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Games Entertainment

Microsoft Unveils Gaming Console 413

Posted by CmdrTaco from the are-you-freaked-out-yet? dept.
DarkenWood writes "I just got an email from Microsoft about the x-box. They have officially unveiled it." 600mhz, NVIDIA Video, 4x DVD Player.
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Microsoft Unveils Gaming Console More

Microsoft Unveils Gaming Console

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  • Remember, the target X-box price is in the $300 range. An NVidia GeForce DDR graphics card alone will set you back $200+.

    The integrated design of the X-box will, theoretically, make it cheaper to manufacture than an equivalent PC, assuming the volumes are similar.

    Also, Microsoft probably intends to sell the X-box hardware for a loss (common practice in the game console world), and make their profits by extracting licensing fees from game makers. This should increase the price gap between the X-box and a similarly equipped PC.

    What I don't understand is why include a hard disk? In the console world, price is everything. Why add $60-80+ to the end user price? Sure a hard disk is a great addition, but make it just that, an addition. Also, after Rob's experience with his Tivo drive going bad, I wonder how many X-boxes will be sent back with bad hard disks.

  • Re:Let's try to stay objective... (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    In addition, there's no way you'll be able to buy a sub-$500 PC that has the graphics horsepower of the X-box. An NVidia GeForce DDR card alone will set you back $200+.

    The X-Box in particular will look interesting to PC developers because it's an architecture they're already intimately familiar with, but without the compatibility headaches of the standard Intel architecture.

    Also, game developers won't have to develop to the lowest-common-denominator of PC hardware. They'll be able to take advantage of specific features in the NVidia graphics chipset to enhace their games.

    What I don't understand is why include a hard disk? Since price is so sensitive, you could drop he overall price significantly by excluding it, not to mention improving overall reliability.

  • smutty OS (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    MS is releasing PocketPC to manufacturers soon. The marketroids really pick terrible names for the embedded lines.

    Windows CE = Wince (the facial expression of sudden pain)

    Now they've updated it, added a new interface, and call it "PocketPC." Say that a few times and see if it isn't a bit too phonetically similar to a portable autoerotic contraption.

    PocketPC
    PocketPC
    PocketPC
    PocketPC

    "You used to flinch in pain, but now you can just fuck yourself. Where do you want to come today? -- Microsoft"

    http://www.zdnet.com/zdnn/stories/news/0,4586,24 72028,00.html

  • Yeah, kind of like SONY did... (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    They unveiled the PSX2 the same week the DC was released in Japan. Don't bitch at Microsoft for something all console manufacturers do.

  • Re:X-Windows on the X-Box? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Don't hold your breath - it will be using an optimized version of the Windows 2000 kernel (which is much better than Linux, IMO)

  • I have an X-box already - well, almost (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    My PC has 128 MB RAM, a Creative 5x DVD-kit, PIII, Win2K kernel (not a stripped-down version, the fat, bloated one). I guess 70 percent the same as an X-Box.
  • if by any, you mean not any, then yes, you are correct.
    ----------------------------
  • Is it just me, or am I the only one who thinks that this thing will already be outdated by the time it comes to market?

    Yes, you'll probably be able to spend 5 times as much (or more) for a machine that is much more capable than this one.

    On the other hand, a console with fixed specs has the serious advantage that it's worth a developer's time to take advantage of every capability of the hardware. You won't find many games taking advantage of a Matrox G400's bump-mapping, since only a small fraction of the game buyers will have a G400. But everyone who buys an X-Box game will have the same graphics cards, and thus all its features are worth optimizing for.

    Speaking of different computer systems, what I would like is like a laptop, except without the built-in keyboard, but with the computer bits built in to the screen. Add touchscreen tech so it's like a Palm, only with a 10"+ screen, full color, ability to run "real" OSes, etc. (With USB and maybe firewire for adding external devices, including keyboards, mice, et al.) Give it a roll-up screen cover for protection, or some other screen protection that keeps out of the way while using the device. I wonder if anyone is working on such a beast?
  • >Most popular PC games are programmed outside of Japan (USA, Europe). I
    >much prefer PC games to their console counterparts.

    Who cares? Go to an arcade and take a look at the games people are playing. There won't be a single PC-type game anywhere in sight at most of these places. The arcade I go to most often had a coin-op Quake game but I don't think that thing lasted a week before it was gone.

    Microsoft's "Gaming Console" is going to suffer the same fate as Atari's repackaged 8-bit computers that Atari tried to pass off as Gaming Consoles....
  • Just like the Sega Dreamcast uses WinCE, even though they're in competition? Or Compaq buying Windows, supporting Linux, _and_ Tru64? Companies won't switch because MS represents their milch cow right now, and until free operating systems get more mindshare (not necessarily be installed, but more awareness), you'll see the same hypocrisy from a lot of companies.
  • They didn't unveil anything, they just put up a website! I don't see a product.

    All this is is vaporware 2.0: Vaporware with a little but of cash spent on a logo and a colorful (yet ultimately disposable) website.

    I'm gonna side with RXC [pbs.org] on this one. Same old MS vaporware tactics.
  • Now wouldn't that be funny.

    If WebTV is any indication, they'll probably do everything in their power to prevent you from doing this, but it should be possible all the same.

    Yay! $200 Linux box!
  • What doeas the actual unit look like?
  • I'd rather bitch at all the corps that use that tactic, thanks.

    (as your Mom told you, "Everyone else is doing it" is not a valid excuse)
  • 5) Icon appeal - Sony has Crash Bandicoot etc.

    How about a port of XBill. Now there's an icon :)

  • Read the date on that page: It says March 10th.. I'm sure we've all already seen that page..
  • I'm with you on this. This is so much VaporHARDware at this point. Seems to be the normal MS strategy of putting out the vapors(also known as farting) two years in advance to squish the competition before it happens.

    Hey Bill. TO LATE!
  • I note the benifits to the consumer AND to MS in that post.
  • Actually... mine was a legitimate post. And yours was just rhetoric attempting to belittle.
    <BR><BR><BR>
    You state, "The whole point of a game console is that the performance stays fixed, developers learn to squeeze performance, games just work, and so on.
    <BR><BR><BR>
    Well, ok, thats all well and good. So, say i upgrade my processor. How does this impact the games development or performance other than it being able to run faster, higher fps, etc? What about 3d archetecture? Something wrong with Nvidia making a new 3D chipset that is backward compatible?
    <BR><BR><BR>
    This answers your question on wether or not games will 'just work'. Of course they can if the modular design of this system is engineered correctly.
    <BR><BR><BR>
    Buh Bye.
    <BR><BR><BR>
    ++Om
  • sorry... forgot to set the HTML tag. I'm not THAT clueless.
  • Nah, you didnt upset me. You have an exellent point. I can see the disaster you are indicating.


    However, I dont think it would be so bad if the proper marketing was executed. I come from the Amiga line of computers. Clearly written on the box were the system requirements. (Ex: AmigaOS 2.0 or greater, 2M+ of RAM required). THIS in and of itself would make users WANT to buy the 'upgrades'. So say they have the X-Box released. Two years later, they come out with the 'X-Box Plus Upgrade Kit ' which includes a new processor and 3D chipset (thats backwards compatible with the OLD games). Games released that were programmed for the new upgrade do not work W/O the upgrade installed. So this is a marketing move AND a technological move.


