...](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RE2hNrq1Zxs&feature=youtu.be&t=3m5s)

~~~
monocasa
Eh, that's not the biggest deal, it's basically always been like that on
consoles, and that's the whole point of Mantle/Metal/Vulkan/DX12. ie. the fact
that GPUs have MMUs these days, so user space can just write raw to the
command buffer without being second guessed by the kernel drivers.

The switch to DX12 is just that you can write the same sort of code on Windows
and Xbone (the 360 had enough extensions that you sort of had to have separate
rendering backends for 360 and Windows, despite them both potentially being
DirectX 9).

------
andrewbarba
Maybe I am completely off the marks here, and I'm sorry if this is off topic,
but as someone who follows very closely what Apple is (or isn't?) doing in
their Pro machines I am very curious how those specs compare to what everyone
is asking for from Apple. The RAM is obviously low, fine, but it sounds like
the CPU and GPU are significantly more capable than anything that Apple is
shipping right now, and Microsoft will sell this thing at a fraction of the
price that Apple will sell any pro hardware. What am I missing? Where is the
big gap in component cost? How is something like an Xbox so different, and so
much cheaper, than a pro level desktop?

~~~
joshuamorton
A big part of it is the type of graphics card. FirePro (the kind in
workstations) are much more expensive than normal general purpose graphics
cards, which are again more expensive than custom SoCs which can be developed
barebones for a specific use. Reason being that a calculation error that
results in a dead pixel is fine when you are playing a video game. It'll be
there for 1/60s and then be gone, never seen again. The same error in a disney
film or a 3d scene rendered for a poster needs to be pixel perfect, so
workstation class cards have a much lower threshhold for error, and cost
accordingly.

(Also, and this is just conjecture: its possible that Apple intentionally
overprices their pros as a sort of "look this is premium" cost, while the goal
of an xbox is mass market sale).

~~~
nailer
> Reason being that a calculation error that results in a dead pixel is fine
> when you are playing a video game. It'll be there for 1/60s and then be
> gone, never seen again. The same error in a disney film or a 3d scene
> rendered for a poster needs to be pixel perfect, so workstation class cards
> have a much lower threshhold for error, and cost accordingly.

I've heard this a lot, and I don't doubt that it's correct, but could you
explain why? Like do consumer class GPUs have less accurate floating point, or
do their embedded algos contain hacks to produce less accurate results faster?

~~~
joshuamorton
Unfortunately I'm not familiar enough to give you a conclusive answer. One big
thing is that most consumer-class GPUs use normal memory, whereas workstation-
class use ECC memory, which can correct for bitflips that might occur during
normal operation.

~~~
AlphaSite
HBM is ECC by default, so that distinction is slowly vanishing.

------
chocolatebunny
Does anyone know anything about the "Hovis method" they reference for fine
tuning the power profile for each chip? I'm having a tough time understanding
how tweaking the voltage rails from board to board can improve power
consumption/heat dissipation without impacting CPU performance.

~~~
Symmetry
Normally, yes. Due to process variations each chip has a slightly different
maximum frequency for a given voltage. Usually chip makers test each chip,
sort them by how fast they can go at a standardized voltage, and sell the
faster ones for more money under a different model number - sometimes also
fusing off features like multi threading.

It sounds like what Microsoft is doing is standardizing on frequency and
giving different chips as much voltage as they need to hit their performance
targets. So everybody buying one of these consoles gets the same performance
but some people will have more power hungry consoles than others. Possibly
those people will get better heat sinks?

~~~
wlesieutre
Or same heatsink, different fan speed. Some people get a quieter one, and
others sound like a jet engine.

------
BatFastard
This should provide some amazing graphics on a 4K screen! The console
programmers do some incredible feats with the resources they have available.

~~~
jd20
What I find interesting, is the parallel in movie content, where 4K UHD
content just became available late last year (while 4K movie content was
available earlier, all the stuff I'd seen was poorly encoded or heavily
compressed). I see a lot of people on AVSForum complaining that there's
absolutely no visual difference between 4K or 1080p, sitting on a couch at
normal distances, based on scientific arguments of the human eye's resolving
power, or their own subjective experiments.

