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[Sword Of Doom]

You sure about that profit thing? You sound quite sure of that. Btw - after 2 generations, The suits at MS actually want to make money on the Xbox project. Otherwise it goes the way of the dodo. That's why services and value adds are important this generation.

The Xbox project has been profitable has it not? Maybe not as much as the suits would want it to be but I believe overall it has been profitable. And if they take a loss now it will benefit them in the long run because they will have a greater piece of the market share. The point is that it's going to be difficult for the Xbox division to make smart decisions when the suits are breathing down their necks.

 

[SwiftDeath]

The Xbox project has been profitable has it not? Maybe not as much as the suits would want it to be but I believe overall it has been profitable. And if they take a loss now it will benefit them in the long run because they will have a greater piece of the market share. The point is that it's going to be difficult for the Xbox division to make smart decisions when the suits are breathing down their necks.

I was under the impression that xbox division was overall a loss due to RROD and the original xbox

 

[Raist]

The Xbox project has been profitable has it not?

It's hard to know for sure because there's no official numbers just for the xbox division, but it's quite unlikely it has.

 

[bishoptl]

The Xbox project has been profitable has it not?

As a division? Doubtful.

 

[Crimson_Fate]

The Xbox project has been profitable has it not? Maybe not as much as the suits would want it to be but I believe overall it has been profitable. And if they take a loss now it will benefit them in the long run because they will have a greater piece of the market share. The point is that it's going to be difficult for the Xbox division to make smart decisions when the suits are breathing down their necks.

It had been until they blew their profits in the redesign of the controller ,Kinect 2 and timed exclusives.

Can you Imagine the type of machine they could have produced for the same money if they just left the controller alone, forgot about Kinect 2 and actually gave a dam.

 

[daman824]

that's pretty much what sony banked on with the ps3, and that didn't turn out so well...

It was different though. Since they released later, Sony had less games than microsoft. It was also incredibly hard to find the base sku, so for alot of people, it was $200 more.

But that price difference will hurt microsoft.

 

[iamshadowlark]

The Xbox project has been profitable has it not? Maybe not as much as the suits would want it to be but I believe overall it has been profitable. And if they take a loss now it will benefit them in the long run because they will have a greater piece of the market share. The point is that it's going to be difficult for the Xbox division to make smart decisions when the suits are breathing down their necks.

As a whole? I'd think not.

RW: And you’re not a fan of the Xbox?

Joachim Kempin: Forget Xbox. That is a crummy product. Think of the graphics you have on an Xbox versus a regular PC. The PC runs circles around it. I voted against Xbox when it got started. Microsoft lost $6 billion to $10 billion on Xbox. Today they are making a small amount of money in that area. But is this important for the company? No, it’s a distraction. You know why Xbox was done? There was only one reason; Bill said, “We need to stop Sony from conquering the living room with the PlayStation.”

http://readwrite.com/2013/02/11/mic...top-exec-joachim-kempin#awesm=~oinyn0ueRf3IbY

But you have the concepts of sunk costs and such so who even knows if they plan to recoup all that.

It had been until they blew their profits in the redesign of the controller ,Kinect 2 and timed exclusives.

Can you Imagine the type of machine they could have produced for the same money if they just left the controller alone, forgot about Kinect 2 and actually gave a dam.

They gave a damn. Estimates put the XB1 APU project at around 3 billion. Maybe a bit misguided but definitely not lacking.

 

[Bundy]

The Xbox project has been profitable has it not?

Report: Microsoft's Xbox division has lost nearly $3 billion in 10 years.

 

[tinfoilhatman]

Has the PS4 release date not been announced for your country then?

Sorry am just assuming launch PS4's will be sold out and I'll have to wait for the next 2-3 shipments before I'l be able to get my hands on one without waiting in line.

 

[SwiftDeath]

Sorry am just assuming launch PS4's will be sold out and I'll have to wait for the next 2-3 shipments before I'l be able to get my hands on one without waiting in line.

