Xbox Lockhart not “holding back” next-gen, design details

Some more details about Xbox Series S, still codenamed Xbox Lockhart, have been disclosed in a recent report from Microsoft insider Brad Sams.

Sams has revealed that the original plans were to release Xbox Series X in late August and Xbox Series S in mid-October, but those had to be changed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

As for the official reveal, the insider mentions that “it’s a bit hard to lock down the exact date but the announcement should be coming sooner, rather than later,” which should mean by the summer because Microsoft’s plans are now much more fluid than in the past and are evolving almost daily.

Sams also has details on the console design, which is expected to be rather different compared to Xbox Series X’s.

As to disguise the product, “Microsoft recommended employees put the hardware in a PC tower, subwoofer, or something else that is quite large.”

“For Lockhart,” instead, “Microsoft has said that the hardware should be disguised by using Durango or Scorpio covers, which means the device is not the same shape as the Series X.”

Also, it seems “concerns” about Lockhart possibly holding back next-gen games on Xbox “have faded as Microsoft has built a strategy of using the same base components across both devices (like Raytracing support and CPU specs).”

Thanks to this work, the only thing to change is said to be resolutions as developers should be able to “target the same visual fidelity for both consoles.”

Xbox Series S is rumored to be coming with a 4 Teraflops GPU “optimized for 1080p displays.”