[Official] Xbox Series X & Series S Discussion

[spaceelf]

I expected the S to be...well, frankly, not worth my time.  And so far it's been great.

 

I'll still trade up to an X when I can but I'm glad I picked this up.

[George P Global Moderator]

7 hours ago, LostCat said:

I expected the S to be...well, frankly, not worth my time.  And so far it's been great.

 

I'll still trade up to an X when I can but I'm glad I picked this up.

Unless you care about res over frame rate when gaming then the S is a good little box for the price. 

[spaceelf]

35 minutes ago, George P said:

Unless you care about res over frame rate when gaming then the S is a good little box for the price. 

I care about both really, and the One X really wasn't doing it as far as frame rate.  I was avoiding playing plenty of games on there.

[George P Global Moderator]

 

This looks pretty cool for any Series S owners, makes it pretty portable.

[spacelordmaster]

You know, I find it extremely insulting that Microsoft is charging $219.00 for a 1TB Seagate SSD drive and not letting users use an SSD drive of their choice to store and play the games directly from it. Yes, you can use an external USB drive of your choice, but only to store the games. If you want to play them, you have to transfer them to the Xbox internal SSD.

 

Like seriously, WTF where they thinking about? No point in paying $299.00 for an Xbox Series S and then have to spend an extra $219.00 for an SSD. Ridiculous.

[tsupersonic]

On 21/07/2021 at 11:42, spacelordmaster said:

You know, I find it extremely insulting that Microsoft is charging $219.00 for a 1TB Seagate SSD drive and not letting users use an SSD drive of their choice to store and play the games directly from it. Yes, you can use an external USB drive of your choice, but only to store the games. If you want to play them, you have to transfer them to the Xbox internal SSD.

 

Like seriously, WTF where they thinking about? No point in paying $299.00 for an Xbox Series S and then have to spend an extra $219.00 for an SSD. Ridiculous.

I have a Series S, and am ok for the time being on the 500 GB SSD, since I came from an OG Xbox One with 500 GB HDD. We're starting to see more next-gen games (or Series X/S optimized), and they are taking up quite a bit of space, so 500 GB will be less than ideal. I am really hoping once the Seagate exclusivity ends, that more choices will be available, and prices will come down. 

[George P Global Moderator]

Part of the price is the fact it's the smaller cards.  2230 iirc,  compared to the longer 2280s that most people pop into their PC.  Supply and demand aren't the same between the two, so it impacts the price.  It's also a custom setup with it's heatsink etc.   We'll see what happens when it's open to others, I expect some custom adaptor card will hit the market that lets you pop in the longer cards so you can buy what you want.

 

[dipsylalapo Supervisor]

On 21/07/2021 at 16:42, spacelordmaster said:

Yes, you can use an external USB drive of your choice, but only to store the games. If you want to play them, you have to transfer them to the Xbox internal SSD.

Not quite. If you want to make the most of Series X or S games they need to be on the internal SSD, anything else will happily play from the external drive. 

 

For the few games that I've moved from the external HDD to the SSD, it's taken around 5-8 mins for the transfer. Not ideal but hardly painful.

[George P Global Moderator]

On 23/07/2021 at 12:06, dipsylalapo said:

Not quite. If you want to make the most of Series X or S games they need to be on the internal SSD, anything else will happily play from the external drive. 

 

For the few games that I've moved from the external HDD to the SSD, it's taken around 5-8 mins for the transfer. Not ideal but hardly painful.

I think with that time you can plan accordingly.  Maybe not so much if it's a spur of the moment type of deal but otherwise, start the transfer, go do something else and by the time you come back it'll be done.

 

Regardless, I expect the external cards price to drop in time, and also they'll have a bigger 2TB version at some point.

 

For me though, because of how I play most games once (sometimes twice), and then move on, the 1TB internal in my series X will keep me covered.  I just don't keep games installed after I'm done and have moved on.  Plus with game pass anyways, I'm more or less looking at them as rentals.  Play, finish, return (uninstall), then move on.

[spaceelf]

On 21/07/2021 at 10:42, spacelordmaster said:

You know, I find it extremely insulting that Microsoft is charging $219.00 for a 1TB Seagate SSD drive and not letting users use an SSD drive of their choice to store and play the games directly from it. Yes, you can use an external USB drive of your choice, but only to store the games. If you want to play them, you have to transfer them to the Xbox internal SSD.

 

Like seriously, WTF where they thinking about? No point in paying $299.00 for an Xbox Series S and then have to spend an extra $219.00 for an SSD. Ridiculous.

as they said I've played lots of games from an external SSD.  The Series Optimized games need the internal or custom drive, anything else runs great on an external SSD.  I had three external SSDs hooked up at one point, realized I hardly needed that many games installed though.

 

PS5 also won't let you run PS5 games from external storage on another note.

[spacelordmaster]

Are any of these good to use as an external SSD for the Xbox Series S/X? If not, what would you recommend?

 

 

[spaceelf]

If you're going with a straight M.2 drive and enclosure you might want something better equipped for the heat they put out.  I'm considering this one if/when I need it.