Ah ok

Yeah I imagine there are a lot of people like that where if the price was lower they'd get the XB1 if the PS4 was sold out or vice-versa

Assuming the same price

 

[Sword Of Doom]

Probably more like 150Gb/s vs 160Gb/s.




Yeah. I don't believe those Sony numbers either. Not in game. Not real world. Not sustained.

http://gamingbolt.com/oddworld-inha...act-that-memory-operates-at-172gbs-is-amazing

oddworld inhabitants developement director Steward Gilray claims it's around 172gb/s

 

[Sword Of Doom]

Report: Microsoft's Xbox division has lost nearly $3 billion in 10 years.

Thanks for the correction

 

[antic604]

This whole b/w discussion gets really weird. For PS4 there's no such thing as 'real life scenario', because it always transfers data at full b/w of 176GB/s, even if you're pushing just few MBs. For Xbox it's different, because - according to EG article - it is able to transfer 140-150GB/s from ESRAM, as a combination of reads & writes (so if game only needs to read OR write, it's still limited to 109GB/s), plus there's 50-something GB/s from DDR3. In best case scenario it's maybe 200GB/s combined, but as soon as you need more than 32MB then you're limited by the speed of transfer between DDR3 and ESRAM. In the end, Xbox requires much more careful data management and even then it will exceed PS4's b/w probably very rarely.

 

[EGM1966]

Here is the reason people will buy an Xbox One this fall: "I liked the 360 and I don't mind paying $100 more"

As Sony discovered going from PS2 to PS3 the number of people who take that view is generally less than you might think.

For sure they exist - they'll be people getting a PS4 just because they get Playstation too.

But when you look at PS2 to PS3 transition, or Wii to Wii U or Gamecube sales it's obvious that the core loyalty buyers are rarely enough to make the difference vs getting the non-loyal consumer to pick you again.

For the majority price, library, etc. will matter more. Not saying this means easy for PS4 just that when aiming for high console unit sales you need to win over way, way more than the loyal core to succeed and that challenge begins from zero again with each new release.

 

[Sword Of Doom]

As Sony discovered going from PS2 to PS3 the number of people who take that view is generally less than you might think.

For sure they exist - they'll be people getting a PS4 just because they get Playstation too.

But when you look at PS2 to PS3 transition, or Wii to Wii U or Gamecube sales it's obvious that the core loyalty buyers are rarely enough to make the difference vs getting the non-loyal consumer to pick you again.

For the majority price, library, etc. will matter more. Not saying this means easy for PS4 just that when aiming for high console unit sales you need to win over way, way more than the loyal core to succeed and that challenge begins from zero again with each new release.

Friends lists, gamer tags and achievements. Those are things people didn't need to consider in past generations. We'll find out how significant they are.

 

[Putty]

Check this crackpot out!

"Who is right or wrong? Is the xbox one more powerful then ps4 and my answer is "YES" Tera Flops are not the only thing that makes a console GFX better. If a console has hardware rendering of 90% of all effects aa/ af/ raytracing lighting/ sound/ video/ and texture. And all of these abilities never touched the 1.3tf GPU (The balance & offloading that MS has been touting) how powerful would this hardware be over a console (Ps4) with a little more GPU that has to do all said features on the gpu alone. Ask anybody what happens when you aim for 4x AA @ 1080p will do to GPU performance. That big chunk of 1.8tf is going to go down fast. That is the difference between custom hardware (Xbox ONE) and Semi Off the shelf nature of the Ps4. The big thing is that Microsoft has modified the heck out of the GPU. That it had to be split in two. Host and guest can be looked at like memory or as gpu/s."

 

[StevieP]

Crackpot indeed. There are some small aspects where the Xbox has it better, but the PS4 is the more powerful console. Nobody's going to waste what relatively little GPU grunt that's available to do 4xAA when the popular solution on consoles is to vaseline up the screen with some kind of post-AA solution. To top it off, not all games are going to be 1080p anyway (on either box). And whatever issue you have with "4xAA @ 1080p" on one console, you have on the other anyway. They're both using GCN & Jaguar on an APU, despite the fact that the Xbox has more customization work done. Why bother posting that kind of spin? Buy the console where you like the software and features best, because power isn't a question at this point.