    Now lets talk about timelines. You can pretty much milk a gaming system for all its worth in about 2-3 years. THAT would be the moment when the upgrade would hit. The problem would be to convince people that the upgrade would be like buying a new system alltogether at a cheaper price. I'm not marketer, but I suppose that could work as well.


    Now I will hit 'Preview'... ahh.. yes... and now.. this but*click*
  • MicroSoft may have a winner on its hands if it does the following. Now pay attention. They are on the verge of something very cool in the game console market. Like everything Microsoft does (they copy), they can copy the spirit of the home PC with this by making it UPGRADEABLE.!!


    Now, lets think about this.


    They are pricing it 'competitivley' (sp) with PSX 2. When you buy a PSX 2, you are stuck with what you got until Sony comes out with PSX 3. Now with the X-BOX, what if you could UPGRADE it? For example to incorporate the new 1Ghz processor? Microsoft need only sell the 'upgrade' to the box. That would reduce their own cost (dont have to constantly re-engineer an entirely new system) and just sell the chips. What about 3D hardware that NVIDIA will undoubtably make for the machine after the initial launch? Well, why not sell THAT componet as well? Bigger HD? Why not? More RAM? Sure. All these mean that ultimatly they will get more money per console than PSX -2 will, at least on the Hardware side. Sony sells PSX 2s, MS sells X-Box and all the 'upgrades' at approx 100 dollars a pop.


    See the comparison? This can be the first MODULAR game console. They just need to make upgrading it EASY. Just pop the case off, take the 'Upgrade Kit' and stick it in the slot. Badda-Bing/Badda-Bang... you have a new 'upgraded' X-Box.


    They can move much faster in upgrading than the PSX 2 can in re-engineering a whole system.


    Now, will it be BETTER than the PSX 2? Well, probably not using x86 archetecture... but.. who will know that? You and I... yes... but will the masses know that? Thats whats important. They will see '1000 Mhz UPGRADE!' Thats all you have to say, and the masses will think, '1000 Mhz? My LORD that a lot of something! Buy it!'


    Think about it. They are on the brink of something really good. To give you an example, I havent bought a new computer in about 2 years. Why? Because my old one has been upgraded... and upgraded... and upgraded...


    War Quake 2/3 - LMCTF/ACTF


    ++Om

  • The biggest reason people use Win9x over NT is that when they went down to Sam's club or Circuit City or wherever, the computer they bought was pre-loaded with 9x.
  • You can pretty much count on Cringely for a good column every week but the one about the X box is last weeks (changes every Thursday)and you can get to it by clicking here [pbs.org].
  • If I had mod points I'd try to give you all 5. : )
  • WinCE... don't remind me, I have 2 of em, a Philips Nino 510 and a HP 620lx. I've completely locked up the Nino 510 once, which isn't too bad, but don't even get me started on the 620lx. First off, it has it's own "reset" button, and you can probably guess what that is used for. That machine frequently takes trips to the crapper, locking up, not initializing the ethernet card, and whole bunches of other things.
    My favorite thing that it does, is when you turn it off and on around 3 times with the ethernet card in, the card will stop working completely, no lights on the ethernet hub. And the only way to get it back, is to yank the battery while it's alive (not a smart idea) or use the nifty handy reset button.
    The only reason I still have these two things is because I got them both for free, one from work, and one from a contest.
    Okay, my grunting for the day is compete.

    -Drew (unhappy CE owner who can't wait to put Linux on his Nino 510)
  • Rule 1: Remember this is bloat-fucking-central Microsloth we're dealing with. (add to that -- 64MB memory? that might someday be a limitaton, too)


    Rule 2: Remember this box will have Windows CE underneath it (or some varient). Bloat^2.


    Rule 3: Remember this box is designed to compete with PlayStation 2. PlayStation 2 can do a number of non-game things (with extensions that MS will have already installed out of the box). As the number of non-game things grows, it will fall prey to people asking more than what can be done reasonably. If the PC never did this, Moore's law would be a moot point. Albiet, when this happens in the gaming console world, its a free-for-all on who wins the next generation; the PC world is still Wintel on a generation change.


    MS will use this to lock in people away from other products as best they can by over-integrating everything in site. This includes a Web-TV-like interface (don't know if they've said that, but they've thought it -- there's gotta something underneath that interfaces with the "broadband internet" system). Once you hit the 'net, you start bringing in things that change subject to the PC and Workstation world, where things ALWAYS get more intensive than your CPU and memory can handle. ALWAYS.


    If it was just used for games, then screw it, 600 is overkill (unless you are doing real 3D in the processor and not an optimized card). 600 + a decent card is overkill even for doing realtime 3D at decent resolution on a PC, much less the crappy TV res. even HDTV-level resolution would work well with that chip (but then the 64M memory becomes a _heavy_ limitation at the texture-mapping process)


    At any rate, there will, by the time MS gets this thing out, apps that they want to work on it that will still (for various reasons) be slower than ideal, even for a 600Mhz chip. And game makers will have to deal with the portion of processor and memory that WindowsCE (or its varient) will take away from them (you probably cant bypass it as easily as you could bypass the O/S in the old 6502 boxes)...


    Advantage of the 600 chip? by the time they're ready for mass production, those will be the "cheap chips".


    Every chip is excellent for what it was meant to do. Every chip user asks more of his chip than was originally intended.

  • yeah, but coming out in 2001 means they need to seriously consider HDTV standards as well. The other gaming systems will have to as well.

    of course, MS may just choose to ignore HDTV and only send out the standard TV signal. probably wouldn't hurt, unless they were to try to integrate the X-Box w/ Web-TV or something...

  • But does it run Linux?
  • A couple of points:
    1. By the time this is out (4Q 2001?) it will be hopelessly outdated from a hardware standpoint.
    2. I don't think it will be released then either. Microsoft is scared of the new generation of internet enabled game boxes for the same reason it was scared of Netscape. They present an alternate method of accessing functions that the average user now has to go through the Windows OS to use. If one can hook a DSL line into a game box, then all of the internet is available, fast, including the new generation of online applications that are itching to replace Office. This is a classic example of MS announcing something to scare off the developers from support the rival option. The point is, MS doesn't even have to release the product as long as they scare off enough support for the existing boxes to make them a less than stellar success.
  • Like I'm going to buy from people who can't write
    a www compliant web-page.
  • From what I have heard, Intel is willing to give MS the chips for free just for the little ``intel inside'' sticker on the outside of the box.

    I guess it sort of makes sense... you give MS your chips that are at the bottom of the line (the equivelant of P5's now) and you get free advertising every time the box is fired up.

  • I suppose anything is possible.

    What irks me is that every time something doesn't go right with Linux, it's Microsoft's fault. It's never the fault of NVIDIA, Matrox or Diamond. Because we all know how willing hardware manufacturers are to release their specs.

    This is getting ridiculous. I don't care about Microsoft one way or the other. Some of their software works great for me. Some doesn't. The solution? Run vmware in Linux (I've got a very interesting and humorous story about an NT 4.0 install and attempted upgrade that should be good for a few laughs).

