Not gonna happen.

Completely wrong. It would be like a weaker xbox one releasing in 2013, limited to 540p and costing less.

I haven't seen any advertising from MS, so who knows which console they'll put more focus on. All I know is that if the Series X would be the base platform, all of MS's exclusives would push it to the max at 30fps/1440p. On Series S, those games would run at like 540p.

In the end MS will just look at which console sells the most and run with that as the base platform. If that turns out to be Series S they will likely aim for parity and we get the exact same games running at 1080p on Series S vs native 4k on Series X. Imo that would be a serious waste of resources and ps5 games that do target 1440p will no doubt look a lot better, defeating the whole purpose of Series X being the most expensive and most powerful console.

Whew, good thing you have zero insight into what goes on at MS. Your last sentence proves yourself wrong...all that R&D wastes if they don’t plan to make anything of it. 

In your scenario, a Series X game doing 1440p/30 fps would be 540p/30 fps on Series S. That would be a very demanding game with high fidelity graphics, that same product would probably be around 1080p on PS5, assuming current rumors are accurate.

It seems like the obvious solution is simply lowering some visual settings to boost resolution on a Series S version. Whether that be lighting, shadows, draw distance, etc. Hence, the same solutions we've used on PC games for decades.

I think you assume AAA games on a 9TF PS5 might have a focus on 1440p-4K/30 fps. I mean it seems highly unlikely Sony will make 1080p games on PS5. So if the next Horizon:ZD and God of War are 1440p/30 fps, its very likely the Series S could handle those same visuals at 900p-1080p.

Again, my comment assumes rumored specs are true.

The specs of the Series X say otherwise. Its a premium product and i predict the console to be way higher than what many assume here. It will cost more than the XB1X easily.

This is why MS are releasing 2 products instead of one because they know the Series X will be too much for the majority. If its $499 or $549 they wouldn't bother making a Series S so early in my opinion.

The clue is in the name 'Series'. Strongly implies there's going to be more than one, concurrent.

Could be. MS may think SNY will shoot for $399 again with a single SKU, and won't dare go over $499, meaning if they create a premium XB for $599, that they will be guaranteed to have the most powerful console. It would also allow them to announce it really early and feel confident proclaiming it'll be the most powerful console next gen, which is exactly what they've done.

This would also allow them to more legitimately launch a weaker $299-$399 base version, simply for those who can't afford the premium edition. At the same time, this allows them to try and play "monkey in the middle" with PS5. To try and keep sales away from PS5 as much as possible. Take the non dedicated PS fans away at the cheaper and more expensive end of the spectrum. Don't even bother with Pro if it's still on the market, get Lockhart, it's next gen!

While a $299 and $499 next gen XB would also probably work with a $399 PS5, it leaves the door open to PS5 potentially being $499 as well and being the most powerful console by some margin. MS at that point wouldn't really be able to drop the price of the XBSX because it makes Lockhart less and less worth it. SNY could even subsidize PS5 a bit and make the XBSX price drop useless in comparison, while also making PS5 more and more appealing compared to Lockhart. Dropping the price of Lockhart is not going to happen for quite a while either.

MS likely realizes that price can convince many people, if the hardware is deemed worthy enough by the masses. They also seem to realize that premium items sell well enough in general if they are clearly "the" premium product. They no doubt understand that the PS brand is extremely strong and that going head to head with PS5 at the same price would still be an uphill battle, even with somewhat stronger specs.

This type of approach will also either force SNY to "cheap out" somewhat on PS5 to keep the price right in the middle, possibly closer to Lockhart to make PS5 seem like a value deal, or heavily subsidize PS5 early on to offer amazing performance for the price, or launch two consoles of their own. SNY could try and market PS5 at $499, even if it's a clear value at that price, and hope they can make Lockhart look like a lost cause in consumers eyes. That could backfire though. This is also why Lockhart priced around $299 makes sense, because at $399, a 9TF-10TF PS5 at $499 would seem like a steal of a deal, with XBSX only being slightly more powerful for another $100 more. Lockhart wouldn't be as useful at $399 from a marketing perspective here, even though from a dev perspective it would be more worthy.

Lockhart can't be any cheaper than $299 if it's going to play 1080p/60 high settings for the entirety of the gen, so the only way to make a big enough gap is to make XBSX quite expensive. The closer together the two XB prices were, the easier it would be for PS5 to counteract. Mind you, $299 and $599 for a next gen console has never been attempted before and is a gamble in itself. There's no guarantee it would work, or work well for that matter, but at least it wouldn't seem like they're playing SNY's game on SNY's terms.

PS3 at $499 and $599 was not smart and just asking for trouble. XBS consoles at $299 and $599 would be risky, or "bold", but has more thought behind it. Whether it would work or not, we'll see?

Then do you expect the ps5 to sell for $599? $499 for both is the likely price.

As far as we know, they aren't. Only rumors.

From the rumours of the PS5 being a 10TF system, i see Sony aiming towards $499 to $549. I see the Series S going for $299 and the Series X selling for $599+.

This leaves a big enough gap between affordability and Premium prices for the Xbox brand and allows the Series S to be more attractive due to the $200+ savings.

Now it's all speculations. If Sony make an affordable PS5 than this throws a spanner in the entire rumour mill.

Guys, Microsoft will release an affordable base console, for sure, just like ps5, but it will definitely will not be this model SAD, 300dollars is great, but the big majority of people want a disc drive, and be able to buy games in the store. There is no way that the only xbox series that would have a disc drive would be the series X which will cost at least 550 dollars.

They might have a normal S edition with disc drive, even if it would be 350dollars, most people would prefer that rather than being limited to downloads only.

I am willing to bet with anyone that the series S-AD will not be the only base console for Microsoft, they couldn't be that dumb, this is a trillion dollar company, surely they hired some intelligent people to research the gaming market?

Disc drive is even more important that 4TF, can you imagine the only choice being either no discs for cheap, or with discs for 550-600? It would be the whole xbox one launch again haha with people just making fun of it all on the internet and news, this generation it was the whole no used discs, the whole new title of the news would be, no discs at all, no second hand, no lending and sharing with your friends, can you imagine the uproar?