 

[Laughing_Man__]

This just in. MS will be renaming the cloud to "Nimbus" and will be the sole platform for future DragonBall games.

 

[CadetMahoney]

Here is the reason people will buy an Xbox One this fall: "I liked the 360 and I don't mind paying $100 more"

I think Sony was taught that lesson the hard way, being arrogant thinking everyone will buy on brand name alone (2 jobs etc).

 

[maplelord93]

This just in. MS will be renaming the cloud to "Nimbus" and will be the sole platform for future DragonBall games.

This just in. Junior, you aren't funny. Thank you, come again.

 

[Laughing_Man__]

This just in. Junior, you aren't funny. Thank you, come again.

Do you need a hug? I think you need a hug. Come ere!

 

[OSHAN]

Actually the top 2 reasons I get from my friends still getting an XB1 are

1) I don't want to loose my gamer tag
2) The clans I play with are on Live

I

Why would you lose your GT though? I haven't paid for Live in years. My tag is still OSHAN. Can someone take it now that I don't pay?

 

[Skeff]

Crackpot indeed. There are some small aspects where the Xbox has it better, but the PS4 is the more powerful console. Nobody's going to waste what relatively little GPU grunt that's available to do 4xAA when the popular solution on consoles is to vaseline up the screen with some kind of post-AA solution. To top it off, not all games are going to be 1080p anyway (on either box). And whatever issue you have with "4xAA @ 1080p" on one console, you have on the other anyway. They're both using GCN & Jaguar on an APU, despite the fact that the Xbox has more customization work done. Why bother posting that kind of spin? Buy the console where you like the software and features best, because power isn't a question at this point.

What? sounds unlikely looking at the architectures of both APU's in particular the ACE's in the PS4 GPU and the "additional ALU" in the CU's accoridng to Cerny

 

[Kazuma Kiryu]

This just in. Junior, you aren't funny. Thank you, come again.

Much like almost every post you make in Sony threads, yet you keep making them.

 

[slicedmass]

Friends lists, gamer tags and achievements. Those are things people didn't need to consider in past generations. We'll find out how significant they are.

This as well as simultaneous launch dates (more or less). There's not a huge difference in available titles come launch compared to xbox 360 with a 1 year lead on the ps3 as far as content goes.

 

[Perkel]

Report: Microsoft's Xbox division has lost nearly $3 billion in 10 years.

They have officially written off Xbox 1 era as loss. Adding that to current Xbone/Xbox doesn't make any sense. Currently it is important for them to make money and so far Xbox360 and probably Xbone will keep making money.

 

[Sylonious]

Penello referenced the early rumors/reports that the PS4 was "balanced" for 14 CUs. Does that mean the PS4 can only efficiently use 14 CUs and is better off using the additional 4CUs for GPGPU stuff?

 

[iamshadowlark]

They have officially written off Xbox 1 era as loss. Adding that to current Xbone/Xbox doesn't make any sense. Currently it is important for them to make money and so far Xbox360 and probably Xbone will keep making money.

Why? If the question is how much money has MS made off the Xbox project then yes, you include everything. The Microsoft brass looking to nix Xbox certainly look at it.

 

[iamshadowlark]

Penello referenced the early rumors/reports that the PS4 was "balanced" for 14 CUs. Does that mean the PS4 can only efficiently use 14 CUs and is better off using the additional 4CUs for GPGPU stuff?

No, that rumor is long debunked and decredited. Panello is throwing whatever shit at the wall that sticks to try and downplay PS4's advantage. But MS "intentionally choose to not go with the best specs"

 

[SwiftDeath]

They have officially written off Xbox 1 era as loss. Adding that to current Xbone/Xbox doesn't make any sense. Currently it is important for them to make money and so far Xbox360 and probably Xbone will keep making money.

Why? If the question is how much money has MS made off the Xbox project then yes, you include everything. The Microsoft brass looking to nix Xbox certainly look at it.

Cool so when can we assume Sony have written off the PS3 loss?

