No. That’s not an Xbox speaker. It is the Xbox Series S. Think of it as a lite version of the upcoming, next-gen Xbox video game console, the Xbox Series X. Personally, I am no fan of Xbox, but this one here is pretty inviting.
And oh, the eye-catching “speaker grill” is actually a ventilation grill. Too pronounced, IMHO. Other than that, it is a good size machine in lovely white.
The main draw to me is, Xbox Series S is cheap. Like super affordable as far as modern consoles go. We are talking about US$299 kind of affordable. Believe it.
But being ‘cheap’ it does come with some trade offs. There’s no backward compatibility and it is an all-digital machine. Meaning, it has no physical media. Basically, it is a machine that leans toward Game Pass. OK. It is a Game Pass machine.
Digital-only is my only gripe. I am no fan of digital copies of game, let alone subscription-based Game Pass. I relish the days where I could buy a game and not pay for anything else, and then sell it to recoup some money after I am done.
With digital copies, it is not that straight forward. Game Pass is even worst. It is completely and utterly a sunk cost. I don’t believe it is transferable (is it?). The up side is, you get to play many games while on sub.
Even with the “up side”, I still not a fan. Then again, at US$299, it may make me reconsider my stance. I will see how it goes when more details are revealed, which should be anytime now.
Other features expected of the Xbox Series S includes 1,440p at up to 120 fps, DirectX Ray-tracing, variable rate shading, variable refresh rate, “ultra-low latency” (though no specific was offered), custom 512 NVMe SSD, 4K streaming media playback, and 4K upscaling for games.
Microsoft Xbox Series S all-digital console is expected to arrive on November 10, 2020, for the aforementioned Estimate Retail Price of US$299.
Image: Microsoft.
