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Microsoft's dropped an internal Natal processor to cheapen the camera at retail, GI's reporting, citing "development sources".

The news tallies with rumours VG247's heard in the past week.

Apparently the hardware change won't have an effect on the motion system's overall lag.

The load previously handled by the chip now falls on one of the machine's other processors, but while taking a "percentage" of performance away from the system, most games don't use up 100 percent of the available processing power anyway.

It was confirmed last night that Natal will release this year.

MCV reported last November that Natal will retail at a sub-?50 price-point.

The details came from a "behind-closed-doors Microsoft tour of UK publishers and studios," with one source saying the camera could cost as little as ?30.

There'll apparently be 5 million launch units.

Source: http://www.vg247.com/2010/01/07/report-nat...ancial-targets/

Hope it has no affect on the lag, from the demos we've seen so far, albeit they're early, lag is noticeable.

Edited by Audioboxer
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Natal consumes 10-15% of 360 CPU power

Natal may have been scaled back since its original concept, but it's still going to take a neat chuck of 360's processing punch when it releases later this year.

Natal's lead developer Alex Kipman told New Scientist at CES this week:

"Natal has to work on the existing hardware without taking too much hardware processing away from the games developers," noting that Natal consumes between 10 to 15 percent of the Xbox's computing power.

"When we train this 'brain' we are telling it: this is the head, this is the shoulder. And we're doing that over millions of frames," Kipman added.

"When it sees a new image it can tell you the probability it's seeing a certain body part based on that historical information."

It was rumoured earlier that a processor has been cut out of the motion-sensing system in an effort to reduce retail cost.

Microsoft confirmed Natal for a 2010 launch in Las Vegas last night.

Thanks, TechRadar.

Source: http://www.vg247.com/2010/01/07/natal-cons...-360-cpu-power/

Removing that on board chip may indeed affect some games usages of Natal then?

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According to Eurogamer it means very few/zero current games will be updated to support Natal. And games like Burnout Paradise which rely on quick movement will be out of the question (it was a stupid idea to begin with anyway)

Edited by Bhav
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Ouch this worries me now. I was going to purchase one, especially since I have 2 kids who loved the concept of the Wii but hated the games.

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I rather pay more than get "not-so-great" product... >,>

or would they have a NATAL ELITE?!?!?!?

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motion capture will never be popular unless someone uses VR technology and makes the 1st person shooter has the ability to view 360 degrees. (think Gamer movie)

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10-15%?!? are you kidding me? Haven't they learned not to do things half assed? I heard the 360 was going to ship with half the ram until the team at epic making gears said no and look how that turned up.... EPIC lol

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I see none of you have done any game development before. game development is all about efficient coding. If Natal takes 10-15 percent of processing power that does not mean games will have less resources to play with. It does not work that way. Current games will be able to use Natal. does that mean that the games supposedly using 100% of 360 resources will stutter? No. It is just a figure of processing which can be brought up or down depending on how the developer efficiently codes it's games. Down the line, because it is software based I would not be suprised that patches can be applied to Natal which will reduce the load on the processor down to 5-8 percent

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10-15% isn't all that bad. Considering the games that they will be playing, don't look all that fine tuned anyways.

I wish people would release the stats on how much of the systems CPU will be used in total when playing Natal. I would rather pay less for the same product, than to pay more and not notice any difference in game performance.

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10-15% isn't all that bad. Considering the games that they will be playing, don't look all that fine tuned anyways.

I wish people would release the stats on how much of the systems CPU will be used in total when playing Natal. I would rather pay less for the same product, than to pay more and not notice any difference in game performance.

I agree, I'm gking to wait for the final product before passing judgement

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They still haven't convinced me it will be good for any other game type than RTS, other than that the only thing that really interests me so far about it would be the ability to navigate my 360 menu and make selections without holding a controller or remote. Would make watching videos from my bed that much easier since i wouldn't have to hold a controller...and no I don't need both hands free that bad lol

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I agree, I'm gking to wait for the final product before passing judgement

I think Microsoft would have done their homework with Natal to make sure this is going to work without many problems. I don't think the product will be laggy or anything.. i mean COD:MW2 runs smoothly on the Xbox360 so Natal games shouldn't be as CPU extensive as regular xbox games.

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I think Microsoft would have done their homework with Natal to make sure this is going to work without many problems. I don't think the product will be laggy or anything.. i mean COD:MW2 runs smoothly on the Xbox360 so Natal games shouldn't be as CPU extensive as regular xbox games.

:s It's not about whether the game is laggy, it's about whether there's a lag between your movement and the action showing up on screen.

And from the demos so far...there definitely is. The challenge is getting that delay as small as possible.

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I get the feeling Natal will be similar to how Live was on the original Xbox - shows real promise but won't be all that it can be until the new console is launched with everything based around it.

PS - Wahey - 400 posts!!! :)

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