Really, Pachter? By the time the NeXbox and PS4 go into mass production, the prices of HDDs will have dropped to new time lows. The least either of those will have is a ~100GB HDD. And I can see the top of the line PS4s having a 500GB HDD.

Releasing consoles with low capacity HDDs could be used to give room for SKU upgrades, so it's a bit reasonable to launch them with 160 HDDs, or maybe even 64 GB SSDs if they prefer quality, and upgrade it to, say,320-500 GB in some three years.

But 4 GB? Really? Maybe the WII-U will release with some 8 GB of fast access memory, but 4 GB is pushing it.

I fully expect M$ to launch a 4gb system. lol

Ya Pachter is just getting derpy lol

if they do come w 4 gig ill just get a wii u then ,

because these download heavy consoles need more then 250 gig next gen thats for sure , im already down to 50 gigs on my xbox360 and i refuse to settle for 4 gigs any more , what about my music huh , forget it microsoft keep your crap the only possible way ill be satisfied w 4 gig is if they both ditch online period .  

go back to what games ment to be split screen  , fun  no pay to play no crap like 2 maps for `10 dollars 

but thats a pipe dream thatr wont come true ,  thanks to xbox and its crappy online that charges ya 60 a year to enjoy multiplayer which should be free of charge !  been free for 20 plus years on nintendos and sonys platforms  ,  but on their platforms its sorry you gotta pay . . 

i wont buy an xbox if it only comes with even 120 gig that is not enough ,    

500 gigs for 300 dollars. fine , but 4 gigs 300-plus dollars- take it up your b ackside

4gb? What, no way. 250GB will be minimum I think.

4GB? i have easily filled my 160GB ps3 and 250GB 360, 4GB next gen would be fail, on any system.

Pachter comment suggest that the 360 and ps4 will ship with large hdd storage but will also offer a small hdd alternative for a low end price point.

HDD prices should level out by 2014, so I doubt there will be that many concessions from anyone. I'd say HDD size will go up, maybe 20gb for an "arcade" console, but more like 250gb/500gb options. Dare I say terabyte....nah, I think I'd see someone use a solid state drive before that.

Yeah OK. With games running better after optional installs (or even in some cases mandatory like for PS3's BluRay, or for extra content like BF3's multiplayer and HD texture packs on 360), and with an even greater focus on DLC and digital distribution in the future, launching a next-gen console with such a small amount of memory out of the box would be suicidal.

Wii U has already been confirmed to have onboard flash memory, probably in the 4-8GB range, and we know Nintendo likes to do everything ass backwards, so not having an HDD is really a non-issue for them.