Xbox One Owner Impressions

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Grand Master

trooper11

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Alright, well this is going to be a wall of text, but , like the ps4, I'm going to share some detailed impressions.

Hardware:--------------------------------

Well the unboxing went without a hitch. I would remark that the bundled headset is actually better then the one they bundled with the 360. Sure, your still going to want to use a better one for the serious headset users, but this one is comfortable and works well if you don?t have that nice high dollar model :laugh:. There is a 14 day trial thrown in, so I decided to make use of that to test the code scanning functions.

So on to the controller. It has a great feel and to be honest, its basically an evolved form of the 360 controller. They already had a great design, so I'm not shocked that not much has changed. The d-pad is of course the biggest improvement. It feels great and that was really my only issue with the 360 controller. The sticks are also different, they have shrunk in size, have more of a dip in the middle, and the edges are actually textured. I hadn't thought the 360 sticks were a problem, but feeling the new sticks shows me that there was room to improve. The small size makes it feel more precise, as if I have greater control. The textured edge also aids in that since I'm no longer slipping off the sticks like I have done more than a few times on the 360. I actually think adding the texture was the best improvement there. The triggers feel fine and are wider than the 360.

I know some have said that the shoulder buttons are a problem now because of their new shape, but it just hasn?t been the impression I have with it. This could be due to the size of my hands. On the 360 controller, the tips of my fingers rest past the edge of each shoulder button, so what actually presses those buttons is the part of my finger behind the first knuckle, if that makes any sense. So what does that mean for the X1 controller. Well funny enough, I actually prefer the new button style because now the buttons actually extend out more and even the tips of my fingers are resting on the buttons. Also, the little bump that they added lines up with that first knuckle, meaning it feels comfortable when I curve my fingers around the shoulder buttons. So this is clearly a change that will come down to your hand/finger size. The weight of the controller seems to be the same as the 360 and the bump from the battery compartment is gone. Its amazing how they made that flush along the back. For me, I cant point to any part of the controller and complain.

I will mention that Kinect hardware wise looks slick, but its not as big as I thought it was. People had been suggesting that it was this beast compared to the first Kinect, but that?s not really the case. I think the design may give that impression because instead of being curved, its now straight edges just like the console itself. In that respect, it matches nicely. It also seems to blend in more with my entertainment center than the old Kinect did, maybe due to the lack of any lights on the front. No problems there.

On to the console itself. First the dreaded power brick :laugh:. Its about the same size as the 360 S brick, which is much smaller than the 360 launch or the 360 revision before the S models. So while I would prefer no brick, this one starts out on the smaller side, which is good. Also, a minor thing, but they changed the plug from the brick to the console. On the 360, it was this pentagon shaped connector that always seem difficult to plug in, especially when your trying to rout cables and plug it into the back of the console without looking. The new connector is simply two round shapes that are painless to plug in every time. So that?s a plus for me.

Alright, so the console is next. I gave it a very close inspection and saw zero blemishes, etc, so good news there. Its not quite as big as I imagined. It certainly is big sure, but for some reason I got the impression it was taller when laying flat. Its actually the same size as my 360 in that direction. As far as the looks go, I fall to pretty much the same feelings I had with my ps4. It?s a muted design, nothing flashy, but that?s a good thing in my book. This thing blends right in with my theater components and the fact that it has so little in way of lights it?s a huge plus. I still don?t like the gloss on these consoles and that is about the only real 'issue' I have. It serves no purpose except to give me more work to do when dusting. Matte all the way! :laugh: . I would also say that the console does not feel heavier than my 360. Honestly, this reminds me of the original Xbox. It was built like a tank and did not win any design awards and yet it was a very reliable console. I get the same impression here. The X1 is built like a tank and I expect it to be very reliable because of that.

Setup/Temps/Sound:--------------------------------------------

 

Setup from first power up until I was at the dash ready to use it took a total of 20 minutes.  The update itself took 8 minutes of that time.  That time also included me scanning in my 14 day trial for Gold (which was very fast by the way).  Nothing to really talk about, the process was relatively painless, walking through various personalized settings.

