The decision to go with an 8-core 1.6ghz OoO Jaguar cores is still strange to me. Why would anyone go with 8 slow cores at such low clock speeds when a 65W Trinity APU is going to destroy this CPU in every performance metric? Power consumption or saving costs are likely the key drivers here. Even worse, Richland APUs are rumored to launch by March 19th.
http://www.obr-hardware.com/2013/02/world-exclusive-release-date-of-apus.html

From a 6-8 year useful life perspective, it is well worth it to delay the console for 2-3 months to switch out 8-core 1.6ghz Jaguar for a 4-core Richland APU. It would make such a big difference in the long-run in terms of CPU power. Heck, they could drop all the way down to A8-6500 and still have 4-core 4.1ghz Piledriver CPU! The desire to cut corners this generation is unbelievable considering games cost $60 and we are bombarded with $30-40 DLCs/Season Passes and micro-transactions. I mean really these companies couldn't fit a proper quad-core CPU that costs less than $100 in retail? Jeez.

Everything I am reading thus far about the 720 keeps pointing to MS focusing more on entertainment and media rather than gaming. The consoles seem to be moving farther and farther away from their key function and becoming more multi-media devices with a capability to play games. It almost feels like in their desire to attract casuals, they are throwing all these gimmicks like Kinect 2.0, which in the end sacrifices what the console could have been had it been made to target the hardcore gamers, as was the case in the past. I will miss those days.

So Kotaku is in line with the others leaks... I think we won't see so much different configuration in the final machine.

Pretty much what I've Been saying they'll do since February 2012.

As a company can you really blame them though? They'll still have decent third party support and the broad market has much more money potential then the avid group those sacrifices may alarm the so called hardcore group but in the end this group are ever shrinking and becoming more irrelevant as time passes, the whole go all out approach in consoles against the competition is dead and now it's about a balance of being smart and catering to all.

We'll still see great games only we'll be less concerned about raw horse power.

The console makers aren't seeing what's happening or are in denial. Nintendo seems to have already missed the mark and their console is being abandoned by 3rd parties. They are losing exclusives like Rayman Legends and developers are complaining the console is not next generation enough, fearing most people will skip it. Casuals are becoming increasingly more interested in spending $1-3 games on their tablets and smartphones to play at lunch, between classes, on the way to work, at the office, on the train ride from work, etc.. If you buy casual games, you get access for all your iOS and Android devices. That means you can buy 1 game and have 2-3 of your kids playing it on their devices. Some of my friends who teach in grade school say kids growing up now love playing on tablets and smartphones more than on consoles. It's not a waterfall drop off in interest wrt to consoles, but it's definitely there. Consoles are no longer the definitive go to gaming toy. Actually many kids even want iPads over consoles when they are 5-7 years old.

The hardcore gamers are getting completely fed up with some of the direction consoles are moving. Instead of being simpler to use, they might require always on internet connection, block used games, and unlike the past, they might no longer seem that revolutionary. In the past a high-end PC cost thousands of dollars. Now the cost of a gaming PC has come down exponentially where it's pretty affordable to put one together. With things like Steam Big Picture in your living room and incredible prices of PC games online (Trine 2 is going for $3.74 on Steam right now for example), a lot of people may be questioning why they are going to buy a next gen console.  I am not talking about guys like us on this forum who will buy those consoles. I am talking about the general public.

Free to Play market on the PC is set to explode worldwide by 2015.

League of Legends on the PC is now the the most played game in terms of hours per month on any platform/system. It's a Free to Play game....

http://www.geforce.com/Active/en_US/shared/images/articles/join-the-free-to-play-revolution/lol-infographic.png

The console makers are facing major threats from both the hardcore and casual markets simulateneously on competing devices.

Crytek just announced that ALL of its games soon will be free to play, including Crysis 4:

http://www.digitaltrends.com/gaming/crysis-4-free-to-play-crytek-says-its-game-will-all-be-free-to-play-in-the-future/#ixzz2Kk40w791 

The console makers continue to charge $60 for games, MS forces the Xbox Live gold fee to play online and force us to pay high prices for their hard drive upgrades. Now with Xbox 720, they are rumored to force you to install every single game you buy, which means that 500GB hard drive will run out of space in no time and then you are forced to pay $100 for MS's overpriced 1TB drives I bet when in 2014 you'll be able to buy a 3TB drive for that much $. 

So hell ya I am mad that they are shoving us a $400-450 console with such weak CPUs and then dare to sell $60 games as $90-100 games by tacking on additional DLC/Season Passes and micro-transactions. You know Dead Space 3 had 11 Day 1 DLCs??????????????? The console industry is out of touch with reality. They are not prepared to face the future in 3-5 years where you could play 100s of free games on a basic PC/laptop. Starting out with weak hardware is not the answer either. Just look at the Wii U. 

Look at other trends projected for gaming. Consoles are under threat and it's only to increase in the next 5 years. 

Valve Software Boss Expects PC-to-TV Streaming of Video Games to Become Standard Feature.

No Need for Game Consoles: Future TVs to Stream Video Games from Local Desktop PCs

http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/multimedia/display/20130211235428_Valve_Software_Boss_Expects_PC_to_TV_Streaming_of_Video_Games_to_Become_Standard_Feature.html

P.S. I am not mad at you btw :), just releasing some frustraction since I was still hoping deep down the next gen PS4/720 just might use something better than that 8 core Jaguar CPU :(

Sorry but I just don't see it that way, the dedicated gaming platform will always be around even if it has a reduced combined userbase in future, to people online platform holders seem to be making strange moves because the industry has shifted into a direction they're not familiar with so they make assuptions, I still remember a while back when people were saying web games on Facebook were a threat. What's happened in gaming is that it has developed multiple branches, gaming in general is the trunk while F2P, casual market, traditional market, IOS and so on are all branches coming off it with the broad approach being the one that attepts to grab fruit of the most branches, people right now don't understand this because it's a new form gaming overall has taken but will be how it plays out from now on in future.

PCs and TVs can already interact a lot of my friends are PC gamers and use TVs and streaming to them is not going harm consoles as much as you think much like Rayman Legends has about as much impact on Nintendo in the long run as a Kitten scratching a tank, the only exclusives that matter on Nintendo's platforms are the first party it's the main reason anyone gets their platforms and tbh with them they'll be fine for many gens despite the consistent calls of doom, doesn't matter about which developer moans here and there because 4 years from now many of them will be back tracking on statements or say they were misquoted same goes for complaints about the X3.

The so called hardcores can get fed up all they like because as MS realized catering to them still left them with huge financial hits that only Live and the casual market regained. It's time for people to accept the broad approach is here to stay as it rakes in the money and keeps platform holders going, the moves platform holders are doing may upset them but it's of minimal impact to the broad market with only the second hand block being an issue and tbh I don't see that taking off as here in Europe no matter what your terms and conditions the consumer has a right to sell what they've bought trust me it's air tight, the's no way MS will allow one region second hand game and block others as that's legal nightmare waiting to happen they'll just drop the whole second hand block and carry on as normal.

Updated info on Wii U CPU as NeoGAF has chipworks breakdown for CPU now as well.

At this point, Wii U is fully official in every component. Now we just need ground up games built on final dev kits to give us true examples of its full potential.

I'm now expecting the PS4 to blow the Wii U out of the waters, and for Nintendo to have crappy 3rd party support unless they pay for it in one way or another... Quite sad.

LOL :)

I don't see the funny part. Its fully detailed... and there have been no games to push the hardware yet... so yeah.