    --

  • Yes, I also have that feeling, odd though it may seem. Many of their recent moves seem to betray a sense of desperation- case in point, their trying to invalidate NT4 MCSEs and earn money off their MCSEs by forcing new courses (a really dangerous move.) The smart thing would be to subsidise those MCSEs and keep them happy- maybe they can't afford it? How much is X-Box costing them? Were any of the demos real? People seem unusually willing to accept their word that the demos are real considering that these are people who got caught IN OPEN COURT faking video evidence before a federal judge! (But they wouldn't lie to meeeee!) People seem unusually ready to protest that they do good work based on a sort of catchetism (sp?) that The Best Man Wins thus making them good by _default_ (remember that Hacker Diet page with the sidebar on the Excel spreadsheets and exactly why no two versions of Excel were compatible with each other? Real 'good' work there).

    I think they are indeed panicing/desperate, and I'll go on record as saying, this early, that they are financially overextended (yes they had a lot of money, but a Microsoft can also BURN a hell of a lot of money in half-assed projects and featherbedding) which sets them up for one hell of a crash. Not a 'panicky investor crash', I'm talking a 'investigation reveals MS actually is 75 grand in the red and can't make its payroll' kind of crash (in general terms, not that specific headline): a situation where everything's covered up until the last possible minute, nobody will believe a word of it, until the story eventually breaks causing _major_ shock and astonishment. Again, the essence of the story would be simply that MS spends more than it makes, and that this eventually _will_ matter.

    Might the mechanics of breakup perhaps reveal some of this? It would be very funny in a cruel way- rather than MS trying to hold out and conceal secret wealth and power, MS could be trying like hell to conceal secret _rot_, secret debt and the _real_ balance sheet.

    What do they really have? I wouldn't say 'Office and the development tools'- I'd say, what do they really have besides the reputation of absolutely unchallengable wealth and influence? What would happen if Microsoft was to say 'We can't afford that'? The idea seems unthinkable- well, I'm thinking it. Again, how much is X-Box costing them? How much did W2K cost them, how much did the consumer W2K cost before it was abandoned and switched over to Windows Me? How much is _that_ costing them?

  • Was the karmic punishment for those stupid enough to actually VISIT the xbox.com site the insanely small seizure-inducing text, or quite possibly the ugliest logo I've ever seen in my life?

    I reserve judgement on the xbox - I won't bash it simply because Microsoft will build it. I'll bash it if it comes to market and sucks.

    But for the love of GAWD, please, xbox people, hire a clueful web designer. I'd be happy to forward my resume.
  • Will the thing not run properly on 10?

    The ethernet is to make using it with a cable-modem easy. Most of those use 10Mb, so this has to support them.

    The price difference between 10/100 and straight 100 Mb chipsets is trivial anyway, there's no reason to not support both.

  • I have a P2 450 with an nVidia card. I get very good framerates in Quake 3 at resolutions higher than standard TV. The graphics of games like Q3 are far better (IMHO) than those consoles. It's not about the MHz of the CPU
  • As it seems to be running standard PC parts, does that mean it's upgradeable? Will I be able to swap the CPU for something newer? Or beef up the RAM? I wonder if they'll integrate the nVidia graphics into the mobo?
  • numerous developers and publishers have already expressed their enthusiasm for it



    Translation: We don't have any licensees or partners yet...

  • I submitted a quickie about something I'm pretty sure was NEVER submitted before in the past.

    Something about this neat snack product over in the UK that can be obtained elsewhere, called Penguin Biscuits. It's this nice chocolate covered, chocolate creme cookie that has Penguins on the packaging.

    This item got rejected for whatever reason.

    Seems like there's been a LOT of this going on lately. People having sumitted stuff only to find out that it's been declined and then have that selfsame subject posted by Rob & Co. as old news. What's going on here gang?
  • The GUI wasn't new technology either, neither was pens or a 32-bit OS.

    In the public awareness, microsoft already has a gaming console, the x-box, and in 2001 they have been on the market for more than a year. This is what counts. It's lame but it counts, and it's called marketing, like it or not.

    By the time the x-box eventually hits the streets (by that time it will have a new name though, because the x-box will get bad press sometime before, because of better specs (or whatever) from the established console companies) people will remember that Microsoft has actually been in the console business for a long time, regardless of the fact that the ``y-box'' is the first thing to actually hit the streets.
  • The only reason Microsoft's saying anything right now is to try to derail any momentum Sega's Dreamcast and Sony's PS2 are building up.

    Microsoft is an adept at the vapor game. Although they'll have to work to acheive the level of hype Nintendo was able to garner for the release of their N64. Now that was a feat ...
  • 600Mhz, Nvidia video, DVD... gee, sounds like my PC, only with less RAM. So what can I do with this that I can't do with my PC? What games can it play - the ones I can play on my PC? I don't see what the hype's all about...

    The Sonys and the Segas had some kick-ass hardware in them that made for some stunning games, stuff that I've never seen on a PC... and I doubt I'll see on the "X-Box."

    ---


  • With an nVIDIA [nvidia.com] card? A custom one? Good luck.

    I'm having enough trouble trying to get my TNT2 to work with Linux. :(

    --

  • what?

    Mac's were at 72 DPI back when there were only Mac's, Mac Pluses, Mac SE's, and SE30's... Also classics, color classics, and classic II's were locked into 72 dpi.

    But ever since multisync displays arrived on the scene (what? around 1987), mac users have been free to use whatever resolution they cared to use...

    I like 1600x1200 for stuff like Photoshop, Illustrator, Premiere, and maybe some 3-D apps, but when i want to read text i switch to a much saner resolution.

    Their style sheets said 9 px, not 9 pt... hence the type was exactly 9 pixels tall, not points, by the way.
  • If you notice, the PSX has a "proprietary video output" meaning you buy the specific adapter for your television. If the X-Box is similar in this respect you'll be able to plug it into just about anything.
  • my buddy but I think I ought to defend this innocent piece of hardware. I wouldn't expect MS to port the craptacular 95 kernel to this puppy, I think they're going to move CE onto it with some enhancements gleaned from NT.
    1. Stop complaining about Microsoft not optimizing its code libraries, people who write REAL games are going to use their own stuff.
    2. The hardware is most likely NOT going to be a problem. nVidia is damn good at the graphics processor stuff, I bet the chipset in there will be a modified GeForce processor. With stuff specifically written for the GeForce the T&L among other things till be done on the GPU, this means the processor doesn't have to handle the really intense graphical stuff. My guess is that as many of a game's functions as possible will be done with full hardware acceleration so the processing gets distributed to the stuff which does it best.
    3. Another guess will be that MS is going to try to revitalize WebTV with the X-Box. The MSN and WebTV infrastructure already exists, this will just put a much more powerful front-end on it.
  • okay so who wants to crash while playing games?

    Windows unfortunately has a reputaition of an os that crashes. If they make a gameing console will it crash too?

    I would not touch this thing till they have the bugs out. If it is like there windows software, well let see, there was 3.1, 95, 98, and 2000 may have gotton it right but it is just to dam bloated.

    send flames > /dev/null

  • Remember Mac use 72 dpi while others use 96, so if their CSS say 9 pt, you'll get 9 pixel letters.
    So, it is unreadable on the Mac :(
    O/T, did you check out this month's "Web Pages for Designers" article? Talks about using JavaScript to figure out which browser you're looking with, and loading the proper CSS def for your browser/platform.
    I Haven't got it 100% working on IE 4.5 Mac yet, but worth a look: WPFD [wpdfd.com]

    Pope
  • I can say with some authority that nVidia has been in bed with Microsoft for a long time now. The MS hosted graphics conventions were always the sites of big nVidia announcements.. Developer outreach programs would be by MS and nVidia together..