 

There is a comprehensive settings section that is worth looking through because there are some interesting options some might need to use.

 

A couple that I adjusted:

Under power options - resume games quickly (beta)

Under display - choose color depth and color space 

Regarding temps and sound. I made use of my trusty infrared thermometer for some quick temp numbers. Sound wise, to my ear, the X1 is running quieter than my ps4 (not huge, but noticeable to my ears). That has held so far at idle and under load. I'll do more testing with disc playback as well. You can over course here it if your on top of the console, but anything over a foot and a half and I can't hear it anymore.

The heat is definitely coming out from the top vent near the front of the case, obviously where the cpu/gpu is. That big fan seems to be handling it well though so far. Exhaust temps while idle at the dashboard(and while doing the update process at the start), hovers around 98F. Testing around the over vents is much lower, in the 75-80F range. While playing KI, I was reading as high as 115F from the top corner of the vent, while the sides remained in the same 75-80 range. The case has not felt hot at all, just on warm on top, again just in that front quarter.

Software/UI:--------------------------------------------------------

Performance of the UI is great, I can jump between apps, games, the dash, etc with no lag. The style of the main dash is one that I prefer simply because it looks more pleasing to my eyes on a TV. The layout is quick to navigate and seems less complex than the 360 dash. The pins section is very useful so far to quickly get to whatever I want to pin. Like the ps4 layout, I think MS will need to add filtering options to the marketplace as the library goes. Right now its fine, but that horizontal layout will get cumbersome with tons of content. The use of smaller tiles helps, but it won't be enough later. I do appreciate the way they handled the activity feed though. You can easily filter the groups you want to see and it doesn?t feel so 'in your face' since it?s a separate app you can quickly switch to, or ignore all together if you wish. They could certainly do more such as allow you to filter what types of activities show up in the feed, but otherwise it?s a good first effort.

Thanks to Kinect, there is a feature that seems small, but just feels great concerning the ui. That is scanning in codes. Gone are the days of typing in codes. I know it?s a small thing, but man its just so quick and reliable that it surprises me every time. I can just flash the card up for what seems like 1 or 2 seconds and bam, it reads it and asks me to confirm, which I do via voice quickly and its done. Couldn?t be simpler honestly.

I have had zero trouble loading the apps I wanted. They launch quick and seem very stable. They perform fine as well. Pinning my favorites to the main dash is very helpful. The ESPN app is even better than the 360 version.

UI navigation without voice:

I started by going through all the settings and sections of the dash just with my controller.

Not as bad as I thought it might be. The key is knowing what buttons on the controller do (this is applies to my experience with the ps4 ui as well). I was able to navigate just fine throughout all the settings that are under the 'settings' tile. Also, the menu button on the controller is your best friend. When you press it, it always show some options like going to the general settings page or search, but then more options will show up depending on what you have selected, so its context based. This is what you use to close apps, uninstall apps, etc, etc. Basically it?s a shortcut to the functions you would use most frequently. When you are inside any app, the menu button will take you the menu for that app. The view button will vary from app to app, but in the ESPN app for instance, it toggles you in and out of full screen when watching content.

So all in all, not complaining about that method of navigation so far.

UI navigation with voice:

So obviously this will take a little getting use to, mainly due to strict wording you must use. The more I use it though, the more natural it feels, so the wording most of the time is not cumbersome. The only place it really hurts is when you call out game names and have to say the entire name. They need to work on adding more natural speech recognition overall to make it all feel more natural. Also, you will need to take note of what commands each app supports, since there is no mandatory uniform set of commands once your in an app. The general system of course uses one standard across all interaction and that includes any apps made by MS, but third party apps aren't so uniform.

