It’s been a long time coming, but Microsoft finally completely pulled the curtain back on Project Scorpio, now simply called the Xbox One X, at their E3 2017 Xbox Briefing. After months of playing their cards close to their vest, Microsoft let loose, revealing the souped-up machine’s full specs, price, release date, and a whole lot more. No doubt about it, Xbox One X is going to be a beast to contend with!
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Originally announced at E3 2016, Microsoft boasted Project Scorpio would be the most powerful home console ever. Microsoft was willing to take their time to sure they delivered on their promise – while Sony announced the PlayStation 4 Pro in September of 2016 and launched it only weeks later, Microsoft played the long game. Scorpio’s basic specs were revealed back in April of this year, and a peek at the system’s dev kit was given in May. Now, a year after being announced, the system has been laid bare.
You can get a first look at Xbox One X in the trailer at the top of this post, or you can scroll down for a run-through of all the pertinent information…
Hardware Specs
As mentioned, Microsoft provided a basic rundown of Xbox One X’s hardware specs back in April. The system is powered by eight custom x86 Jaguar cores clocked at 2.3GHz, a 1172MHz GPU with 40 customized compute units, and 12GB of GDDR5 memory.
Microsoft provided a few more technical details at their press conference. The system will support 4K resolutions, textures and assets, and other fancy visual features like HDR, wide color gamut, and premium Dolby Atmos sound. The chip at the heart of it all boasts 6 million transitors, 384 bit wide memory bus, and is cooled by a futuristic liquid-cooled vapor chamber. In terms of pure hardware grunt, Xbox One X is impressive, and it’s the smallest Microsoft console ever, too!
Supported Games
Of course, a cutting-edge piece of hardware isn’t any good if there aren’t any games to play on it. Like the PS4 Pro, all Xbox One X games will also be playable on the standard Xbox One, no true exclusives, but some games will use the system’s power to deliver better visuals and exclusive features. Microsoft has remained frustratingly shy about which games will ultimately support X.
Thankfully, we finally got to see some games running on Xbox One X, including Forza Motorsport 7, Crackdown 3, Metro Exodus, Middle-earth: Shadow of War, Assassin’s Creed Origins, and BioWare’s stunning Anthem. Heck, even Minecraft is getting a fancy 4K update!
Release Date And Price
And now, for the moment of truth – ow much does Xbox One X cost, and when’s the darn thing coming out? As always there’s been plenty of debate about how much Microsoft’s system should cost, with some like controversial analysist Michael Pachter insisting it can’t cost any more than $399.
Well, forget the armchair analysis, because we now have hard numbers. Xbox One X will cost $499 at launch, and will hits store shelves on November 7.
And there you have it, all the basics you need to know about Microsoft’s latest gaming machine. Will Xbox One X be a success? We’ll just have to wait and see if Project Scorpio strikes consumers’ hearts.