    This has been going on since the days of the Riva128 (damn I feel old ;-]), back when there was a realistic need for MS to break into the gaming API market segment.. Back before Direct3D was worth the paper it was printed on. When Glide was proprietary but popular.. Anyway, now I'm reminiscing. nVidia basically is being forced into the Open Source market, like everyone else.

    MS would never drop them, they have too much invested.. Besides, ATI is an Apple partner, Matrox is open-source friendly.. Maybe they'd get S3 but I doubt that. The simple fact is that nVidia has never been about their consumers, they've been about hype and the next-best-product. An alliance with the Devil just reinforces that :-) [last point is tounge in cheek]
  • It's a console, not a PC. If Microsoft has any sense, they will weld the case shut. Developers want a standardized platform, not one with an infinite variety of CPUs, RAM configurations and hard disks. If it breaks, exchange it under warranty or toss it in the trash.
  • Some of us are actually following the development of the XBox with interest and curiosity. Zealots besides, M$ has HUGE resources and all signs point that they are commiting a lot to this box. If they do things right, and keep an API similar to the one PC developers are used to working on, creating games for this new console will be easier than any console before.

    Last week at the Game Developers Conference Microsoft decided to use the Pentium III as its cpu of choice, thanks mostly to Intel being such a big bully. In this new website, the cpu is not specified... so, any chance the cpu choice is still not final, or is the brand new web site just, outdated?

  • When have you seen MS go into a new market at less than full-force? If they're dumping billions into the console, making it cheaper than PSX2/Dreamcast/NextNintendo, and dumping billions in convincing companies to port to them (and maybe exclude other systems), and dumping billions to sell the games for cheap... it's going to hurt competition. And we've seen this happen before. And they can do this.

    And when was the last time they were sucessful at this? WinCE? I guess that's why right now I have a Palm, and looking around me at meetings I see a sea of Palms.

    Just because they can throw a lot of money at it does not mean they have anything close to a certain victory.

    And as for dumping - I would say that Microsof is but a small little bunny rabbit of product dumping compared to the dumping behemoths Sony, Nintendo, and Sega!

    Furthermore, the problem I see with the X-box is that the majority of early adaptors already have a computer, and by that point will have computer with a lot better specs than the X-box - why then would these people have any desire to buy the X-box? Right away, they cut off a huge (and probably the most desirable) segment of the market that will be dominated by Sony, Sega, or Nintendo.

    Another possible problem (as if they needed more!) is that it looks like the Nintendo and X-Box release dates are closing together (in that Dolphin probably will not ship until fall 2001 as well). In the scenario of a concurrent Nintendo/X-Box release - who do you think will dominate (hint - the winner will be aided by a plumber).

    I love PC games - but I'm also buying a PSX2, and don't see how the X-box could possibly draw me in.
  • One of the BIG advantages of the consoles,
    is that games-creators know excactly what kind
    of platform they are working with.
    The playstation is a playstation.
    For the PC-platform, you have to consider a lot,
    even with good APIs.
    You have to decide between everyone being able
    to play it, or being really cutting edge.
  • True, Microsoft would never think of using market power to influence another company to limit a competitor (like they said they would in los documentos de la Dia de los Muertos [opensource.org], or like the gub'ment said they did in DOJ v Microsoft [usdoj.gov]).
    --
  • Novices don't use X consoles. Novices don't use Linux. Novices use Microsoft products.

    "X Box" will become a common term used by novices, just as "PS2" seems to have already displaced "PS/2" in many gaming circles.

  • It might very run existing PC games,

    MS has stated that the X-Box will have its own proprietary disk format, X-Box games will not run on PCs and visa versa. the USB ports on the X-Box will also not accept non X-Box devices.

    Many game companies port once for console, once for PC

    right, and this is the big issue.

    the X-Box will not be out until Q3/Q4 of 2001.. this means that :

    - at this point the X-Box will be at best equal to existing PCs in game performance (but with a smaller HDD, much less ram and a much slower CPU, i am betting 3d hardware for the PC will improve enough to be on par over the next 18 months.)

    - MS completely controls what games can or cannot be released for the X-Box, they have stated they will be more restrictive than Sony about this. a lot of developers will not want to be bothered with going through MS.

    so buying an X-Box over buying a PC is a terrible idea, the point of buying a game console is that you can play games that you cannot play on the PC,.. or at least, that are better experienced on a console.

    the X-box is a pile of crap.
    ...dave
  • Yeah, well they aren't running Windows 3.1, 95, 98, NT, or 2000 on it, so how can you possibly compare the X-box to those? Look at WinCE -- I've never seen a WinCE system crash, and I'll bet you won't see the X-box crash any more than the PSX or the N64 did (which did occasionally happen, although I'd blame it on the game). The bottom line is that this isn't going to be running a desktop operating system with hundreds of processes. It will be a fairly small OS that will probably do very little more than provide memory management, multitasking, and a DirectX compatibility layer.

    -----------

    "You can't shake the Devil's hand and say you're only kidding."

  • Whatever you do, don't visit the site using Navigator with JavaScript off and CSS support off and images off. You'll be greeted with a screenful of image placeholders with the text at the very bottom of the page (it relies on CSS-positioned layers).


    Cthulhu for President! [cthulhu.org]
  • And the particulary sad thing about it is that Slashdot has already covered [slashdot.org] the X-Box unveiling. Come on guys, it was only 2 weeks ago, surely you could have remebered that far back!
  • Because an X-Box costs $300 and a PC with monitor and ISP connections costs $800 plus monthly ISP charge.

    Yeah right. How about (for 2001):

    Because an X-Box costs £300 plus extortionate MSN only monthly fee plus online-gaming monthly fee and you need to find a decent TV and stereo to plug it into anyway to have a good game and TVs are crap anyway, whilst a low-end PC with good graphics card costs $400, can do a lot more, has 30Gb of disk space, a keyboard and a mouse and can output to either a monitor ($200) or the aforementioned TV, and comes with the cheapest ISP subscription you can find around, and has a lot more uses apart from playing games.

  • I can't believe people are ranting about this X-box thing. This is probably the best hope that the United States has at winning back the long-lost (since Atari) game console market. Our trade deficit with respect to Japan is horrible. Winning back some of that should be good news to anyone in this country, irrespective of your feelings about Microsoft.

    On the other hand, I love how Microsoft calls it the X-box. Are they now trying to steal the meaning of X from X-windows? Shouldn't they call it something generically stupid like "Microsoft Box" or "Microsoft Console"?

  • The X-Box is a farce, and it pisses me off, because it's designed to stifle development for consoles that actually exist.

    This article [pbs.org] contains the best discussion of why we can't trust MS's intentions with regards to consle gaming any more than in ay other arena. The strategy is textbook by now: perceive of a threat to your hegemony, release specs for a super-powerful, industry-breaking alternative that you may or may not have plans to produce, and the 3d party developers for the competitor will hesitate -- "should i wait and develop for this monster supermachine that MS is building?" Development for the competitor is slowed, and everybody loses except MS, who hides in the vapor until they can address the threat in some way that doesn't actually involve producing anything.

    This sucks for gamers. I, for one, am pissed as hell at the idea that MS is worried about digital home delivery from Sony's PS2, and has chosen to f up *my* gaming opportunities because of it.