The voice recognition itself has worked well for me so far. I have tested it sitting 2 feet away and then out to 8 feet. I haven't noticed a huge difference in success rate. I'm at about 90-95% at the moment. For the first half hour so, I would say it was more like the 70% range due to the strict wording I mentioned earlier. When I use the right phrasing, its picking me up nearly every time, without delay. I will need more time try more commands to see if this holds up, but its promising so far. Xbox On and Xbox Turn Off have been the most reliable command for me so far, I don?t think I had to repeat myself once yet for those commands. 'Xbox Record That' also has worked flawlessly for me so far. I made a few clips during KI fights and it worked as intended, waiting for me to go save and/or upload.

As far as learning what commands to use, there is a speech tutorial that goes over the basics, and there is a cheat sheet MS published. But, you can also just navigate the onscreen help to see possible commands. When you say Xbox, everything you see on screen can be accessed by just calling out the name you see. That includes apps, navigating menus, etc, etc. If you wait too long, it stops listening and have to say 'xbox' again, but if your navigating at a regular pace, you will just say xbox once and then just the names from that point forward. I find myself not having to say xbox much while I'm doing something with voice.

So bottom line, how does it shake out? The performance is there, no doubt about that. You can quickly dive into anything from the dash. The vocabulary is pretty large, but there needs to be more work done on building in natural phrases and somehow allow for more 'error' but still take you where you want to go. You can certainly tell that voice is not an add-on. You can literally jump into anything you can with the controller. It?s a 'smart' system, but it could be smarter and that keeps it from being amazing at the moment. Right now, its very usable and I personally love using voice in combination with the controller. I use voice to get me into a section or item, and then the controller for using that 'menu' button, 'view' button or some navigation. I have used voice only for testing media apps, and that feels comfortable as well.

There is a lot to the OS, that much you can tell once you start to dig into it and just play around. Overall, I'm pleased with the experience so far. The performance is great, the layout is straightforward and quick to get where you want to go. Even the less frequently used settings are laid out decently, being grouped under one 'settings' tile. The nagging issues are improving the store navigation through filtering, etc. Its not bad right now, but will get worse as the library grows. Overall, I'm fine with it as a start.

Games:-------------------------------------------------------

Alright, so next would be games. Right now, all I have is Killer Instinct, but I will have Zoo Tycoon and Ryse later to try out. I will be downloading Zoo Tycoon, so I can test out how that experience is. I'll also try out the Kinect Sports Rivals Demo and see how Kinect gesture controls are holding up. The lineup is pretty good, but highly dependent on what type of games you like. Its like any other launch lineup and it may not have anything you want right now.

So playing through Killer Instinct has been great. I'm really enjoying it so far. I'm still working through the dojo (which is a great fighting game tutorial by the way), but just jumping into games vs the cpu felt good. The much improved d-pad really shines here. I still have a lot of practice to do to get the new mechanics down, but Its still fun just using the basics. I haven't jumped online yet, nor will I until I feel confident in know the ins and outs, but its going well so far. The visuals are great with the detailed, moving environments and the detailed character models. You can tell this thing is running at 60 fps because its very smooth in motion. As an old school KI fan, there are tons of nods to the old series. It definitely feels like KI evolved for 2013. I haven't worked through all the characters, but Sabrewulf is still the same insane rush down character I remember from old KI. If he gets you into a corner, watch out.

I'll add further impressions of games once I get to them.

Conclusion:-----------------------------------------------

Alright, overall impression of the entire package. I'm happy so far. I haven't run into any glitches outside of the occasional voice command repeat. The system hasn't given me any crashes or lag during gameplay or when using the multitasking features. The apps are running well and also haven't crashed. Kinect is working well so far. The auto login using my face has been consistently working quickly, in full light or in the dark. The voice commands are good, not great thanks to a strong vocabulary and deep integration across the system, but lacking enough natural voice recognition and absolute reliability to push it over the top.

There is still a lot for me to test such as the tv features (including using my harmony remote instead of a controller), the party system, editing clips in the upload studio, accessing media from a network share, dlna (play to) functions, and more.

