Xbox Boss Phil Spencer: Upgradable Console Is A Stretch

An upgradable console might not be something of the future as much as rumors may suggest. Here is what Xbox boss Phil Spencer has to say.

With the Xbox Project Scorpio coming out later this year, word had it that it would be the last generation of consoles and that upcoming consoles would be more like PCs.

An upgradable console might not be something of the future as much as rumors may suggest.

Upgradeable console would suggest that users would be able to open up the device and install components or make alterations but Phil Spencer has made it clear that it will not be the case. According to him that is not the plan.

According to Spencer:

“Am I going to break open my console and start upgrading individual pieces of my console? That’s not our plan. There is something special about what happens with a console. You buy an appliance-like device; you plug it into your TV; it works when you plug it in. It’s not like I’m going to ship a screwdriver set with every console that comes out.”

Upgradable console

While some may say that the idea is not all that different as compared to changing the hard drive on an Xbox One, Spencer has made it clear that such an upgradable console is not what the company is working on and neither is it something that will be coming out in the near future.

The idea that users will open up a console and change compute components inside seems like a stretch to me.

The fact that you are supposed to plug in a console to a display and expect it to work straight out of the box is something understandable. It would be odd to get a console in which you need to replace the CPU and GPU. Plus that would change the size and other aspects of the console and it would not be a console any more.

We will have to see what Microsoft has in mind for the future of the Xbox brand and the console gaming scene. We might hear more about it at E3 this year.

Let us know what you think Microsoft should do and whether or not the idea of an upgradable console is something that you are interested in.

 

Sarmad is our Senior Editor, and is also one of the more refined and cultured among us. He's 25, a finance major, and having the time of his life writing about videogames.