As someone who doesn’t own an Xbox I have no idea what the difference is and that’s a huge knock on their marketing and product teams.
X is the flagship console, while S is the lower cost version. They’re both current gen.
Oh I thought the S was the refreshed last gen Xbox One?
No, that's the Xbox One S. This is the Xbox Series S.
That's hilarious. I'll never understand why they named these consoles in such a way
It becomes even more confusing when you think about the fact that the Xbox One is not the Xbox 1, which was just the Xbox. And that the Xbox One X, the souped up version of the Xbox One, can be abbreviated as the XBOX, which again, is not the original Xbox.
Don't forget they skipped 359 console gens on their second try.
These people are beyond stupid. Every single one of them needs to be fired.
They thought people would be confused by the Xbox 2 going up against the PlayStation 3 so they deliberately adotped even more confusing names.
Not really. If you were going to buy an xbox, you would either just buy the cheaper version, the more expensive version assuming its just better, or look up the difference.
Ehhh consumers will figure it out
lol
Consumers who were already going to buy an xbox will figure it out, the rest will just buy the cheap one
look up the difference
Sounds like too much effort
It makes sense. It may suprise a lot of people on here but their biggest market is not the people who demand 4k 60FPS in all games and will riot if they don't get it. Their main market is kids playing FIFA and Minecraft and other casual gamers who just enjoy fun games at a reasonable budget. For that they really got it right with the Series S.
Nintendo understanding this market is a big part of how they've been outselling MS and Sony in the Wii and Switch generations despite being behind on hardware power.
Makes sense because the Series S is dumb cheap. Only the Steam Deck can compare in terms of value
I would argue that the Steam Deck's emulation capabilities surpass the Xbox. It might not play the latest games at amazing quality and performance, but it covers a wide breadth of games, far wider than what Xbox supports.
Depends on whether you're willing to spend $20 to turn your Series S into a devkit, at which point the S can be an utter beast for emulation.
Alternatively 2$ if your region is set to Turkey.
The Steam Deck is more expensive.
Series S: $274.95
https://store.steampowered.com/steamdeck
Steam Deck: $359.10
And that's for the low-end Steam Deck. The nicest one is $519.20, almost twice what the Series S runs.
Compete in terms of value, not price. The series S gets you Xbox's current gen game library and a selection of 360 games, and if you're willing to use dev mode a powerful emulation suite. Deck gets a huge percentage of Steam's 20-year catalog as one-click installs, most other PC games that don't use anticheat as slightly more involved installs, every PC game if you want to install windows, and also a powerful emulation suite. Plus it's a dockable handheld instead of something that needs a monitor and controller.
The series S has better media apps and can be woken up from the couch, though.
the steam deck is also just a regular ol' PC so you can use it for non-gaming stuff like making a lil' drawing on the go, or plug in some peripherals and just.. use it like an honestly pretty okay performance desktop.
Steam deck is a mobile PC. That's infinitely more valuable than a locked down platform device.
I mean, I would rather have a Steam Deck too, but then we're getting into how much people value openness versus price, and that's definitely not a constant; some people aren't going to care much about openness.
That said, if I were trying to compare Valve's offering and Microsoft's offering, I'd probably compare a desktop PC running Steam to the XBox, as they're more-physically-comparable in terms of what they can do; the Series S doesn't have one having to pay for mobility. If one were comparing to a mobile console, then sure, the Deck is a legit comparison.
I still would say that the XBox Series S is going to be cheaper on the low end, though, than a desktop PC. You can get a $279 PC that can play games and a comparable controller, but I'd bet that it'd be more-limited than a Series S.
That being said, Microsoft sells the XBox at a loss, and then makes it back by jacking up the price of games:
https://www.pcmag.com/news/microsoft-says-xbox-consoles-have-always-been-sold-at-a-loss
As VGC points out, Wright was also asked if there's ever been a profit generated from an Xbox console sale, which she confirmed has never happened. To put that in context, Microsoft has been selling Xbox consoles for nearly 20 years now, including the original Xbox, the Xbox 360, Xbox One, and now the Xbox Series X and Series S. In all that time, every single console sale cost Microsoft money.
The reason game consoles end up being profitable is through a combination of software, service, and accessory sales, but it's still surprising to find Microsoft has never achieved hardware profitability. Analyst Daniel Ahmad confirmed that the PS4 eventually became profitable for Sony and that Nintendo developed the Switch to be profitable quickly, so Microsoft is the odd one out.
We know that consumers weight the up-front price of hardware disproportionately -- that's why you have companies selling cell phones at a loss, locking them to their network, and then making the money back in increased subscription fees. I assume that that's to try to take advantage of that phenomenon.
If you wanted to compare the full price that you pay over the lifetime of the console, one would probably need to account for the increased game price on consoles and how many games someone would buy.
Now, all that being said, I don't have a Series S or a Series X, and I'm not arguing that someone should buy them. I have a Linux PC for gaming precisely because I do value openness, so in terms of which system I'd rather have, you're preaching to the choir. I'm just saying that I don't think that I'd agree with the above statement that the Deck is as cheap as the Series S.
Well yeah, most people are still using 1080p TVs. Your average console gamer doesn't need 4K, nor do they care about framerates. They just want to play games*.
As an average gamer, i say you are right!
I mean, for a long time the Series S was all I saw in stores.
The “S” had a good two years lead in availability, so anyone who needed to replace their console got that. Anyone impatient got that.
Personally I gave up after two years not being able to get my kids X’s, and instead built gaming computers with them. No more xboxes
The S is very popular in the rest of the world precisely because of its cheap price and gamepass.
I'm 95% a PC gamer, but if I was a broke college student, a Series S plus Game Pass would keep me busy all the way through school.
I have both X and S and love the S. It's almost portable, small, slick and gives enough power to enjoy games when I'm not in front of huge tv.
I own a Series X, but I also own a 4k TV. So, for me, it made sense to spend the extra $$$ and get a console that could truly utilize my TV's capabilities. If I had a 1080p TV, I probably would have gone with the Series S.
I always figured that was exactly why they had both consoles.
I feel like that's like saying the MacBook air is more popular than the MacBook pro...
It's an absurd value. I have two that I just use as media centers and the house. You can also travel with it very easily. About the same size as my switch one you put a travel case on it.
I wouldn't buy one just for media. Even premium media players like NVIDIA SHIELD TV or Apple TV cost less than Xbox Series S.
And they don't also serve as a current gen console.
Well sure, but you said you just use them as media centers. Unless you count games as media too. But for just viewing streaming services there are cheaper options.
Heck, a Roku Streaming Stick is enough for me in that regard and many smart TVs have that stuff built into them by now.
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