PS5 era?

 

[Crimson_Fate]

Why would you lose your GT though? I haven't paid for Live in years. My tag is still OSHAN. Can someone take it now that I don't pay?

Your Live tag will always stay , they will loose the tag it in the sense that they do not have their same gamers tag available on PS+.

 

[Log4Girlz]

The Xbox project has been profitable has it not? Maybe not as much as the suits would want it to be but I believe overall it has been profitable. And if they take a loss now it will benefit them in the long run because they will have a greater piece of the market share. The point is that it's going to be difficult for the Xbox division to make smart decisions when the suits are breathing down their necks.

Probably not. And investors of MS want high margins.

 

[Majanew]

No, that rumor is long debunked and decredited. Panello is throwing whatever shit at the wall that sticks to try and downplay PS4's advantage. But MS "intentionally choose to not go with the best specs"

Yep. And MS should have stuck with that once they said it. MS made a weak system and now they have to stand by their decision.

 

[Mandoric]

The Xbox project has been profitable has it not? Maybe not as much as the suits would want it to be but I believe overall it has been profitable. And if they take a loss now it will benefit them in the long run because they will have a greater piece of the market share. The point is that it's going to be difficult for the Xbox division to make smart decisions when the suits are breathing down their necks.

It's hard to tell because of the obfuscated financials, but the answer is basically "probably not; if it has, only because of Live".

Maintaining the XBL platform doesn't require maintaining a hardware platform, just a reason to keep people paying that sub. For the past two gens it's been Halo and better CoD, where owning the hardware was vital to enforce a lockdown on MP. In the future, it might be their investments in TV, media services, or community features, coming to you on a Windows PC or Phone or a standardized, MSX-style hardware package from another manufacturer.

 

[Manmademan]

Cool so when can we assume Sony have written off the PS3 loss?

PS5 era?

Investors really don't care what you've lost 3 years ago, they only really care about potential gains and losses for the next quarter.

Both Sony and MS's console losses are ancient history, as are Nintendos profits, judging by their stock price.

 

[vcc]

Investors really don't care what you've lost 3 years ago, they only really care about potential gains and losses for the next quarter.

Both Sony and MS's console losses are ancient history, as are Nintendos profits, judging by their stock price.

Investors do look at past performance as a hint on future performance and narrowly breaking even in the medium term and losing money over all tends to make them gun shy and invoke lawsuits.

 

[Mandoric]

Investors really don't care what you've lost 3 years ago, they only really care about potential gains and losses for the next quarter.

Both Sony and MS's console losses are ancient history, as are Nintendos profits, judging by their stock price.

Caveat: "what you lost 3 years ago" can become the benchmark for next quarter's potential loss. You can say "this is what we're doing differently now", and sometimes it'll work, but a pattern of failures tells investors that it's likely to happen again.

The same logic applies to Sony; they can sit back and say "PS3 bombed because we got outfocused on the blue ocean by Nintendo -and- the red meat by Microsoft, and invested too much in a custom part we're no longer using." Investors are buying this logic.
But if the PS4 bombs like the PS3 did, Kaz's head will be on a pike outside headquarters and the $2-$3bn that could have been sunk into a PS5 will instead go into backing life insurance policies or selling TVs at a loss until all the factory workers they hired in the '80s retire and they can be competitive again.

 

[Perkel]

Why? If the question is how much money has MS made off the Xbox project then yes, you include everything. The Microsoft brass looking to nix Xbox certainly look at it.

Sorry, i had brain fart.

 

[SwiftDeath]

Investors really don't care what you've lost 3 years ago, they only really care about potential gains and losses for the next quarter.

Both Sony and MS's console losses are ancient history, as are Nintendos profits, judging by their stock price.

Hmm while I agree that analysts are usually rather narrow-minded in their focus

That's not always the case

That being said shareholders are very much focused on long term gain and if there is a history of losses that will matter in both companies cases

Hence the let's spin off so and so division

 

[iamshadowlark]

Investors really don't care what you've lost 3 years ago, they only really care about potential gains and losses for the next quarter.

