XBox 720 Speculation Specs

[Melbosa]

http://www.ign.com/wikis/xbox-720

If the hardware specs here are true... why the F' is M$ going with a PowerPC CPU??!?!? Make porting so much harder for Devs between PC and XBox and even Mac PCs are Intel CPUs now.  That will be a big mistake unless these new PowePC CPUs are based on Intel architecture - this I do not know as I have stopped following the PowerPC lines from IBM.

Otherwise the other surprise is the Blu-Ray player.... but I guess it will be the industry standard for movies for years yet - how long was DVD the standard for?

[Lazybones]

I basically ignore these hardware rumors now, until someone spots a dev kit.

PowerPC is fine, that is what the current Xbox uses, so for compatibility of existing dev tools it will be fine... Also differentiates the console from PC, if you are using the XNA tools from Microsoft, other than some specific optimization, this really comes down to a compile time difference. Unlike the PS3 that used the whacky CellProcessor that had a standard general core, and a bunch of little special purpose processors.

[Melbosa]

While it may be conformed tool set for the previous console I disagree with the it will be fine.  I have read enough developer comparisons for the transition of a game from PC to XBox 360 and versa, and while it is better than PS3 conversions, it would be so much easier if the consoles stuck to a conformed instruction set that matches the PC develop platform then the development cycle would streamline a bit.  They could still optimize the intel or amd processors for bus speeds, memory bandwidth, etc to stream out the consoles workings for optimization, but I think conforming to a single architecture will improve the development that much more. It will open the door for more indie developers and smaller companies - which means chances for lots of bad games but also diamonds in the rough!

This is My Opinion, but also has been something I've read in the a fore mentioned comparisons.

[Lazybones]

Part of it is cost as well, most consoles cost what a high end PC video cart costs.... every component counts... this is why RAM has often sucked on previous consoles.

[Mr. Analog]

The guy behind the "always on" speculation, AKA Microsoft Game Director Adam Orth, has parted ways with Microsoft:

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/articles/455958/20130411/adam-orth-resigns-xbox-microsoft-always-twitter.htm

[Darren Dirt]

The guy behind the "always on" speculation, AKA Microsoft Game Director Adam Orth, has parted ways with Microsoft:

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/articles/455958/20130411/adam-orth-resigns-xbox-microsoft-always-twitter.htm

Microsoft employee runs his mouth, gets fired. #dealwithit

[Mr. Analog]

Yeah, but, Microsoft talking heads say stupid @%&# all the time.

I sense strife within Microsoft over "always on" as a desirable feature.

Maybe somewhere in the company the good guys are winning (maybe they can reclaim the dashboard from advertising!)

[Thorin]

Well either they learn how to deal with customers and provide a better experience than the competition or they lose customers to the competition.

Interesting that Major Nelson was the one to issue the apology.  I wonder if his dashboard is as ad-ridden as the rest of ours?  If so, I wonder if he's ready to buy a PS3/4 for his homelife yet.

[Mr. Analog]

Who can say for sure what's happening on the Redmond Campus but I do know that some greedy bastard decided that the 360 dashboard was a great place to smother us with advertising. I don't even use the dash anymore, I just use the QuickPlay feature because it's less irritating (by a wide margin!)

I'm guessing they have their own brand of kool-aid but it would be silly of them not to have and understand what makes competitor products good. I remember hearing a story from a long time ago about guys buying up black earbuds to plug into their iPods while working at Microsoft to disguise it from management back when they were trying to push the Zune.

It's funny looking back, the Zune wasn't a bad product but everything about it was marketed backward.

[Lazybones]

The announcement is today.