Xbox Series X

The Xbox Series X is an upcoming home video game console developed by Microsoft. It was announced during E3 2019 as "Project Scarlett" and is scheduled for release in late 2020.

This article is about the 2020 console. For the fourth-generation Xbox platform, see Xbox § Fourth-generation models.
Xbox Series X
Also known asProject Scarlett
DeveloperMicrosoft
Product familyXbox
TypeHome video game console
Release dateQ4 2020
MediaUltra HD Blu-ray, Blu-ray, DVD, CD
CPUCustom 3.8 GHz AMD 8-core Zen 2 (3.6 GHz with SMT)
Memory16 GB GDDR6 SDRAM
Storage1 TB Custom NVMe SSD
Removable storageStorage Expansion Card (up to 2 TB)
Display720p, 1080p, 1440p, 4K UHD, 8K UHD
GraphicsCustom 1.825 GHz AMD Radeon RDNA 2 architecture
SoundCustom Project Acoustics 3D Audio
Controller input4th-generation Xbox Controller, compatible Xbox One controllers and accessories
Online servicesXbox Live
Dimensions15.1 cm × 15.1 cm × 30.1 cm (5.9 in × 5.9 in × 11.9 in)
Backward
compatibility		Xbox One and select Xbox 360 and original Xbox games
PredecessorXbox One
Websitewww.xbox.com

The console is one of the planned fourth-generation family of Xbox hardware, succeeding the current Xbox One line, and expected to have improved hardware for higher display resolutions and frame rate and reduced loading times. Microsoft plans to have this be a soft transition to its next generation of hardware; the Xbox Series X is expected to be fully compatible with all games, controllers, and accessories that are currently supported by Xbox One, including selected Xbox 360 and original Xbox games already backward compatible on the Xbox One. Further, Microsoft's internal Xbox Game Studios does not plan to immediately produce titles exclusive for the Xbox Series X, but instead will produce titles that are compatible on both the Xbox One and Xbox Series X, with certain titles having enhanced features on the new console.

History and development

When Microsoft's Xbox team started work on the successor to the Xbox One consoles, their primary targets were to at minimum double the graphic performance of the Xbox One X as measured by its floating point operations per second (FLOPS), and increasing CPU performance by a four-fold compared to Xbox One X while maintaining the same acoustic performance from the Xbox One consoles.[1] As the engineers collected power requirements to meet these specifications, they saw these parts would draw a large amount of internal power (approximately 315 W) and would generate a good amount of heat. This led to the decision to split the components onto two separate circuit boards; one housing the CPU/GPU, memory, and power regulators, and a second board to act as a Southbridge board for slower input/output (I/O) functions. The boards mounted on opposite sides of an aluminum chassis helped to create air channels for cooling. The remaining components - the heat sink, the electric shielding, the power supply, the optical drive, and the cooling fan were then arranged in a Tetris-like fashion, according to Microsoft designer Chris Kujawski, to achieve a compact form factor, resulting in the tower-like structure.[1] To meet the acoustics factor, the system includes numerous sensors for controlling the speed of the fan, and the large open top was necessary to assure good air flow through the system.[1] While certain elements like the optical drive, air flow requirements, and heat sink size fixed certain dimensions in the overall form factor, they were satisfied they were able to end up with a square footprint for the unit.[1]

Microsoft first teased new Xbox hardware under the codename "Project Scarlett" during its E3 2019 press conference,[2] The company estimated that Scarlett would be four times as powerful as Xbox One X,[3] with support for 8K resolution, real-time ray-tracing, and 120 frames-per-second rendering.[4] Microsoft said they wanted a soft transition from Xbox One to Scarlett, with Scarlett supporting backward compatibility with all games and most hardware supported on the Xbox One.[4] The console was formally unveiled as the Xbox Series X during The Game Awards 2019, as well as its final design and a late-2020 release date.[5][6]