Both Sony and MS's console losses are ancient history, as are Nintendos profits, judging by their stock price.

This is extremely naive. Of course they care. Which is why you have guys like Loeb who lobby for companies to axe branches of their company that have failed to hold their own weight. You let a case build for a product or venture being a moneysink and investors will certainly yell for the axe.

 

[antic604]

The 133Gb/s number comes from MS themselves, in the Eurogamer article.
"in real-life scenarios it's believed that 133GB/s throughput has been achieved with alpha transparency blending operations (FP16 x4)."
That's a very limited scenario but that was before the upclock.

Thanks. So that's not real game performance either.

Actually, isn't this the best case scenario where Xbox' ability to simultanously read & write from the ESRAM and therefore getting close to max theoretical b/w can be fully realised? I'm not graphics programmer, but I think that while rendering a scene with transparencies - you know: in REAL GAMES! - you have to read what's underneath and draw (write) the transluent layer? I guess that's why fps in many PS3/X360 games dives when there's a lot of 'alpha effects' or 'transluencies' on screen, because they were b/w limited?

 

[Massa]

Probably not. And investors of MS want high margins.

In that case bundling the system with a Kinect 2 was an incredibly stupid decision. Should have gone for the core first with Kinect 2 in a couple of years.

 

[Skeff]

Actually, isn't this the best case scenario where Xbox' ability to simultanously read & write from the ESRAM and therefore getting close to max theoretical b/w can be fully realised? I'm not graphics programmer, but I think that while rendering a scene with transparencies - you know: in REAL GAMES! - you have to read what's underneath and draw (write) the transluent layer? I guess that's why fps in many PS3/X360 games dives when there's a lot of 'alpha effects' or 'transluencies' on screen, because they were b/w limited?

Yes that's the absolute peak they reached whilst specifically testing for it in the best algorithm they could find to take advantage of it, In a real game the performance will be nowhere near that.

Saying that, I think the Bandwidth numbers will be satisfactory for both consoles, as long as the developers are able to use the ESRAM effectively.

 

[StevieP]

In that case bundling the system with a Kinect 2 was an incredibly stupid decision. Should have gone for the core first with Kinect 2 in a couple of years.

Kinect can only be fully realized an appliance (which Microsoft wants) if it is a standard pack in.

 

[dragonelite]

This is extremely naive. Of course they care. Which is why you have guys like Loeb who lobby for companies to axe branches of their company that they feel hasn't held their own weight. You let a case build for a product or venture being a moneysink and investors will certainly yell for the axe.

Not into stocks. but if im not mistaken past results don't influence stock prices only current and future result influence the prices.

 

[Skeff]

Not into stocks. but if im not mistaken past results don't influence stock prices only current and future result influence the prices.

well, the future result is drawn from the past in a lot of cases so....to say it is irrelevant would be wrong, but to say 5 years ago is as important as 1 year ago would be disingenuous.

 

[iamshadowlark]

Not into stocks. but if im not mistaken past results don't influence stock prices only current and future result influence the prices.

Well

1) there's a lot more to investor relations than a current stock price

And

2) MS stock price would reflect a fuck ton more than xbox performance

 

[Raist]

Investors really don't care what you've lost 3 years ago, they only really care about potential gains and losses for the next quarter.

http://www.eteknix.com/microsoft-investor-wants-to-fire-ballmer-and-sell-xbox-division/

 

[SwiftDeath]

In that case bundling the system with a Kinect 2 was an incredibly stupid decision. Should have gone for the core first with Kinect 2 in a couple of years.

Not if MS gets a lot of advertising and data collection revenue from it

http://www.vg247.com/2013/07/04/xbo...-in-mind-kinect-integral-to-next-gen-adverts/

Less effective potentially now I imagine but still

 

[bigboss370]

In that case bundling the system with a Kinect 2 was an incredibly stupid decision. Should have gone for the core first with Kinect 2 in a couple of years.

the entire X1 reveal/presentation in May would not be possible without Kinect. It would look weird if the system launched and you couldn't do any of what Mehdi did on stage.