    *sigh* Is anything safe from them? i would be willing to wager that if they announced a super automobile, 300 mph top speed, 900 mpg, with 200 cupholders, a heads-up in-winshield dvd player and a laser for shooting at pedestrians, to be introduced, maybe, in 2003, ford's stock would drop. this is vapor. it's marketing, and it sucks.

  • Microsoft is developing a new version of Windows, specifically for the X-Box. It's going to be called X-Windows!

    HH

    Yellow tigers crouched in jungles in her dark eyes.
  • The reason that your submissions were rejected is probably that on March 10th (day X-box announced), Hemos posted Microsoft Unveils The X Box [slashdot.org]. Taco is 13 days behind with this piece of 'news'.

    HH


    Yellow tigers crouched in jungles in her dark eyes.
  • It's aimed at gamers. Gamers (even fairly casual gamers) are usually pretty savvy about hardware specs. In 18 months time when this thing is launched, Moore's law suggests that we'll have 2Ghz processors. Playground rivalry and peer pressure will put kids off owning one:

    "What you got?"
    "2Ghz Athlon. You?"
    "600Mhz X-Box"
    I'll leave you to imagine the teasing, feelings of inadequacy etc.

    PC games designers won't want to be writing games for 2 year old technology either. They'll be too busy pushing the latest hardware to the limits.

    Mind you, by the time it's released the spec may well have been upped to a much faster CPU - but will Intel still be willing to give Microsoft fast CPU's for nothing?

    HH


    Yellow tigers crouched in jungles in her dark eyes.
  • ethernet?!?! did i see that right? it comes ethernet compatible? now i know im getting old.

    i know all y'all out there remember the good ol days of excite bike and legend of zelda...or maybe even that atari classics. these kids now a days are just spoiled.
  • For the curious: here's a rendition of the word "Microsoft" from their page.
    XX X X XXX
    XX X X X
    XX X X XXXXX XX XXX XX XXXX
    X XXX X X X X XXX X XX X
    X XXX X X X X X XX XX X
    X X X X XXX XX XX XX X XX
    Each bright pixel is replaced by X.
    --
  • The designers behind this better be going to som kind of super-duper proprietary FP monster of a processor that will be doing the graphics along with the NVidia and Intel parts or this thing is going to be much slower than the other stuff that's out. By the way, what form-factor will this need to dissipate the heat of the toaster^H^H^H^H^H^H^HProcessor that's inside it? Aren't the Coppermine 600s the ones everyone is having problems with anyway? What if my freaking X-box takes two presses of the power switch to turn on? By the way, here's how they're going to make it proprietary: Software sound. That way the processor gets some usage and Linux won't work on it.
  • The specs say it's 100 MBps Ethernet. Not 10/100. Will the thing not run properly on 10? I'm not going to get one of these, but I could see this as being a problem. Having to buy an expensive switch rather than a cheap-o hub to connect it.

  • Paul: What are we doing today, Bill?

    Bill: The same thing we do everyday, Paul. Today we will take over the world!


    My point - this is another part of the "Windows Everywhere" campaign. Do you really think that if microsoft builds their own box, that you could put your own OS in it? Right. The whole thing will be proprietary, including where it can connect on the web (MSN will be get hits, at last!), along with what you can load on it (read: Microsoft certified products only!). With a new version of Windows, some type of CE, I'm sure, they are trying to make sure the more-and-more powerful consoles (Dolphin, PS2, Dreamcast) don't infringe on their new internet campaign. With Windows focusing on a internet distribution network, you know that this is focusing on a MS propritary internet. They control the hardware, and the software. This console is just the beginning - next it will be MS Internet Appliances. Is there any doubt? And so many of you out there will buy into it with their billion dollar ad campaigns. And when you turn on your toaster in 10 years, and a Windows logo come up (probably followed by a blue screen of death) you will wonder how it all happened.


    Don't you dare reverse engineer your toaster!

  • I wonder if Microsoft will try/be able to forbid people running software on this?
    If it is as it sounds, I can forsee the battle commencing one of two ways:
    1. A GPL library is released to develop cross-platform games including this console (perhaps/probably booting its own OS so you don't even have to install).
    2. John Carmack (for example) decides that Quake IV will be twice as fast if he writes past whatever software M$ place on this, and writes a GL implementation that again boots its own system.
    Apart from the obsolescnce of this console by release (and lets face it buy 2001 Sega will be talking about Dreamcast 2), the only way I can forsee M$ convincing people to develop for this is if they can run the same games on a PC, and if you can do that who is going to buy a deliberatly cut-down slow PC......definetly not the gamers of the planet. I guess this is really a way to try and get the technophobes to use a computer by putting it in a flashy box and letting them look at a TV instead of a monitor.
  • Seriously, though, despite what I wrote in the title, there are some pretty strong reasons to think that the X-Box will be fighting a battle that even MS can't solve with their mighty reserves of cash.

    1) The lesson of VHS VCRs - Most people keep the same components of their home entertainment systems for years. Just look at how long people hold on to the same VCR (at least 2 years, probably many more). I doubt that people will want to replace their brand spanking new DVD-playing PSX2 with an X-box. Nor will they be very likely to buy it to supplement their primary home entertainment system with a X-box (just as not many people buy several VCRs for their main home entertainment system). The thinking may very well go "Sure, I could play games and watch DVDs and access the internet with an X-box...but I can already do that with my PSX2!"

    Sony has reportedly sold a million PSX2s in the first week of their launch, just in Japan. The US and European markets, huge compared to Japan, will get hit with the PSX2 a good 8-12 months before the X-box. That translates into many millions of units of software and hardware sold and once a PSX2 has been bought, the likelihood of an X-box being bought in the next year will be much less.

    2) Name recognition - Microsoft will face a very large uphill battle to position themselves to compete against Sony in the living room. Most people associate Microsoft with those computers they use at work or in their homes, not with a system that sits next to their TV and VCR. On the other hand, tens of millions of Playstations have been sold, giving them a clear brand name for games in the living room, and adding a DVD player and possible internet access can only make that position stronger.

    3) Timing with DVD - A PSX2 launch this year will probably hit when DVDs suddenly become the "must have" item for most Americans. (I don't know how well DVDs are doing in Europe.) Just looking around me, only a few of my friends (college graduates, grad school, tech work force, 20-35 year olds) have DVD players but most are looking to buy one by the end of this year. Several, having seen the the rise of the PSX, are talking specifically about getting a PSX2 for its dual use (games and DVDs). That's not proof, I understand, since it is anecdotal, but I think it seems reasonable.

    4) Capturing the console game makers - Microsoft has listed some big names (Konami, Capcom) as having "signed on" to the X-box developer list. While they need those developers, I'm curious how many will really jump in with both feet. Those developers would be foolish to not say "we're considering the system" but are probably not actually under any contract to really develop for the system. Several of these companies (Capcom with Resident Evil and Konami with Metal Gear Solid) know that begin associated with Sony and the Playstation has been a fantastic partnership for them. With indications that Sony's machine will do extremely well out of the gate, they'd be giving up a lot if they started making exclusive deals with Microsoft.

