The new $450 Xbox Series It is a large white brick. It’s so brick-like that it doesn’t even have a slot to put your latest game discs in. But don’t view this redesign as you would the PlayStation 5 Pro from Sony. It is not smaller nor does it include a disc reader, like Sony’s PS5 slim. Inside, it’s another story. Video teardowns show that Microsoft has completely redesigned the inside of the Series X by 2024. Despite that, the slightly cheaper console doesn’t seem to be the redesign Xbox needed.
Starting Tuesday, there are two new versions of the Xbox Series Series S with more storage space. There’s the $600 Galaxy Black edition with a glossy exterior and 2TB of SSD storage. Finally, the digital edition Robot White de 1 TB It costs $50 less than the base price (although the current Series This is the version of Microsoft’s console that should appeal to potential or current Game Pass subscribers.
What about disk readers?
Lately we have heard many complaints about disc players. The $700 PlayStation 5 Pro will be sold without one, and you’ll have to spend an extra $80 to be able to use discs. How does Xbox fit into that debate? The all-white digital console has an otherworldly aesthetic. It looks like an alien device or an oversized children’s building block. I can’t even say it looks like a toaster, especially when the Xbox Series S exists.
The YouTuber Austin Evans weigh-tested and disassembled both the Galaxy Black and Robot White Xbox Series X. Despite having more storage than before, the 2TB version weighs 0.38 pounds less. Without the disc drive, the white version weighs 1 pound less.
Does this matter much for a console that will be in your TV cabinet for the rest of its useful life? No, not really. When you look inside the new version without a disc drive, you’ll see that Xbox removed the drive and left a void. According to Evans, you can’t physically integrate a new disc drive into the digital edition, since the new internal components don’t have the necessary connections to power it.
We bring you the news and important changes
The most drastic and potentially impactful changes revolve around the CPU and cooling system. Xbox reconfigured the motherboard to support a new 6nm SOC, smaller than the original processor. The new consoles now have a completely redesigned heatsink. The new Series X uses heat pipes, while the 2020 version uses a larger vapor chamber. That cooling system is much better than any heat pipe solution, but it is also more expensive. Evans surmised that the smaller chip requires less voltage to achieve current clock speeds, allowing for a less expensive cooling system.
© Austin Evans / YouTube
It’s not like Xbox is the only one to do without a vapor chamber. The PlayStation 5 has used heat pipes in several internal redesigns since its launch in 2020. As Evans noted in previous teardowns, Sony did something similar with its pre-slim PS5, reducing the chip size and heatsink, all without lowering the price.
According to Evans’ testing, the new versions consume less power than the original consoles, about 11W less on average when in menus or during gameplay. They expelled no more or less heat than the originals and they did not sound louder (nothing above a whisper).
The engineering behind the redesign of the new Xbox is significant, but it won’t make a real difference to consumers. You won’t save anything notable on your monthly energy bill. With all the new consoles and internals, it would have been more encouraging to see a reduction, or at least compete on price for more storage, especially if Microsoft is spending less on cooling than before. So, one could make a better case for purchasing one. For now, it’s best to think of these consoles as either exactly the same as before or, in the case of the big white brick, more limited.
This article was translated from Gizmodo US by Lucas Handley. Here you can find the original version.