 

https://www.amazon.com/ASUS-ROG-Arion-Aluminum-Enclosure/dp/B07ZKB4SLK/ref=sr_1_2?dchild=1&keywords=strix+usb+enclosure&qid=1627485753&sr=8-2

[spacelordmaster]

On 28/07/2021 at 11:24, Randomevent said:

If you're going with a straight M.2 drive and enclosure you might want something better equipped for the heat they put out.  I'm considering this one if/when I need it.

 

https://www.amazon.com/ASUS-ROG-Arion-Aluminum-Enclosure/dp/B07ZKB4SLK/ref=sr_1_2?dchild=1&keywords=strix+usb+enclosure&qid=1627485753&sr=8-2

So what would be an ideal external SSD for the new Xbox consoles? Any recommendations?

[spacelordmaster]

https://www.amazon.com/s?k=WD+M.2+NVMe&i=electronics&ref=nb_sb_noss_2

[spaceelf]

On 28/07/2021 at 13:10, spacelordmaster said:

So what would be an ideal external SSD for the new Xbox consoles? Any recommendations?

The Xbox Series ports appear to only be USB 3.0 still so it might not matter too much.  I like my Crucial X8 and Sandisk Extreme personally, not sure if they're the best options out there but they do the job (the X8 is on my PC atm.)

[spacelordmaster]

Has anyone here tried the Call of Duty HD Textures update on the new Xbox Series S/X?

 

Is this textures update going to make any difference  if you have a 1080p/60Hz monitor?

[spaceelf]

On 01/08/2021 at 01:22, spacelordmaster said:

Has anyone here tried the Call of Duty HD Textures update on the new Xbox Series S/X?

 

Is this textures update going to make any difference  if you have a 1080p/60Hz monitor?

I haven't bought a CoD since....Ghosts was $20?  I think?  So no, but almost all texture packs these days are meant for 4K gaming.

[spacelordmaster]

I have never had a console before in my life. I have always gamed on PCs and I have to tell you I am over impressed with this Xbox Series S console. I cannot believe that this tiny box, the size of a shoe box, can produce such amazing visuals. The Nvidia card on my PC is more expensive than this thing was and its graphics are not as good. It's quite impressive the technology behind this thing. Can't beat it for $279.00 that I paid for it brand new at BestBuy. Got a 10% discount because the box seemed a little damaged but unit inside was fine.

 

I have been playing Call of Duty: Cold War multiplayer and its been a blast. Even got a 1440p monitor to go with it. An LG Ultragear 32GN600-B QHD 165Hz HDR10 Monitor w/FreeSync. Got that baby at Walmart for $239.00. Everywhere else was at $349.00. It looks pretty nice. 

 

I am new at this console thing so its been quite a challenge to work with the controllers but I'm getting used to it. It's one fun little box.

[tsupersonic]

On 05/08/2021 at 00:17, spacelordmaster said:

I have never had a console before in my life. I have always gamed on PCs and I have to tell you I am over impressed with this Xbox Series S console. I cannot believe that this tiny box, the size of a shoe box, can produce such amazing visuals. The Nvidia card on my PC is more expensive than this thing was and its graphics are not as good. It's quite impressive the technology behind this thing. Can't beat it for $279.00 that I paid for it brand new at BestBuy. Got a 10% discount because the box seemed a little damaged but unit inside was fine.

 

I have been playing Call of Duty: Cold War multiplayer and its been a blast. Even got a 1440p monitor to go with it. An LG Ultragear 32GN600-B QHD 165Hz HDR10 Monitor w/FreeSync. Got that baby at Walmart for $239.00. Everywhere else was at $349.00. It looks pretty nice. 

 

I am new at this console thing so its been quite a challenge to work with the controllers but I'm getting used to it. It's one fun little box.

If you don't have it, get Game Pass. Such a great value and allows you to play all sorts of games. 

[spacelordmaster]

On 05/08/2021 at 14:47, tsupersonic said:

If you don't have it, get Game Pass. Such a great value and allows you to play all sorts of games. 

I tried the Game Pass but to be honest, I didn't like the games they have and since all I play is Call of Duty and Battlefield, the Xbox Live Gold seems to be sufficient. It's one powerful little box I can tell you that. Amazing.

[spacelordmaster]

Not happy with the storage SSD on your Xbox Series S? If you are willing to take a chance to replace it yourself with a bigger size SSD, this is the guide for you.

 

Xbox Series S Internal SSD Card Replacement Guide

[spacelordmaster]

I have a technical question for you guys:

 

I have a 1TB SSD connected to my Xbox Series S to save gameplay. Is there any way to access that SSD from Windows through the network without having to unplug it from Xbox and connecting it to the PC?

[George P Global Moderator]

I don't think there is any sort of network share support via the Xbox.   Another way to lock things down probably.   If there is I haven't seen it posted to this day.    You can access network shares going from the PC on the console though.

[George P Global Moderator]

 

Not interested in this but it makes me wonder what other whacky custom XSX designs they can do for other games with the shape of the system.  

[George P Global Moderator]