Following the unveiling, a Microsoft spokesperson stated that Xbox Series X constituted an entry in a fourth generation of Xbox hardware, which will be branded simply as "Xbox" with no subtitle.[7] Prior to the E3 reveal, it had been speculated that Microsoft was also developing a second, lower-end console codenamed "Lockhart" to accompany what was unveiled as Scarlett.[8][9]

Microsoft planned to go into detail into the hardware specifications and launch titles for the Series X at both the 2020 Game Developers Conference (GDC) and E3 2020, but both events were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Microsoft scheduled online presentations over the same planned days in March 2020,[10] while the company will schedule its planned E3 presentation at a later time.[11] Detailed specifications were presented by Microsoft, Digital Foundry and Austin Evans of Overclock Media on March 16, 2020.[12][13][14] Starting in May and running until launch, Microsoft planned to have monthly digital events around the Xbox Series X and its games as part of an "Xbox 20/20" series.[15]

Microsoft reported in March 2020 that despite the pandemic, they still expect the Xbox Series X to ship by the end of 2020, though they are monitoring supply chains and the safety of their workers.[16] Spencer believes that while the hardware will continue to ship on time, titles poised for the release window of the Xbox Series X may be delayed due to the pandemic.[17]

Spencer said that Microsoft intends to use a similar Xbox All-Access subscription-based pricing approach as they had done with the Xbox One, where subscribers would pay a monthly fee for both the hardware and services like Xbox Live Gold. Current All Access plans with the Xbox One will include routes to upgrade to the Xbox Series X, and Spencer states that there will be similar upgrades from the Xbox Series X in the future.[18][19] These subscriptions are also planned to include access to the Xbox Game Pass service that provides a subscription-like service to the Xbox game library.[20]

Hardware

The Xbox Series X is powered by a custom 7nm AMD Zen 2 CPU with eight cores running at a nominal 3.8GHz, or when simultaneous multithreading (SMT) is used, at 3.6GHz. One CPU core is dedicated to the underlying operating system.[13] The graphics processing unit is also a custom unit based on AMD's RDNA 2 graphics architecture. It has a total of 56 compute units (CUs) with 3584 cores, with 52 CUs and 3328 cores enabled, and will be running at a fixed 1.825 GHz. This unit is capable of 12.155 teraflops of computational power.[13] The unit ships with 16GB of GDDR6 SDRAM, with 10GB running at 560GB/s primarily to be used with the graphics system and the other 6GB at 336GB/s to be used for the other computing functions. After accounting for the system software, approximately 13.5GB of memory will be available for games and other applications, with the system software only drawing from the slower pool.[13]

The internal storage of the Xbox Series X is a 1TB NVM Express (NVMe) SSD with a raw input/output throughput of 2.4GB/s. With an on-board compression/decompression block, the unit is capable of throughput as high as 4.8GB/s.[13] A proprietary external 1TB SSD fast storage is available, functioning similar to memory cards on other devices.[13] Additional HDD storage can be added through USB connections. A 4k UHD Blu-Ray optical drive is also included.[13] Developers at The Coalition found that without any changes to their code, Gears 5 loaded four times faster on the Xbox Series X than the Xbox One X due to the higher throughput on memory and storage, and would be able to increase this further once they incorporated the new DirectStorage API routines.[21]

The Xbox Series X target performance is to render at 4k resolution at 60 frames per second.[13] Microsoft stated that the console CPU will be four times as powerful as the Xbox One X including support for real-time ray-tracing, up to 120 frames per second rendering, and 8K resolution via the HDMI 2.1 standard.[6][22] The console will also support new features of the HDMI 2.1 standard including variable refresh rate (VRR) and Auto Low Latency Mode (ALLM) that are currently being incorporated into newer televisions.[13] The console will have dedicated audio hardware acceleration.[23] A feature called "audio ray tracing" will use the graphics ray tracing processors to process spatial audio in the same manner to improve the audio immersion for the player.[24]

