With not much to go on besides its futuristic fridge aesthetics, the next-gen Xbox console’s specs have, until now, been a subject of speculation, guesses, and Very Important Opinions on the internet – a prospect of some questionable value for those of us saving up for this holiday season bonus purchase. But this week, Microsoft published the Xbox Series X tech-numbers, including a new custom CPU and GPU, ray-tracing, backwards compatibility, and more. Get hype.
According to Xbox, the console features “a superior balance of power and speed in console design”, with an AMD CPU based on Zen 2/RDNA 2 architecture (comparable with Ryzen and Threadripper CPUs on PC), and a GPU clocking at 12 teraflops – that’s “more than eight times” the original Xbox One console, and supporting up to 120 frames-per-second, variable rate shading, ray-tracing, and HDMI 2.0 connectivity.
Xbox Series X delivers a true generational leap in processing and graphics power with cutting edge techniques resulting in higher framerates, larger, more sophisticated game worlds, and an immersive experience unlike anything seen in console gaming.
The console also features a built-in SSD for storage, and introduces a new “Quick Resume” function to suspend and resume multiple games without saving or load times. Not unexpectedly, the Xbox Series X supports backwards compatibility with Xbox 360 and Xbox One games, and, perhaps not-so-unexpectedly, Xbox One accessories. So that’s super convenient.
The Xbox Series X is scheduled to launch in time for Xmas.