Given that the market reception to 4K TV's and UHD players seems to have been
tepid at best, I find it interesting that Microsoft thinks 4K will be such a
huge draw to consumers. Is it just bragging rights (my 4K's bigger than your
1080p)? 4K rendering will really make the 1080p look that much better? People
playing these things will sit 1-2 feet from the screen? Or maybe VR headsets
will benefit the most?

~~~
Strom
Definitely interesting. Regarding the human eye, it varies greatly from person
to person how well they see. However it's not even only about the eye itself,
but also how well suited & trained [1] your brain is to interpreting the
signals.

I personally have always had perfect vision, and have always been able to
notice even fairly subtle differences in resolution. My brother also has
perfect vision in the classic 20/20 sense, but has to inspect closely to tell
apart even 720p & 1080p movies. Our ability to notice differences in bitrate
is even more far apart. [2] It's not even only about picture quality, but also
about refresh rates. I can tell the difference between 100 Hz & 144 Hz, and
I'll even notice bad frame pacing on an otherwise stable framerate. At the
same time I have a friend who didn't notice anything different about the 48
fps variant of The Hobbit compared to other 24 fps movies.

It probably has a lot to do with what we spend our time doing. In that I've
spent most of my life hunting for better picture quality & higher frame rates.
Compared to the average person I must've spent an unbelivable amount of time
thinking about & observing picture quality & frame rate. Thus I have probably
developed a skill for this.

\--

[1] The training can be an implicit side-effect of other activities.

[2] Interestingly this is for video bitrate. The reverse is true for audio
bitrate. My brother being a lifelong audiophile claims to hear the difference
between even 320 kbps MP3 & FLAC.

------
z0d
The Xbox Scorpio SoC is RX480 again, Polaris chip on steroids - coupled with
more GDDR5 6.8GHz@326GB/s BW vRAM 12GB with reserved to OS @1.5-2GB Plus a
quad core Jaguar cluster added in with Vapor Chamber & full DX12 HW
improvements. That should be a slightly OCed GTX 1060 level of perf looking
from the specsheet, Plus they are banking on that DX12 due to the CPU being
Jaguar still, Also the GCN HW of the AMD thus helping it to boost the ASync
compute. Prev gen was also a RX480 based but cutdown chip less than cut down
GM204 perf (<980M)

And It did 4K forza which was a direct port from the Studio 10 to the Scorpio
from XB1 @60FPS/~64% GPU usage, Mobile GTX 1070 and up should be still
outperforming it & when it comes to proper optimized titles like BF1 / TF2 /
TW3 / MEC etc will aid further to render more details, Also running old 4K
forza on Console GFX options vs PC GFX options is not an apples to apples
comparison. Note that TF figure on AMD and Nvidia aren't same either...

Consoles can never reach PC levels of detailing due to the market and targeted
audience. I'm a PC gamer, I can't stand to the degraded visuals on the
Consoles, Also the Nvidia Tessellation is superior to AMD. Sad part is due to
the % of market the PC games get downgraded / unoptimized mess due to these
consoles Also the XB1Scorpio doesn't add any significant advantage over the
PS4Pro because of less than stellar exlc. titles & Checkered board rendering
used. Finally the native 4K@60Hz or 30 isn't out, I highly doubt an RX480 can
run the games at 60FPS 4K, the power isn't just there for the recent games and
upcoming powerful engines developed with Pascal HW will outperform this weak
chip soon..

------
Analemma_
It's interesting that, for the second time this week, a big company has given
journalists an exclusive and sort of intimate look at their future roadmap
instead of saving it for big keynote surprises.

Between leaks making nothing ever a surprise anymore and the general jadedness
at products never living up to their keynote claims, I wonder if this signals
a kind of paradigm shift in "how to hype a product". Certainly all the Apple
commentators seemed very pleased that Apple was breaking with their
traditional radio silence, and this made me much more interested in Scorpio
than I was recently, since I can see from a skeptical source that it's not
just hot air.

------
clhodapp
Hrm, I can't help but think that despite this being only slightly _more_ than
Sony's PS4 Pro spec-wise, that difference is going to matter a lot because it
seems to be the difference between being able to _output_ (upscaled) 4k and
being able to _render_ 4k. We'll see if that turns out to be true when the
Scorpio Xbox One actually launches (this kind of pre-release article is very
prone to botching facts like this). If it does hold then this machine actually
has some hope of switching the preferred platform for console games back over
to Xbox One.

