NowGamer

Xbox 720/Project Durango could well have separate CPUs for running games and system applications, according to a newly uncovered Microsoft patent filing.

The filing, found by Beyond3D (via GAF) seems to back up much of the information found in the alleged Xbox 720 document that recently found it's way online, then was taken down at Microsoft's request.

As summarised on GAF, the patent relates to system architecture which satisfies "quality of service (QoS) guarantees for multimedia applications such as game applications while allowing platform resources, hardware resources in particular, to scale up or down over time".

That suggests Microsoft could create a core gameplay platform/spec for the next Xbox while modifying or updating other console capabilities such as multimedia functionality.

Additionally, "resources of the computer system are partitioned into a platform partition and an application partition, each including its own central processing unit (CPU) and, optionally, graphics processing unit (GPU)" according to the patent, confirming the idea that the next Xbox will come in multiple iterations with a heavy emphasis on capabilities split between games and other functions.

It doesn't mention specs - check out the original leaked document for those.

finally a new rumor

well,this patent coming too late so i guess just a protect,they won't really use it like many other patents we heard

anyway hope next rumor will be something like this one

This is cool news. I'm very interested in MS and Sony's multimedia direction for the upcoming systems. Very cool ideas bring brought to the table, and I don't expect these to be untrue in the end, it actually makes sense.

Makes sense regarding those (possible) DVR rumors and the subscription-based idea to keep the initial cost down.

Looks like Microsoft isn't screwing around when it comes to a multimedia hub unit for their next console.