Chark said:
So as crazy as that rumor sounds I was thinking about it and it could be just as possible as not. At first you'd think that there would be no way in hell MS would be in a situation even remotely similar to the RROD, not that this will or would be.
The hardware development process is lengthy and complex. The technology needs to be decided upon, contracts made, tests made, kits handed out to developers. If a problem comes around you might have to work through it as it might be to difficult, costly, and time-consuming to make any big changes.
We've heard the rumors for a while about yield issues regarding the X1. Issues that delayed the original 2012 launch date outlined in the leaked X1 plan overlay document. A delay that would be supported by MS's lack of first party titles in 2012, even if rumors suggest X1 games are behind PS4 games in the development process; perhaps they are, and the X1 would never have had a large stockpile of exclusive titles if it weren't for the delay yet that stockpile is still short of PS4's, if both rumors are considered true that is. Something still possible considering MS's 1st party history and only recent accumulation of studios.
Now, if that delay is more than just a yield issue, but also a heating issue than how do they solve it? They've already delayed it, can't afford that again, so they can try to cool the console down and use the hot chips until a manufacturing fix comes for a remodel. So the console is big and spacey to house a giant fan at low rpms to be quiet, has a titanic head sink, and a vent that is half the console. Sounds like overkill on the cooling end right? It is, unless there is a heating issue they are trying/have to fix. Question is, will all of those over the top heating fixes would they need to underclock to 800-900 gigaflops? Given the cooling extremes the console seems to be taking, maybe it is true. Or maybe they avoided having to with the console design.
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It's not an overheating problem that's causing the downgrade, according to GAF it's a yield problem caused by the design MS have implemented in the APU. To put it as basically as I can from what I've read the ESRAM is taking up a lot of space on the APU leaving other components little space on the die which results in loads of transistors but little power from it as the CPU and GPU are using so little of the die. The problem now is that the ESRAM is pivotal to the console's design as indicated by the below tweet so removing it or changing it is a no go which means the change has to come from the GPU to improve yields, if the console is experiencing heating problems as well then that's even more of a kicker.
