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Microsoft leaked the Xbox One, HoloLens and more way back in 2012
Covering Microsoft can be comical. The enormous, multinational company is notoriously prone to leaks. Here's a short highlight list from our vast library of leak posts about Microsoft: Microsoft's fitness wearable, Band The Xbox One game console, in development kit form, on eBay of all places Cortana for Windows, the voice-based search engine Former CEO Steve Ballmer's entire CES 2010 keynote speech While that list of all stars is impressive unto itself, there's a far more interesting leak that happened way back in June 2012. A 56-page business presentation was uploaded to document-sharing service Scribd -- the document outlined four years of Xbox plans, the vast majority of which have now played out. From Kinect 2.0 shipping with Xbox One to HoloLens (then known as "Project Fortaleza"), essentially the entire recent history of Xbox was exposed nearly three years ago.
Bloomberg: Next Xbox features an AMD x86 chip, making backwards compatibility difficult
The Xbox 360 successor may not support Xbox 360 game discs, according to a Bloomberg report. The issue arises from the as-yet-unannounced console's chip, which allegedly comes from AMD and, like the PlayStation 4, uses x86 architecture (like a PC). Resultantly, backwards compatibility would have to be handled on a software level through emulation, as game discs won't play (like with Microsoft's last console). Today's report, which cites unidentified "people with knowledge of the matter," reflects earlier rumors of the next Xbox -- codenamed "Durango" and / or "Kryptos" -- containing AMD's "Jaguar" SoC. The chip design is intended for laptops and tablets, allowing the chipset to push the maximum amount of power without employing too much wattage. Earlier this year, specs for the retail version of the next Xbox were said to be as follows: a 64-bit D3D11.x 800MHz GPU, an 8-core 1.6GHz 4MB L2 CPU, 8GB DDR3 RAM, 500GB of on-board memory, USB 3.0, HDMI-out, and an optical drive for 50GB discs. It's unclear if the reported specs have changed since then, but we'll likely find out in the near future as Microsoft's expected to detail its next game console ahead of this year's E3 gaming conference in early June. [Image credit: Kotaku]
Alleged Xbox 720 document leak resurfaces, stirs rumors of Kinect 2, native 3D, AR glasses
A document passing itself off as an internal Microsoft presentation about the future of Xbox has surfaced, and is stirring internet chatter with its possible hints at the future of the console. Despite turning up online over a month ago and potentially dating back to 2010, a few things mentioned that have since come to fruition -- like SmartGlass -- are earning it more attention. The proposed developments include cloud-based entertainment, native 3D, augmented reality "Fortaleza Glasses," scalable hardware -- all by 2015. If that's too long to wait, however, the time line also indicates we'd be seeing the next generation hardware in 2013 for $299 (more precise and four-player ready Kinect 2 included). The Xbox 720 package described includes such pie-in-the-sky bullet points as Blu-ray and whole-home DVR features, all from a low-power always-on box built on a "Yukon" ARM hardware platform. Of course, even if this is legit and not just some business student's exercise, all the talk of value propositions, OEM licensing and developer profitability are proposals that could have changed. Need more reasons to be skeptical? Digital Foundry points out the extremely optimistic wattages listed and previous appearances of the illustrations included. Ponder over the full 56-page document for yourself -- taking into account the bored minds on the internet that are capable of cranking out this kind of stuff, like that infamous Nintendo Revolution video -- after the break. Update: The document has been pulled from Scribd, apparently at the request of a Covington & Burling, LLP. [Thanks, Leonard]
Microsoft says there will be 'no talk of new Xbox hardware at E3 or anytime soon'
Sony has already confirmed that we won't be seeing a next-generation PlayStation at this year's E3 trade show, and now Microsoft has also come out and dampened any expectations about a new Xbox possibly making its debut. In a statement published by Kotaku (following a report on Twitter from Bloomberg's Dina Bass), a Microsoft spokesperson says flatly that "while we appreciate all the interest in our long-range plans for the future, we can confirm that there will be no talk of new Xbox hardware at E3 or anytime soon." The statement goes on to say that "2012 is all about Xbox 360," before rattling off a list of milestones and some of the big titles planned for release this year. That leaves Nintendo with the stage to itself hardware-wise, which will presumably be showing off more of its next-generation console, the Wii U.
Next Xbox console to be six times more powerful, headed for fall 2013 release?
