Xbox One Slim And Project Scorpio Confirmed At E3, 4K Gaming Comes To Xbox In 2017

The long list of leaks for the Xbox One Slim culminated with the biggest leak yet with image and details Sunday. Microsoft opened its E3 2016 briefing by revealing the Xbox One S with a new controller that supports Bluetooth. The briefing was closed with the company’s new message of gaming beyond generations with Project Scorpio, a seriously upgraded Xbox.

Project Scorpio will arrive in holiday 2017 with 6 teraflops of GPU performance, 8 CPU cores, and 320 GB/s of memory bandwidth. All this extra horsepower is geared towards supporting 4K and virtual reality gaming. Existing Xbox One owners will not be left behind as Xbox Head Phil Spencer promises games will be both backward and forward compatible with the Xbox One to the Xbox One S to Project Scorpio.

“Gamers have never had more choice in how and where they play,” said Spencer. “We are bringing our biggest games lineup ever to Xbox One and Windows 10, uniting gamers across networks on Xbox Live and expanding the Xbox One family of devices with the addition of Xbox One S and Project Scorpio to give gamers more choice in how and where they play. There’s never been a better time to be an Xbox gamer.”

The new Xbox One S will be released this August with a $299 starting price. The console will support hard drives up to 2 TB inside. The starting price is for the 500 GB HDD version with a 1 TB being offered along with a 2 TB launch edition for $399. The console size has been reduced by 40 percent for the Xbox One S, which is drastically smaller than the current version of the console. The size difference is even more impressive when you factor in the news the external power supply is now an internal power supply. This is a first for the console as Microsoft has favored external power supplies since the very first Xbox 360.

Microsoft intentionally made the Xbox One with plenty of breathable space. It wanted to avoid the heat issues the launch version of the Xbox 360 experienced that led to the infamous Red Ring of Death (RROD). This resulted in a larger than expected console, from a consumer standpoint. However, it provided stability for the Xbox One at launch and a generous amount of space and material to cut down. Enough so that it can now stand vertically with the assistance of a stand sold separately.

It is important to note that some room was saved by removing the dedicated Kinect port on the rear of the console. An adapter will now be needed to hook up the motion sensing that is now primarily used for voice commands.

Other features include support for High Dynamic Range (HDR) imaging. This provides a dynamic range of luminosity that is closer to what the human eye see in real life and a higher contrast ratio between lights and darks.

It will also support 4K Ultra HD video from either from Blu-ray or from streaming services like Netflix. This should provide a nice step up for those with 4K HDTVs in their homes.

The Xbox One S will come with an updated design for the Xbox wireless controller. Microsoft has added a textured grip “for enhanced comfort.” It also features new thumbsticks to “reduce wear” and “help maintain accuracy and smooth rotation over the life of the controller.”

Interestingly, the new controller also adds support for Bluetooth. This enables the controller to connect easily to Windows 10 devices running the Windows Anniversary Update. Meanwhile, the wireless signal performance for the Xbox One has also been improved.

The new controller will be included with all Xbox One S consoles, per the Microsoft announcement. They will also be sold separately for $59.99.

[Image via Xbox]