    5) Icon appeal - Sony has Crash Bandicoot and several other recognized properties (like Spyro, Gameday, Twisted Metal, or Jet Moto) that they can leverage in marketing to pull in the gamers with games and related advertising. Nintendo, as another example, can release Pokemon or Mario anything and make several million in sales. Microsoft will probably have to come up with a comparable set of icons to market their machine and the software it runs and to this point, the PC market has been a tad anemic in that department. If MS can pull in the big companies (as mentioned in 4) this may not be such a big deal.

    Anyway, that's the stuff I've been thinking about...should be an interesting play to watch it unfold.

    matt

  • you may want to check out this website for more info: www.xboxpc.com [xboxpc.com]
    It clears up many common misconceptions you have about this new console system.
  • I think some people need to realize a few things about Microsoft. Regardless of their business tactics, the reason they succeed with a lot of their products is because they are simply the best. That doesn't always mean the most reliable, but the most usable. When they enter a new market, people tend to get mad, and then a while later switch to the MS product because they like using it better. Examples are: IE, Outlook, Excel, Word, Visual Studio, all their hardware (mice, joysticks, etc.), even Win2000 (hasn't crashed on me yet). That doesn't mean I don't support competition (still love Linux), but it's not like MS is trying to release crappy products.

    Speaking of the X-Box explicitly, I think it will be the most powerful console for at least 2 years after it is released. That doesn't translate directly to success, but here are some reasons I think it will:

    • The performance mostly comes from Nvidia. While they may have some Linux issues, their hardware is top notch. It may not live up to marketing claims, but it WILL be much faster than the PS/2
    • More RAM than any other console (64 MB)
    • Runs stripped down Win2000 and DX8. Almost all PC developers will jump on the X-Box. The question is the proven console guys...
    • Unlike the PC, the hardware doesn't change for every user. People will actually use SSE (maybe). But, every feature of the Nvidia chip will be used, because it is guaranteed to be there. As a PC game developer, this is a dream come true.
    • HDTV support: All 10 people who own HDTV's will love the X-box.
    • Like it or not, MS is spending a TON of cash on marketing. The ad campaign is rumored to be bigger than the Win95 launch.
    • Finally, despite what MS is saying now, this eventually will be used as a web/email terminal. $300 for a webTV and a kick ass game console sounds good to me...

    The main reason it will succeed: Microsoft has seen Sony nearly double in profit after the debut of the Playstation. They want that money. Sony has proven that game licensing is a VERY lucrative business. MS will do whatever it takes for X-box to be a success. Insert immoral/illegal conspiracy theories here...

    *These are my own opinions. I have no "insider" information, just reactions after hearing the specs at GDC and hearing from other developers.

  • Here is a little something I came up with from looking at pricewatch prices for the items that will be in the X-Box. Of course these are all a little more high-quality than Microsoft will use, especially since I pointed at Athlon here, not Penticrap 3. But take a look:

    MS X-Box comparison system
    --------------------------

    $300 for Athlon + Mobo
    $40 for 64MB PC133
    $110 for 8GB HD
    $150 for Viper 770 Ultra
    $50 for 3Com 905C
    $90 for 4x DVD

    total: $740

    Please remember this pricing is vague, and, again, uses more high-quality components than MS will use. For example, MS will probably use something to the effect of a Vanta nVidia card. But it would still cost a lot more than $300 for any of us to make a system like this these days.

    That's all...
  • MS is not going to be competing against the hardcore gamer market with this thing... So it doesn't matter if its specs are outdated by the time of it's release. The X-Box is going to be a combo WebTV/cheap PC/DVD player.

    Think about it- They already have MSN. With their capitol, they can get MSN ready for broadband in 18 months. They sell these things at a cut rate compared to the PS2 and Dolphin, take a loss on the hardware, hook a few million parents into buying it for their kids, then MS gets that $30 a month access fee for the new MSN ASDL Service. Not to mention $10 a month for their new online game, Asheron's Call X. I'll bet MS even gives discounts on the x-box if you agree to sign up for "MSN-ADSL". Get the parents in a 2 or 3 year contract, who cares if the system is cutting edge or not?

    The games really don't matter... As long as they have a lot of ports and a lot of "Wal-Mart" style cheap games, the parents will be happy. For, say, $200 they bought their kid a dvd player that plays some games and lets them get on the net and keeps them from messing up Dad's computer... This is the market MS is aiming for with the X-Box, and I'm sure they will succeed. I sincerely doubt it will affect any of us, or hurt quality game development in any way.

    X-Box is going to be the AOL of game consoles... A lot of people will have it, but the people who are "in the know" will look down on it and the really cool stuff will happen elsewhere.

    Josh Sisk

  • At last! (Score:3)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday March 23, 2000 @06:31AM (#1180259)

    At long last we have a gaming console that is made by Americans! For too long our country has neglected the lucrative console market, and the Japanese have had a clear playing field. This console, by far superior to anything the Japanese have ever manufactured, will blow these foreign "competitors" out of the water.

    I mean, just look at the specs! A 600 MHz CPU - far better than the 200 MHz "Emotion Engine" that the PSX2 has. And it will use tried and testing gaming technology as well in the form of DirectX, which has made Windows boxes the platform for serious gaming. No console will be able to compete with this kind of setup.

    I have to say, well done to Microsoft for providing a console that looks like it could become the preferred choice for gamers when it is released. If anyone can pull this off, it will certainly be America's most innovative and foward-thinking company, and if they succeed, their conquest of the console market will benefit all of us as gamers.

  • Hmm, Nvidia and Microsoft... (Score:3)

    by farrellj ( 563 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @06:28AM (#1180260) Homepage Journal
    Could this be the source of the problems from NVIDIA with Linux? Could MS have said "Nix the plans for the Open Source Linux drivers, or we will go with ATI?" Hmmm, possibly!

    ttyl
    Farrell

    ...just because you are not paranoid doesn't mean Microsoft is not out to get us!

  • I'm not impressed. (Score:3)

    by Millennium ( 2451 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @06:38AM (#1180261)
    I'm willing to listen to what MS has to say. But it's all meaningless until I see the games. But MS won't even release shots of the console itself, much less anything that runs on it. As far as anyone knows, it's pure vaporware.

    Besides which, I see no innovation here. All I see is an ultra-cheap (in both price and quality) computer, hobbled by lack of even a keyboard, though I'm sure someone will make one that'll cost extra. But then, when has MS ever innovated anything (with the possible single exception of the scroll wheel)?

    And I love this bit about a "proprietary AV connector." There's Microsoft, Embracing and Extending again. Who's going to use that, anyway? If the X-Box is going to work with current TV's (and it has to), it'll have to have an adapter of some sort. Better to throw in a $10 adapter with a TV than make something you can only hook one thing up to; monitor manufacturers have done this for years with Mac monitor adapters.

    Honestly, MS; you're getting sloppy (in tactics; you always were with coding but that's beside the point). WinCE failed to capture the PDA market. This isn't likely to capture the console market given your current apparent tactics. And then there's the DOJ to worry about. Keep this up and you might actually be where you belong in a few years: the bottom of the heap.

  • Re:Why it might or might not succeed (Score:3)

    by Dr. Evil ( 3501 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @08:50AM (#1180262)

    This is probably untrue if MS paid any attention to the OS/2 saga.

    Why write for the X-box when you can target the Playstation and corner both markets?

  • I can't use it. (Score:3)

    by Signal 11 ( 7608 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @06:26AM (#1180263)
    NOTE: By turning this system on you agree to the licensing agreement found herein as well as all future games which may run on this machine.

