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Forums - Microsoft Discussion - "Falcon" much closer than even thought?

Okay on another board I go to that shall remain nameless but is home to many industry insiders (hell no, not neogaf, that place is lame) a guy who appears to know a lot about Falcon, possibly working for MS, or perhaps in Taiwan, has made a few statements in reference to Falcon and the recent articles about it.

 

In response to this article http://www.xbox360wire.co.uk/2007/07/18/redesigned-falcon-xbox-360-coming-sooner-rather-than-later/ in a thread discussing it he said (in various posts not all at once). I have divided his comments by post 1, 2, etc.

Post #1 "That article is rather misleading. It's farther along than you think. The Falcon has been in production for the last couple of weeks. MS is ready for a price drop even now as I type."

 

Post #2 "The northbridge of the system has been drastically reduced. Along with both chips. Power Supply. Heat Sinks. And overall internal metal casing of the system."

Post #3 "
"This is happening over the course of 6 months. It started in May already. When Xenos went to 65nm. Now that MS has bled the retailer space dry. They are ready to start putting the new hardware on shelves. Retailers already know when the price drop will hit."

 

Post #4 "More than likely the final phase of the falcon augmentation will signify some form of newness to the consumer. Whether it be a new color. New Design. Or a special sticker on the box"

So this guy seems reliable and there are MANY industry insiders on this forum so it sounds like Falcon is EXTREMELY close and very cool..

 



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This is exactly what MS need.  They need to have a new board that fixes the RROD and reduced costs.  Although I will be interested to see what kind of price cut they will give the 360.

If indeed it is true that they will be reducing production costs of the CPU, Motherboard and GPU by 50%, then surely this could effectively help them reduce the Core, Premium and Elite costs by at least 30%.

Personally, I reckon they should phase out the Core system and focus primarily on the Elite or the Elite and Premium as the 2 systems of choice.

I also wonder what systems they will produce with the new chipset?  Will they bother with the Core?  They could phase out the remaining Cores with a $199 pricetag and bring in the new Premium's and Elites at $299 and $379 respectively. 



Prediction (June 12th 2017)

Permanent pricedrop for both PS4 Slim and PS4 Pro in October.

PS4 Slim $249 (October 2017)

PS4 Pro $349 (October 2017)

I dont think MS will ever eliminate the Core as Bill Gates is behind it, and it's central to their long term strategy (to entice Madden playing casuals in the future, and certain low income foreign markets).

And the Premium is what they consider their "base" sku, and the Elit is very popular and probably the one they make the most profit (or least losses) on and also has the macho factor of having a bigger HDD than any PS3 model, so I dont see it going away..sadly it seems 3 sku's will remain.

I'm a proponent of the Core, so what I'd love to see is the Elite phase out the Premium and become the new Premium. So after the price drop you'd have $199 Core and $299 120GB Premium (old Elite). That would be a simple lineup with amazing value (IF ms could afford it!) Remember when Elite first came out there were rumors it would eventually become the new premium.

However, I dont see that happening either, really, anytime soon. Especially since MS just announced a 20 gig Halo 3 edition. And the 120GB HDD is probably too expensive for a $299 sku as well.



It was said back in february or march that 65nm components for Xbox360 will go into production by may, so by now the first "Falcon" shipments should start arriving in Microsoft warehouses in the US. Taking that into consideration, the Microsoft pricing srategy is working perfectly. They need to sell out the remaining stock of 90nm Xbox360, build a stock of Falcon Xbox360`s for the price cut, replace the faulty motherboards with new one`s and there is no sence in making the price cut right now because untill Halo3 arrives on store shelves there is no big AAA titles to support price cut and keep the momentum going. We have seen today on Vgcharts that PS3 price cut didnt`t really made such big impact on sales and Wii momentum can`t be stoped with a price cut, so i must say that Microsoft is doing everything right
and we should expect to see price cut simultaneusly with Halo3 relase.



I think it's very likely that the Elite will arrive to Europe at a reduced price already (probably accompanied by a price cut for the other models). If Microsoft drops the Core, that would amount to another non-price-cut (PS3 style), so I hope they don't do that.

My reason for saying that is that it would be a bit stupid to launch the Elite in Europe in August and then reduce its price before Christmas. It's possible, but...

 



My Mario Kart Wii friend code: 2707-1866-0957

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The advantage to the Core is that it brings the 360 that much closer to a $199 cost, typically the magic number for expanding your base. Of course they need to make the Core financially attractive in comparison to the Premium. Packing in free memory cards would be a good idea.



NJ5 said:

I think it's very likely that the Elite will arrive to Europe at a reduced price already (probably accompanied by a price cut for the other models). If Microsoft drops the Core, that would amount to another non-price-cut (PS3 style), so I hope they don't do that.

My reason for saying that is that it would be a bit stupid to launch the Elite in Europe in August and then reduce its price before Christmas. It's possible, but...

 


Isn't that what most people are saying Sony is going to do?



Post #3 "
"This is happening over the course of 6 months. It started in May already. When Xenos went to 65nm. Now that MS has bled the retailer space dry. They are ready to start putting the new hardware on shelves. Retailers already know when the price drop will hit."


I am not sure I would be believing this after this post... normally when retailers find out when a price drop is going to hit the information leaks. I am pretty sure we would have heard something from some other source then some random guy on a website...



I'm sick of waiting for the 65nm -- but as long as it's out by November so I can get a more reliable system, Wii will keep me entertained until then.



If the new chipset is in the Halo Edition 360 I may get it. I was gonna get an Elite but since the Halo 360 has HDMI I don't need to spend the extra money. That's also if the Halo Edition is set at the same price as the Premium.



Love the product, not the company. They love your money, not you.

-TheRealMafoo