Inside Microsoft's Xbox 360 - A Tour of the 360's Motherboard
by Anand Lal Shimpi on November 18, 2005 12:19 AM EST- Posted in
- Systems
Taking the Surface Tour
Moving away from the ports and looking inwards, we take a look at some of the ICs and other devices present on the Xbox 360's motherboard.
The Xbox 360's OS and other necessary software is loaded in the 128Mb (16MB) NAND Flash device that's on the motherboard:
Originally we assumed the chip below was a TV encoder, but we've since found out that the TV encoder on ATI's Xenos GPU is identical to what is on the ATI Radeon X1000 series of PC graphics cards - meaning the Xbox 360's TV encoder is located on the Xenos GPU itself and makes use of ATI's Xilleon display engine.
If it isn't the TV encoder, then what is this mystery chip? We haven't been able to find the physical interface for the Ethernet port, so it is possible that the 100Mbit PHY is located within this chip, as well as the audio codec, both of which would make sense given its location on the motherboard (within close proximity to the AV cable connector). In addition to those two options, it is possible that this chip may house whatever DRM technology is used in the Xbox 360.
Next up we've got a single 64MB Samsung GDDR3 memory device from the Xbox 360's motherboard; there are a total of 8 of these chips on the motherboard, adding up to the system's full 512MB of unified system memory. The part number on the chip indicates a 700MHz operating frequency, with a 1.4Gbps/pin data rate, which is exactly what is specified by Microsoft:
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Calin - Friday, November 18, 2005 - link
Power can be provided using two complete layers- one for ground, one for power. With the added benefit that, if they separate layers with data connections (those nice lines), they reduce interference between signals on different layers.Lifted - Friday, November 18, 2005 - link
Loading a little faster this time around. Ohh look, pictures!Gigahertz19 - Friday, November 18, 2005 - link
Haha 1st post..who carez about X-Box..I got my PCDonegrim - Friday, November 18, 2005 - link
A pc with a similar spec to the xbox would cost at least 3 times as much, probably more. And to play multiplayer games you would need another pc per person.DrZoidberg - Monday, November 21, 2005 - link
u dont need another pc for multiplayer, u just need to play online multiplayer games.Griswold - Friday, November 18, 2005 - link
3 times the price of an xbox360 isnt that much really. Especially when you think about the tenfold possibilites you have with a PC compared to a console. These arguments just dont cut it. If you can get the games you want to play on the PC you work with, no point in buying a console. If you prefer the console style games and dont really care too much about a PC besides browsing and e-mails, stick to the consoles.If you want the best of both worlds, get both.
I dont own a console because I realized, the games I like to play are simply sub standard as far as playability is concerned on consoles and/or dont exists (yet) and when they do, they play horrible due to other limitations.
Langley951 - Monday, July 23, 2018 - link
The Xbox 360 sold much better than its predecessor, and although not the best-selling console of the seventh generation, it is regarded as a success since it strengthened Microsoft as a major force in the console market at the expense of well-established rivals. https://mcdvoice.me/