Xbox 720, Xbox Loop -- whatever Microsoft ends up calling it, that hot rod of a console looks to be on deck for a late fall 2013 release. According to IGN's sources, this successor to the Redmond gaming throne is purported to pack a GPU based on AMD's 6000 series of chips and will boast silicon circuitry that catapults its performance past Nintendo's upcoming Wii U by 20 percent. If you're looking for a more apples to green X's comparison, this next-gen console's graphical capabilities are also reportedly six times greater than its 360 progenitor. While MS is likely holding back its monstrous new platform for a big E3 reveal, it appears the company's still whittling down its spec list, with dev kits to be issued later this August. No mention was made of its rumored Kinect 2 integration, but we're more than certain that famous hacking tech will be front and center.[Image credit: Joseph Dumary]
Rumor mill: next gen Xboxes + Kinect 2 to read lips, track fingers, make unicorns real
Pinches of salt at the ready, folks. According to the latest speculation, Microsoft's sequel to the Xbox 360 will actually be two models, a pared down set-top box for casual gamers and a heftier model for the hardcore. Either way, Xbox 720 / Xbox Loop's getting paired up with a revised version of the magnificent Kinect hardware. The digital grapevine's saying that Kinect 2 will be able to read your lips, track your fingers and sense the tone of your voice to determine if you've come over all angry. It can't do that currently thanks to its USB cable, which can only transmit 16MB/s of data -- limiting the camera's resolution to 320 x 240 at 30fps. We don't know what protocol the new sensor bar will use, but we do know that either USB 3.0 (which can transmit 400 MB/s) or Intel's Thunderbolt (700MB/s) would remove such limitations. In related news, 2012's Kinect for Windows is getting a shorter USB cable for better data integrity and a refocused image sensor that will switch to "near mode" to see objects 50cm away -- which means a whole bunch of classic Kinects and Nyko Zooms are gonna wind up as a filling for a New Mexico landfill.
Rumor: Gamerscores transferring to next Xbox console
A rumor in Game Informer (full text from GI after the break) states that Gamerscores and achievements will be transferable to Microsoft's next console. As far a rumors go, this is one many Xbox 360 owners might pray Microsoft wouldn't prevent from becoming a reality.Achievements and Gamerscores are two features of the Xbox 360 that have developed a strong following, particularly among "ch33vo-holics." We can already imagine the internet hissy-fit temper-tantrum freak out we'll see if the Xbox faithful can't transfer their data. Although the next console is still years away, it would be unfortunate to envision Microsoft not allowing gamers to transfer their data effortlessly to the next system.[Via X3F]
Seagate - the answer to digital distribution?
When thinking of gaming, the companies that make the storage medium are rarely thought of. Seagate, however, is offering up an interesting view of the future; a future that could effect the way we buy our games. According to Seagate, they are working on a technology that will drastically increase the amount of data we store on hard drives. Using a technology called heat-assisted magnetic recording (HAMR), the company expects to be able to shove 50 TB of information into a single square inch of drive space, or around 300 TB of information on a standard 3.5" drive. With that kind of space, the entire Library of Congress can be stored ... without any compression. The technology is expected to become commercially viable in a scant three years, by 2010. This means we may be seeing the Xbox 720 and PS4 being entirely based around digital distribution or fully installed console games, mostly eliminating ugly load times and noisy disk drives. With that kind of space, we may never have to worry about filling it up; 300 TB can hold around 6,144 50 GB Blu-ray disks (or the entire Library of PS through PS3 games that could ever be created with room to spare).
MS opens in-house chip lab for Xbox 720
The NY Times reports that Microsoft is ending its partnership with IBM to found it's own chip design lab to work on chips for a planned third generation Xbox:The design effort will initially be split between research labs at the company's headquarters in Redmond, Wash., and its Silicon Valley campus here. Tentatively named the Computer Architecture Group, the project underscores sweeping changes in the industry. One reason for the effort is that Microsoft needs to begin thinking about the next-generation design of its Xbox game console, said Charles P. Thacker, a veteran engineer and Microsoft engineer who will head the Silicon Valley group. Voice recognition may also be an area where the research could play a significant role. Thacker is famous in certain circles for his work at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center. The division will be called the "Comupter Architecture Group" which isn't the snazziest name ever, but then, neither was IBM.
