Alleged Xbox Series X front/back pictures and PCIe 4.0 SSD details get leaked

Xbox fans were eager to get some exclusive details on the upcoming next gen console at CES this year, but Microsoft essentially ditched any Xbox presentations, leaving AMD to hype things up with what later proved to be “unofficial” renders of the rear side port selection that clearly did not reflect what Microsoft intends to deliver with the commercial version of the Xbox Series X models. A few days later, Brad Sams from Thurott presented renders that were supposed to better reflect the port selection on the rear of the new console, and, to prove that his renders were accurate, Sams recently posted pictures of a real life prototype Xbox Series X console.

The new images show the back and the front of the prototype console and confirm Sam’s initial renders. We also get confirmation that the front side will feature a USB-A port for wireless controller quick charge. As for the back side, in addition to the HDMI out, optical audio output, 2x USB-A ports, Ethernet jack and power connector, there appears to be a debugging port for game developers. Close to the digital lock port we can also see a serial number, which apparently is valid, as one twitter user managed to add it to his MS account.

In other news, Twitter user Postradamus discovered a LinkedIn job résumé of an ex-Phison software engineer who claims he helped design the E16 and E19 flagship NVMe controllers from Phison. He specifically mentions that the E19 controller for DRAM-less PCIe Gen 4x4 NVMe SSDs is going to be integrated in Microsoft’s Xbox Scarlett (initial codename for the Series X) console. A quick search on Phison’s site reveals that the E19 controller supports capacities up to 2 TB, but the cited performance figures are actually closer to PCIe 3.0 stats, with sequential reads / writes peaking at 3,700 MB/s and 3,000 MB/s, respectively. Nevertheless, the overall performance should still be increased more than 15 times over the HDD solutions on current gen consoles.