~~~
phonon
Does it really make much of a difference?

Even for large screen TV's, you would need to sit about 3-5 feet from a 4K TV
to make out every pixel.

3k rendered, then upscaled to 4K should be pretty much indistinguishable to
99% of viewers.

------
pwthornton
I hope this is more than just putting out 4k games. Most people don't have 4k
TVs, and, very importantly, for those that do, most don't have a big enough
one for how far away they sit.

I'm thinking of upgrading to a 65-inch OLED this year, and from my couch of
about 10 feet away (maybe a hair closer), I won't be able to tell 1080p from
4k. And that's a pretty big TV!

I would much rather see Scorpio games at 1080/60 fps with more effects, more
polygons and more complex lighting.

~~~
markdog12
This must be highly subjective, because for me, 65" 4k tv 10' away is like
night and day to me compared to 1080p

~~~
blisse
There's no difference side-by-side between 1080p and 4K resolution if you're
5ft or further away from the TV[1], all else being equal.

However, all else is rarely equal, and 4K TVs now have lots of other features
and technology that make them just better (prettier) buys in general.

[1]
[http://s3.carltonbale.com/resolution_chart.html](http://s3.carltonbale.com/resolution_chart.html)

~~~
markdog12
> A person with 20/20 vision

I'm honestly wondering if I'm an outlier and may have better than 20/20
vision. I would think it's pretty rare, but I have had people comment on my
vision before. I work on a 17" 4k laptop screen with tiny text no prob.

------
m-p-3
Not mentioned in the article, but apparently it will also support AMD
FreeSync.

[http://i.imgur.com/GUCJSAH.png](http://i.imgur.com/GUCJSAH.png)

------
KaoruAoiShiho
This is MS admitting defeat for this gen and going for an early next gen. BC
gives it the mid-gen excuse though. This is a good move though and will put
Xbox back on the map.

~~~
supernovae
So Sony admitted defeat and made the PS4 pro?

I think more than anything, it's the fact 4k happened much quicker than
expected..

~~~
mikewhy
Maybe. My thought was that the release PS4/Xbone were still too far behind PCs

~~~
Narishma
People who buy consoles don't generally care how far behind PCs they are.

------
blktiger
It sounds like MS has been able to get a lot out of their hardware. It will be
interesting to see how much it costs.

~~~
archeanthus
I'm expecting to be along with predictions, being right around $500. I won't
be surprise if it ends up being more, though.

------
bhouston
I suspect this is using the new Ryzen cores from AMD? If so then that by
itself is a big performance boost.

~~~
strictnein
They specifically state it is not.

> "To be clear, then: Project Scorpio doesn't feature Ryzen cores, but the
> Xbox team are not so concerned about this. "On the CPU side of things, we
> could still meet our design goals with the custom changes we made," Kevin
> Gammill points out. "At the end of the day we are still a consumer product.
> We want to hit the price-points where consumers want to purchase this. It's
> about balancing the two.""

------
dontyouremember
I'm excited by the specs, especially given that Red Dead Redemption 2,
Battlefront 2, Call of Duty WW2, and Destiny 2 are all hitting this holiday.
Should be the best way to play those games.

Although I wish they had more unique games coming out alongside that stuff.
Playing Zelda on Switch is a good reminder that eye candy doesn't matter all
that much after the novelty wears off.