The console's form is designed to be unobtrusive and minimalistic. It has a 15.1 cm × 15.1 cm (5.9 in × 5.9 in) footprint and is 30.1 cm (11.9 in) high and weighs 4.45 kg (9.8 lb);[14] while configured in this vertical orientation, the unit can also be used on its side. Its forward-facing features present only the main power button and the optical media slot. The top of the unit is a single powerful fan. Xbox head Phil Spencer states that the Xbox Series X is as quiet as the Xbox One X.[25] Rear ports include HDMI 2.1 output, 3 USB 3.2 ports, Ethernet connection, expanded storage slot, and power input; an earlier leak had suggested a TOSLINK port for digital audio but this was eliminated in the final design.[14] Absent on the Xbox Series X include the HDMI passthrough port that had been on the Xbox One as well as the infrared blaster port for remote control. The Xbox Series X output conforms to the HDMI Consumer Electronics Control specification, allowing the console to control the connected television's functions as replacements for these absent ports.[26]

System software and features

Spencer stated that the company was prioritizing high frame rates and faster load times as a priority over higher resolutions, which the Series X achieves via the better-matched capabilities of the CPU and GPU.[27] Microsoft also focused on reducing the effects of input latency to improve responsiveness, adding support for HDMI 2.1 Auto Low Latency Mode and Variable Refresh Rate features, and "dynamic latency input" technology—a new input pathway that allows developers to incorporate potential controller lag into their games.[6][28] In addition, the console's Quick Resume feature will allow users to suspend and resume more than one game at a time, including suspending game states across a console reboot.[22] This feature includes resuming a suspended game after a reboot of the console.[24]

According to Tom Warren of The Verge, the Xbox Series X dashboard will remain similar to the Xbox One dashboard with additional user interface features to account for the new Series X hardware elements.[29]

Controller and accessories

The console will ship with an updated version of the wireless Xbox One controller, which was aimed to be more ergonomic to fit a larger range of hand sizes. It will include all the same key buttons as the past controllers: two analog joysticks that can be depressed, a circle pad, four action buttons, two system buttons ("View" and "Menu"), the main Xbox face button, two grip triggers (left and right) and two shoulder buttons (left and right). The new controller adds a "Share" button alongside the "View" and "Menu", which is used to record and share video clips or screenshots from gameplay.[30] Microsoft found that by aiming the size to fit an eight-year-old's hands, they were able to make the design fit a larger section of the population, and thus features more sculpted grips, and reducing and rounding the trigger buttons.[30] The d-pad is a new concave design that Microsoft's Ryan Whitaker said was a means to merge the normal d-pad style on the standard Xbox One controller and the version on the Elite variant to accommodate a range of playstyles.[30] Small tactile dot patterns have been added to the buttons to help players orient fingers on the controls.[30] The controller will continue to use two AA batteries, though a rechargeable battery pack will be available as an accessory. Microsoft found from focus group studies that players were nearly split 50/50 on the use of batteries through recharging and thus gave the controller the flexibility for both sides.[1]

The controller uses the same wireless protocol introduced by the Xbox One, and is backward compatible with existing Xbox One consoles. Existing Xbox One controllers will also be compatible with Xbox Series X.[30][28][31] The new Xbox Series X controller also supports the Bluetooth Low Energy (BTLE) standard allowing it to pair with mobile devices and other hardware supporting that standard, and will have internal storage to remember those connections.[30] The new controller uses a standard USB-C charging port for its battery.[30]

Spencer said that the Xbox Series X will likely not have immediate virtual reality (VR) support at launch, and that they expect that any VR support will be based on the Windows Mixed Reality components contained within the console's Windows 10 components, but was otherwise not a focus of the console's development prior to release.[32]

Games
Main article: List of Xbox Series X games
The Optimized for Series X logo.

