Specs and performance targets for next-gen Xbox leak

There has been a lot of next-gen console talk over the last few weeks, in large part thanks to leaks surrounding the PS5. Now, leaks on the Xbox side are starting to catch up. Last week, we heard that Microsoft is still planning to launch two consoles next year targeting different power and price points. Now, another report has come out detailing the specs and performance targets for the next-gen Xbox in a bit more detail. 

Citing multiple insider sources, Windows Central this week published new details on the next-gen Xbox codenamed ‘Anaconda', the more powerful of the two systems Microsoft has planned. In terms of compute performance, the Xbox One has seen a big jump from the Xbox One S at 1.4 TFLOPS to the Xbox One X at 6 TFLOPS. With Anaconda, sources claim that Microsoft is looking to hit 12 TFLOPS of compute performance, doubling up on the Xbox One X and hopefully leading to the 4K/60 future that the console giants are pushing for. Meanwhile, the cheaper ‘Lockhart' console will sit at around 4 TFLOPS of performance, which matches last week's report claiming that the cheaper next-gen Xbox would be roughly on par with a PS4 Pro.

Both of the next-gen Xbox consoles will sport eight-core CPUs running at around 3.5GHz, although Anaconda will apparently have a higher per core clock than Lockhart. In terms of RAM, Anaconda will sport 16GB of memory, with 13GB available for games and 3GB reserved for the operating system, although that could change. Microsoft did end up changing the OS RAM requirements over the Xbox One generation, so developers could end up being able to utilise more of it eventually.

Finally, just as Sony plans to jump to SSD storage with the PS5, Microsoft is also looking to include an NVMe SSD in the next Xbox. Some of these spec details are based on leaked marketing materials, so things could change in the months prior to announcement. For now, Microsoft is targeting a holiday 2020 release for Project Scarlett, so we'll have to wait a few more months to see the big reveal.

KitGuru Says: The run up to a new generation console launch is always an exciting time, although I am a bit surprised that Lockhart wouldn't be a bit closer to Xbox One X in performance. Of course, hardware is only half the battle here, Microsoft has a ton of new studios, so we'll be hoping for some big showcase games next year too.

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