    Additional note: Your purchase of this product is non-refundable. Under the Digital Millenium Copyright Act you may not modify, redistribute, or reverse-engineer this product for the purposes of allowing any additional functionality. Yes, we do know that you paid for it but since you don't own your home (mortgage), car (loan), or computer (encrypted 'monitors') anymore, we figure we'll continue the trend and not let you own this either.

    "Where are you taking me today?"

  • Fake endorsements (Score:3)

    by ch-chuck ( 9622 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @10:11AM (#1180264) Homepage
    those quotes on the site from Bungie and EA sound so, so canned - like watching a video tape of captured POWs, scarred, bruised and all doped up, reading a script saying how well they have been treated and how much they are enjoying their stay with the enemy - just robotic verbal buzzword flak with no enthusiasm.

    "We, uh, at Electronic Arts, uh, (just read it!) are (yawn) very, uh, yeah - intrigued, (is that what it says?) at the opportunity to, uh, an intriguing - no, were looking forward to an intriguing cutting edge, ummm, we're intriguingly cutting forward..."

    (director) CUT! It's "Electronic Arts is intrigued by the opportunity to develop exciting new games for the x-box". Now try it again! Take 27! Camera! Action!!

  • Re:Vaporware (Score:3)

    by Pig Hogger ( 10379 ) <pig.hogger@nOSPam.gmail.com> on Thursday March 23, 2000 @08:51AM (#1180265) Journal

    From : http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20000316. html

    But wait, hasn't Microsoft already spent millions on the X-Box? Didn't they demonstrate it in public? Wasn't it killer? Yes, yes, and maybe. Let's take these points in reverse order. The demonstration was amazing, its true, but amazing demonstrations don't always translate into amazing products. The X in X-Box may well mean the mystery hardware upon which it ran. Microsoft admitted the demo was an X-Box simulation running on hardware different from what will actually ship in a year or two. It's easy to do a killer demo if the demo system is crammed with tens of thousands of dollars worth of digital signal processors and memory. Microsoft skirts the edge on truthfulness in these things, and the company would have no qualms about presenting the software as real even if the demonstration hardware was beyond mortal affordability.

    Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from a rigged demo...


    --

  • Re:Present Day Gaming System??????? (Score:3)

    by rc-flyer ( 20492 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @06:35AM (#1180266)
    It's FUD. They are announcing it 18 months in advance of their "projected" delivery date. I think that MS is scared of the Playstation 2 and the Nintendo 64 as well as the Dolphin. They don't want to lose control of the desktop, but these new game consoles are so powerful they can replace many home PCs. So MS announces the X box (as they've done many times in the past with other products), hoping that consumers will decide to wait. I'm giving 50-50 odds that the X box will never be released, it will just wither and die on the vine.

  • Re:I don't understand this X-box thing..... (Score:3)

    by schporto ( 20516 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @06:47AM (#1180267) Homepage
    Except I don't think that's their plan. The biggest reason people use win9x over NT is that win9x tends to be better for some games especially the older ones. M$ would really like to push people off of win9x (for some good reasons). They were along the lines of saying so with Win2000 saying that it would be the personal release too, but they backed off. I would expect 1 more release of the personal versions of win9x line, then a discontinuation. You'll only be able to buy NT for your computer, or this X box.
    But that's just my impression of what they're doing.
    -cpd

  • Let's try to stay objective... (Score:3)

    by coj ( 20757 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @07:11AM (#1180268) Homepage
    I realize it's incredibly difficult for most folks here to be anything but objective about a Microsoft product/project (and for good reason), but it's important to address the issues at hand with some objectivity and knowledge of the console market. That being said...

    1) Will X-Box compete with PCs?
    Nope. Consoles in the US basically have a price ceiling of $300 to stay competitive, and X-Box will be hitting the market at a time when you'll be able to get a Dreamcast for at most $125, and a PS2 for $200. The unit will be priced to move at $250 tops. Right now no one seems to be able to sell a functional PC for under $500, mainly due to the issues of manufacturing costs.

    2) Looking at these specs... this is just a dumbed-down PC??? why would I want this???
    Yeah, err... what exactly do you think a console is? 8) It's a personal computer, streamlined and stripped down to be cheap to make and play games well. In fact, that's the key to one of a consoles major strengths: the hardware is *always* the same. The primary technical gripe of PC developers is the huge hassle of making games work on a wide variety of hardware. The X-Box in particular will look interesting to PC developers because it's an architecture they're already intimately familiar with, but without the compatibility headaches of the standard Intel architecture.

    -Ed

  • HoHum. Another PC. (Score:3)

    by RISCy Business ( 27981 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @08:15AM (#1180269) Homepage
    What is the X-Box?

    Certainly not a revolution of some sort. A revolution requires something different, something new. X-box isn't - it's a PC with a lot of proprietary hardware, a questionable release date, technology that will be outdate by the release date, and what will eventually turn out to be massive problems.

    X-box is just another PC, priced more attractively in order to chain more people to Windows. It's all fairly standard, albeit made proprietary, components you could buy from your favourite computer store. Things like the CPU, the drive, the NIC, etcetera. Wrap it around some crazy motherboard and you're good to go.

    And none of this technology is even mind blowing - hell, it's mostly LAUGHABLE for a 2001 release date. A 600MHz x86 processor? 64M of *UNIFIED* memory? (Which means memory is stolen from the CPU for the video card - my laptop has it.) It's a freaking PC for crying out loud!

    WHY is everyone going nutso over it, besides the fact that Microsoft is trying to claim it as a console? Give me a BREAK! It's nothing more than a PC. I'm not impressed.

    And people are going wacky for it WHY? It's not even all that impressive - so much less so if you look at it's planned release date.

    Microsoft only announced it to work to kill Sony, Sega, and Nintendo's business. And maybe they did get Nintendo, since they haven't caught up to PSX2 and Dreamcast yet. But then again, obviously neither has Microsoft. This is just some hohum gamer PC that will be so outdated in 2001, assuming Microsoft doesn't play change the specs or buy the competition, that very few people will want it save for the Microsoft name.

    You all have fun with your PCs, I'm going to buy a PSX2 and not waste my money on a faux console.

    =RISCy Business

  • I predict... (Score:3)

    by Monte ( 48723 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @06:34AM (#1180270)
    ...the X-Box will be twice as popular as the MSX system!

  • Old news (Score:3)

    by Oscarfish ( 85437 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @06:29AM (#1180271) Homepage
    From my submit.pl page:

    2000-03-10 03:37:37 Microsoft Announces X-Box (articles,microsoft) (declined)

    2000-03-10 14:59:38 Intel Inside X-Box (articles,microsoft) (declined)

    2000-03-12 11:06:22 MS announces official X-Box specs (articles,microsoft) (declined)

    2000-03-12 18:59:47 FiringSquad looks at X-Box (articles,microsoft) (declined)

    I'm not kidding here. All of these were rejected. Is there a thread to discuss rejection of timely comments? Look at the datestamp on the press release - it's March 10, the day I submitted it under "Microsoft Announces X-Box."

  • If it's a PC then... (Score:3)

    by kwashiorkor ( 105138 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @09:23AM (#1180272)
    Something I'm NOT seeing in the various posts about the XBox here on /. is imagination, just gripe gripe gripe. Think about this...