Developers and publishers may opt to develop games specifically to take advantage of the Xbox Series X features such as the higher graphics throughput and ray-tracing abilities and the improved DirectStorage I/O pathways for streaming content. This may be applied either to new games that were natively built to support these features of the Xbox Series X, or existing games which developers have subsequently updated for the new console. According to Microsoft "it will be up to individual developers to determine how they leverage the power and speed of Xbox Series X, including which next-gen technologies they leverage and implement in their games".[33] These games will be marketed with an Optimized for Series X brand and logo.[34][35]

To help with the transition between console generations, Microsoft developed a system called "Smart Delivery", effectively implementing cross-buy between Xbox One and Xbox Series X-specific versions of games released on both consoles. The "best available version" of the game for the hardware will be downloaded automatically. Microsoft has positioned this feature at publishers who plan to release Series X-specific versions of games after releasing on Xbox One, and to users migrating from an existing Xbox One to Series X.[36] All Xbox Game Studios-published titles will use Smart Delivery where possible, and third-party publishers Ubisoft and CD Projekt RED have committed to using Smart Delivery for their upcoming releases.[36]

In January 2020, XGS head Matt Booty stated that they had no immediate plans to make first-party games that are exclusive to Series X, stating that Microsoft wanted to ensure that those who buy Xbox One consoles prior to the Series X launch would still "feel that they made a good investment and that we're committed to them with content".[37] Spencer explained that this approach was about putting the player at the center rather than the console, comparing it to the current ecosystem in PC games where developers can target optimal play on high-end hardware, but still allow them to be played with reduced fidelity on lower-end hardware.[38] Microsoft is otherwise not preventing third-party developers from releasing games compatible exclusively with Xbox Series X.[38] Electronic Arts has affirmed that its games released in 2020 for the Xbox One will include free upgrades to the Xbox Series X but did not specify if this was through Smart Delivery or its own patches;[39] EA affirmed, for example, that Madden NFL 21 for the Xbox One can be updated with a free patch for enhanced play on the Xbox Series X if purchased before Madden NFL 22 is released in the following year.[40][41]

Backward compatibility
Main articles: List of Xbox One games, List of Xbox One X enhanced games, and List of backward compatible games for Xbox One

Microsoft has stated that the Xbox Series X will support all games playable on the Xbox One, including those Xbox 360 and original Xbox console titles currently supported through backward compatibility on the Xbox One, thus allowing the console to support four generations of games.[4] To achieve this, Microsoft announced they would no longer be bringing any additional Xbox 360 or original Xbox games into the Xbox One backward compatibility program in June 2019, and instead using their manpower to make sure these older titles were playable on the Xbox Series X.[42] Backward compatibility is planned as a launch feature, with Microsoft expected to have put in more than 200,000 manhours in validating thousands of games;[43] Spencer said in December 2019 that he himself had been helping to test backward compatibility titles.[44] As Microsoft neared launch, they reopened the means for players to suggest additional games to add to backward compatibility, stating "Resurrecting titles from history often presents a complex mix of technical and licensing challenges, but the team is committed to doing everything we can to continue to preserve our collective gaming legacy."[45]

Because of the processing features of the Xbox Series X, it is possible for advanced graphic processes options not originally programmed into these older games to be worked into the title when played on the console, such as automated High-dynamic-range rendering (HDR) support using machine learning.[13] Work done by the Xbox Advanced Technology Group prior to launch was focused on how far into the backward-compatibility library they could take these improvements including into original Xbox games, adding in features like HDR or improving the framerate of games that may have been programmed to be locked at a specific framerate.[46] Backward compatible games will be supported under the Quick Resume feature as well.[47]

This backward compatibility feature will play into the xCloud game streaming platform. While the platform launched using blade servers based on the Xbox One S, it is expected to transition to blades based on Xbox Series X systems by 2021, retaining compatibility with the Xbox One X game library while adding support for new Xbox Series X games.[48]

See also

References
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