the eye is not worth 100 but kinect 2 definitely might be your joking 180.  the first kinect had a 640x480 cam, no processor, etc...  kinect 2 is a 1080p hd cam w/processor, active ir and more.  thats a big difference.  kinect is still on the market for $79-99  so sans kinect microsoft could drop xbox one to 329-349 range. but the problem is if they dont include it the install base will pretty much be shit considering how bad the 1st one attach rate was

Reference DDR4 chips are at the exact same frequency that they will use with Xbone (2133 Mhz). The only difference is that 2133 effective clock frequency is the max frequency validated by JEDEC for DDR3, while it's the base frequency of DDR4 specifications. It doesn't changet anything either way.

Also DDR4 is nowhere near GDDR5 effective frequency, it's 2133 vs 5500 : x2.5 frquency and then bandwidth at the same bus width.

I doubt the PS Eye is the only reason. The Eye is only $60 retail so it seems highly unlikely that it'd add a further $100 for the asking price of the PS4.

Microsoft decided to make one giant chip of an APU with CPU, GPU and ESRAM in a single chip. The ESRAM on its own takes up 1.6-2.15 billion transistors (out of the 5 billion for the chip). With a chip of that size and complexity it's no surprise the manufacturing costs are going to be high. Keep in mind that a single 7970 GPU (which is AMDs top line GPU) contains 4.3 billion transistors and at release retailed for a little under the cost of a X1. That's without all the added extras of optical drive, PSU, HDD, case etc.

This logic doesn't work. As I stated earlier, look at all the phones and tablets that went up $100 in price from 8 gb to 16 gb just last year.   This hasn't been a $100 dollar cost difference for several years now. 

Sony would not price a console at $460.00.  People are overthinking costs here.  Consoles for the most part launch at $100.00 dollar increments.  IMO $499.99 would be most likely price point.  The camera would not be sold seperately in this scenario and we wouldn't know the MSRP was only 60.

Actually Kinect did pretty well considering the fact that it's an optional peripheral and was released more than halfway into the 360's lifespan.  There aren't too many hardware peripherals in gaming history that can boast the install base / attach rate that the Kinect has enjoyed... it basically gave the 360 a new lease on life for the past few years, allowing it to capture a good chunk of the market that was abandoned by Nintendo once they pulled the plug on the Wii.

The thing that pisses me off though is not only is Kinect 2.0 alot more expensive (and pretty much the only reason why the X1 i $499), but ever since the negative feedback M$ received from the initial X1 reveal focusing too much on Kinect and the TV features, there has been ZERO Kinect-only games demonstrated to show us just how much better the new Kinect is for gaming.  Everything show so far has been optional voice commands or motion controls in games like Forza 5 and Ryse.

So in essence, M$'s mandatory peripheral for the X1 that we are forced to spend an extra $100 for is nothing more than a glorified dashboard, web and app navigator not unlike the standard features that just about every "smart" TV comes equipped with these days.  When you consider the fact that w/out Kinect 2.0, M$ could have potentially released an Xbone core unit for just $350 and undercut Sony again, the same way they released the 360 "core" / "arcade" unit for just $299, which was huge once the PS3's two bundles were revealed to be $200 more than their equivalent 360 bundles.

exactly.

for a company they were so scared of their own success.  the blunder that was the reveal although it was exactly as they said it would be left them with no soul.  i think they listened to much to sony fanboys to be honest.  the xbots didnt mind kinect (shut up if you did middle finger lol) but they just wanted the balance to be more like 75-25 or higher non-kinect focus.  sony fanboys mocked after the tv tv tv sports sports sports tv tv tv cod cod cod fiasco (ironically sony spent almost the same amount of time during e3 talking about the same stuff and not one peep) and all you saw in forums over and over again how many will be kinect, most of  them will be kinect.  so what did microsoft do  show pretty much kinect sports which was obvious.

they could have took the time to show why the new kinect is better but they didnt.  fantasia is a kinect game and people have actually been giving it alot of good words but you would never know.  D4 has dual controls as well.  crimson dragon?  still not sure if they dropped kinect entirely.  ryse total dissapointment but i understand.  went from a kick ass looking kinect game to a kinect controller game to a voice with a few gesturs maybe game. just dance, zumba,  umm...  hell thats how hard it is finding xbox one kinect titles.

kinect for xbox one is a much more capable device they should treat it as such.  not just a cool voice remote

You honestly don't think Sony would launch at $449.99 if they could? In the UK it's £349, the 360 at £279.99 so there's no reason to stick to the 100 increment.

You're making huge assumptions based on tradition.

I don't think it is a huge assumption, when every successful console in the U.S. has launched at even increments of $100.00 save for the Wii.

Exactly!  That is why I think they double screwed themselves with the initial announcement:

-If they show off Kinect again people will light torches and raise pitch-forks.

VS.

-If they don't show kinect the value argument falls on deaf ears because they haven't shown us why Kinect benifits us.