    The XBox proposed stats: An x86 CPU running at 600mhz
    It has 64MB unified DDR SDRAM
    8 gig HD
    DVD ROM drive

    So here we're all whining about it being obsolete by the time this thing ships and blah blah blah...

    Well, if it's made from pretty much generic, off the shelf PC parts, what is really stopping MS from replacing the 600mhz CPU with an 800mhz CPU by release date? How about upping the amount of memory? Increasing the size of the HD?

    The only thing they have commited to is a paper spec. The beauty of it is that the only proprietary part in that spec is the NV25 which dosn't yet exist. If they happen to upgrade any of the hardware along such predictable paths, I'm sure that the developers wouldn't mind.

    I don't think throwing a faster CPU into the mix would be a death blow to any developer, though if they didn't plan for scaling then their game might not be as impressive as one that uses ALL of that power.

    Not only that, but if they decide to stick to exactly what their paper spec says, by the time of the XBox's release, the component parts will cost next to nothing (except for the graphics chip) allowing them to undercut their competition's prices. And that's just good business sense. Just think about how much SONY has ahd to invest in the PSX2 just to get it off the ground. Proprietary this proprietary that... by comparisson the XBox is half-way to being an open system.

    I'm sure that within moments of release, some enterprising H4x0r will develop an interface allowing you to use the hardware for just about anything, much like that 'net appliance (the name eludes me at the moment) that people've been snapping up from BestBuys (or wherever) and turing into dirt cheap 'net surfing wonder toys. Heck, with the amount of hardware in the XBox, and the fact that it practically is an x86 PC, there's got to be some way to bend it to one's will. :-)

    -- kwashiorkor --
    Pure speculation gets you nowhere.

  • This would sound great, but... (Score:3)

    by belgin ( 111046 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @06:51AM (#1180273) Homepage
    We are looking at fall 2001 at the earliest. This thing is going to be competing with computer gamers who have already forked over the cash for at least a 1.2 GHz processor or something equally massive. Computer game players are probably also the initial release target audience.

    Console gamers are going to react the same way they initially did to the Playstation. They will regard it like an old smelly fish until the games start coming that make the thing worth more than their current system. Console gamers expect maybe two crashes in the course of a badly ported game where the previous version was operating on a processor with different sized instruction words. Random crashes throughout a game are not acceptable on console systems. Reviewers tend to send the game back if it crashes even once.

    While I am continuing to be tempted to dismiss this product out of hand, I am trying to reserve my judgement to see what they actually do. MS can do great work if they actually take the time to debug their code, test its usability, and don't try to make it interoperable with everything under the sun. Unfortunately, their business model usually nixes all three of those. If MS can run this as a product where the first release can't be the first of many and seriously debug this thing hard before it sees the light of developers, they could shock us.

    The biggest hurdle for MS is and always will be the developers. If MS advertises this as a port your PC games as they are senario, you get no innovation. Any special tricks that developers could pull off with the X-Box won't happen if they regard it as a PC Jr. This is the factor that tends to make or break a console these days, IMHO. I don't know what processor speed Final Fantasy 8 requires for the PC version, but I'll bet it is a wee bit higher than the PSX's 33 MHz. This is one of the (or perhaps the) most graphically stunning games I have seen in recent years. The initial PS2 games will probably be pretty poor until the developers stop trying to develop for the PSX and start developing for the PS2. If you just port like its the same thing, there is nothing special about the games. If you learn to use the engines, you make breakthroughs.

    Oh well, I guess it is wait and see.

    B. Elgin

  • According to one of my friends who works for Microsoft, they had a special unveiling for their workers, and one of the things they talked about is shipping it with things like Bleem! and UltraHLE or whatever the equivalent is when this thing finally ships so it could run PS and N64 games in addition to whatever they can convince companies to port native...

    Would make sense.

  • Comment removed (Score:4)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @06:41AM (#1180275)
    Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • Cringely has a nice article [pbs.org] about this over at pbs [pbs.org].

  • More VapourWare (Score:4)

    by orac2 ( 88688 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @06:34AM (#1180277)
    "Slated for release in 2001" - because we all know how good Microsoft are at meeting their release dates. This looks like Microsoft's usual trick of making product annoucements when they don't even have a working product, just to get people to hold off on buying someone elses technology. They did it with Windows itself (remember when Windows was just a stop gap to maintain Microsoft's ability to leverage DOS?), Pen Windows (remember that?) and the Microsoft Network. Unfortunately I think the Market Droids have made an error here - it's not like console technology is some new, unproven, region of the electronic frontier, nor is it like Nintendo or Sony don't have huge brand recognition either. (unlike those poor chumps at GO computing who got squished by Pen Windows)

  • Re:I don't understand this X-box thing..... (Score:4)

    by dsginter ( 104154 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @06:42AM (#1180278)
    What about AOL? I actually set gave my unused *free* internet account to an AOL user to save him the grief of dealing with such a lousy company but I returned a week later to find out he went back to AOL because it was *easier*. Yes, thats right - paying over $20 a month to have an ISP crap ads down your throat all day. Made me sick to the point of going postal. And then it made sense. Bottom line is that Windows/Linux/Be/etc aren't easy to use for the average Joe "Non-technical" Consumer. If MS can put one of these boxes together and partner with some broadband co's, then we will see a real winner. Just understand that you are the minority.

  • I don't understand this X-box thing..... (Score:4)

    by pHatidic ( 163975 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @06:28AM (#1180279)
    By the time this so called 'X-box' is out, will anyone care? Currently you can get a system with a celeron chip that's almost as fast, and keep in mind that this is a computer we're talking about. Now by the time the x-box with its 600 mghz chip hits the market, we'll be able to get a complete system minus the monitor with similar specs for the same price. Why then, would anyone choose the x-box over a computer, since the games for the x-box and the computer will be so similar? personally, I'd much rather get the computer over the x-box, so that at least I could run linux!....Now sure, this sounds incredible now but by a year and a half, I doubt that many people will care. Computers for the smart, x-box for the stupid and the uninformed!

  • Why it might or might not succeed (Score:5)

    by Erich ( 151 ) on Thursday March 23, 2000 @06:57AM (#1180280) Homepage Journal
    Okay, there are some interesting things about the X-box.
    • It might very run existing PC games, but those aren't quite as easy and fun for the typical 8-year-old as sticking in a Playstation disk. However, the PSX2 will also come out with lots of pre-existing games, 'cause it will run normal PSX games. Having lots of games available the moment it becomes available, especially the games you currently have, is a very nice feature, and one that will help the PSX2 sell.
    • Many game companies port once for console, once for PC. Don't you think it would be attractive to just port once, for DirectWhatever?
    • The X-box has a hard drive. While this allows you to have lots of save games, it also allows games to add complexity, interfere with each other, and so on. Also, if the OS will go on the hard drive, there are opportunities for MS to fix bugs/introduce new ones... which will cause a moving target for game developers... something they don't want.
    and, perhaps the most important thing that might help the X-box
    • When have you seen MS go into a new market at less than full-force? If they're dumping billions into the console, making it cheaper than PSX2/Dreamcast/NextNintendo, and dumping billions in convincing companies to port to them (and maybe exclude other systems), and dumping billions to sell the games for cheap... it's going to hurt competition. And we've seen this happen before. And they can do this.
    By the way, did you hear why they are using Intel chips rather than Athlons? Intel is giving MS the chips for free. AMD wouldn't give the chips away.

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