Inside the Xbox 360 Elite (possible 65nm core?)

Zoglog

CAGiversary!
Feedback
1 (100%)
http://www.llamma.com/xbox360/news/inside_the_xbox_360_elite.htm

After much fan fair, false information, bogus reports, speculation, denial of existence and all sorts of forum chatter; the eagerly anticipated Xbox 360 Elite has become a reality. It sports a HDMI port, 120 GB Hard Drive, black case and accessories and some other minor hardware changes which we will discuss later. One thing that remains speculation for the moment is the existence of the sought after 65nm CPU. While the CPU and GPU do have different revision information it is hard to say whether or not it is in fact 65nm. There are other subtle hardware differences that could elude to it being a 65nm core which we will discuss later. Now onto the nuts and bolts. One of our new 360 Elites goes under the knife and gets stripped of its sexy black shell and everything else. What surprises to we have under the hood?

360eliteanimated.gif


oh ho!
 
I'm just going to throw it out there and say that the black wireless controller looks like a cheap third-party knockoff.

However, the black headset's pretty cool.
 
I still don't get why everyone on this site has such a hard on for 65nm chips. Just buy your 360 at Costco and reliability is a mute point now, not in 6 months.
 
[quote name='Purkeynator']I still don't get why everyone on this site has such a hard on for 65nm chips. Just buy your 360 at Costco and reliability is a mute point now, not in 6 months.[/QUOTE]
Costco doesn't offer you the possiblity of a quieter system. The fact that apparently the DVD drives are still the old-style ones isn't a good sign on that front, but if the fans didn't have to work so hard it might help a bit.

Doesn't bother me, but some people can't stand the volume.
 
yeah systems are loud but that is the price we pay for the power. When the PS3 is firing on all cylinders it ain't quiet either. The way people talk about 65nm on this site you would think it would be bulletproof and solve world hunger.
 
[quote name='chakan']Whatever, I'm waiting for 65nm. Mock me if you will[/quote]

Just like I should have waited on the Wii.
 
IMO It indeed does have the 65nm chip, when you go to the interview major nelson had they specifally said "it didn't matter what nm chip it has in it" This is a brush off so people would NOT buy the older 360's.
 
[quote name='Indiana']That picture shows the processors as the same size if you ask me.[/QUOTE]

What has the size of the chip case or the die heat spreader got to do with the size of the silicon wafer inside the chip ?

The chip has the same number of pins which means it is the same physical size ...

The only way we are going to know if it's 65nM is to measure the current drawn on the unit - fairly easy to do - (well difficult for me coz I don't have an elite...) - the other clue is the number of power regulators which I've already posted about - if they have halved the number, then it's a good bet the CPU and/or GPU needs half the power (or enough to justify a single rather than parallel regulators) ..


RBJTech
 
Edit the title!!

The Elite does NOT have 65nm chips. Those morons at Llamma can't see that??? It's as plain as day! You can see the bare die and it has the same square surface area the chips in existing 360s. These are like the old P3s and Celerons, they don't have "heat spreaders." What you see is the die itself. Even Microsoft has stated that they haven't put any 65nm chips into systems yet. Ship-shod reporting like this fly-by-night site Llamma should be avoided.

THESE ARE NOT 65nm CHIPS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! End of story!
 
[quote name='Nogib']Edit the title!!

The Elite does NOT have 65nm chips. Those morons at Llamma can't see that??? It's as plain as day! You can see the bare die and it has the same square surface area the chips in existing 360s. These are like the old P3s and Celerons, they don't have "heat spreaders." What you see is the die itself. Even Microsoft has stated that they haven't put any 65nm chips into systems yet. Ship-shod reporting like this fly-by-night site Llamma should be avoided.

THESE ARE NOT 65nm CHIPS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! End of story![/QUOTE]

Star control 2 FTW :)
I'm no experts when it comes to cores but i'm pretty sure that's not the exposed core, but rather a covering. And I have had one of the old AMD's w/o the covering and the core certainly didn't look like that. It was rather shiny if I remember (since we had to be quite particular not to crack the core with the Fan). Well either way I put it as a ?....
 
The circuit/transistor-resistor layout is a little different because they had to move stuff around to fit in the new i/os, but other than that the center of the board with the CPUs and such is the same.
 
One of the more interesting observations that seems to point to lower power consumption implying a possible 65nm core is the fact that there are some capacitors and transistors that have been removed on this revision of board. Many speculate that because the die is not smaller its not the new core. One argument against this theory is this; if the power requirements drop by half and the die size surface area to dissipate heat is decreased by half; it really is not more thermally efficient.

This really seems like the red herring to me. What gets me is - Why didn't llama report back on noise levels. Surely the device was powered up at some point
 
Looks like a hell of a difference to me. But here is what I dont understand, if they have the console, why not just test both of them out let us know if there is a difference? It wouldnt matter if they looked different if they sounded the same...
 
[quote name='help1']Looks like a hell of a difference to me. But here is what I dont understand, if they have the console, why not just test both of them out let us know if there is a difference? It wouldnt matter if they looked different if they sounded the same...[/quote]

Thats what I was thinking, if they have both systems, why dont they just play them and see if there is a difference instead of showing stupid pictures.
 
for all you people know, the mobos look different on various random xbox 360s - for instance a unit bought at launch and one bought yesterday could look slightly different inside for all i (and probably you) know.
 
[quote name='Zoglog']Star control 2 FTW :) [/QUOTE]

Thanks! ^_^

But yes, it is actually the exposed cores shown there. Like I previously stated, they aren't using any heat spreaders to cover those. Has the motherboard layout been redesigned and streamlined just a hair? Yeah. But these are still not the cooler running 65nm chips. The tools at Llamma could have figured out quite easily. They could have simply looked at the power supply to find out if it's supplying significantly different wattage than the existing 360s do. But no, they have to go and take the whole bloody thing apart and make baseless speculations as to the fabrication process used by the main chips when it's clear to anyone what the truth of the matter actually is. *sigh*
 
I'm more interested in seeing comparison shots of the Premium VS. Elite with the HD add-on hooked up. Could make a HUGE difference because of the HDMI slot.
 
It is really disappointing that these are still using the Hitachi drives... not sure if I want to swap my semi-broken 360 for the regular Premium one in hopes of getting a Benq drive or if I want to get the Elite and have something possibly more reliable. It's a compromise we shouldn't have to make.
 
bread's done
Back
Top