Also keep in mind that there are features missing that MS plans to add later. Those include:

-Use any external storage device to store anything from the X1

-Twitch Livestreaming from your X1

-Local media playback

-3D BluRay playback

So like the ps4, the console launches in a somewhat incomplete form. Unless you are just a tech enthusiast or really want to play the launch titles, you wont miss anything by waiting say a year, when the library is going to be much larger and varied. Also, both MS and Sony will be hammering away at improving the Oses with new features, bug fixes, and other tweaks that will result in a much better experience this time next year most likely.

Now bring on more games! :laugh:

Grand Master

trooper11

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Just did a few runs with Kinect Sports Rivals

Surprisingly enough, the controls held up. I actually felt like I was in control and when I made a turn or accelerated, it did what I wanted. I actually got better which each run as I relaxed a bit. The short demo of the jet skiing reminded me of wave race 64 in terms of gameplay. It also throws in voice commands to initiate special bonuses such as boost that you earn by performing tricks during the race. The voice commands were picked up with a hitch during my play through. The course itself was pretty varied, with a share of shortcuts. I can see how this will be a fun party game. If the rest of the sports are as tight control wise, it should be a fun package for the family.

Also, it works fine sitting or standing. It was a lot more comfortable to sit and it still controlled fine.

Of course remember, if you hate motion controls, this wont change that opinion. Those that like it for casual play will be happy to hear that at least this game works properly. I'll be trying out the 2 player mode to see how Kinect like that.

Grand Master

trooper11

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The voice commands could use work. It gets hard many times for the Kinect to pick up what I'm saying.

I'm sure things like accents are playing a part in problems as well. It could be that my voice happens to be something it can handle easier, I don't know. I just haven't had major issues since I learned the commands.

But your right, there is room for improvement. They need more natural voice recognition and and allowing for more error from the user and yet still getting the command right.

Veteran

spudtrooper

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Kinect doesn't like my daughters voice much, but its mostly the way she pronounces things, however Kinect motion sensing for everyone in family is amazing.

 

Played some killer instinct, game is absolute joy to play. May buy one of the character packs in morning. Will be downloading forza in morning as well.

 

My update on boot took about 3 minutes to download and about 6 minutes to install. It felt like it took longer to boot after install than the actual install took, so be patient folks after first patch.

 

UI is very snappy, loving how well apps work. Watching Sherlock with wife on Netflix

 

Edit:

X1 is absolutely quiet, amazingly so! Also, no laser beam lights upfront, logo is very soft glow, looks awesome and hides well.

Veteran

Scazza

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Posted this in the Launch Thread but it can go in here to:

 

Pleased to say that my Xbox One wasn't a lemon. So glad I didn't take the day off because mine wasn't delivered until around 6.30pm yesterday!

 

It was like being a kid at Christmas when it arrived! Everything went smoothly for me, set up fine, installed the update and it was ready to go. 

 

The FIFA 14 was downloadable so I used the 'Xbox, use a code' command and showed the QR Code to Kinect and it automatically started downloading. Whilst that was downloading I queued up SkyDrive, Skype, Upload Studio and what I found to be rather odd, the app that allows BluRay & DVD playback?

 

I purchased Forza 5 & Battlefield 4 (physical disc) and I started by playing some Battlefield 4. It's gorgeous, I didn't play it on the 360 and I must say the visuals are stunning! I have been a COD guy before so it took sometime getting used to controls ect. I am not a fan of how the MP is laid out and it's tough getting in to a game with friends. I did run in to one issue as did a lot of my friends and that would be we'd join a MP session and for some reason be kicked right out to the Xbox Home screen. Also, I do get annoyed with the 'friend session invites' that pop up on BF4 right in the middle of the screen at times, I can be in the middle of a game & it pops up!

 

Forza 5 is stunning! I've completed the 1st 5 races , after 3 races your 'Drivatar' has enough information to put out in to the world of racing which I think is really cool. I was in a party chat with some friends and one of them was playing Forza 5 at the time, my Drivatar was in one of his races and he was raging because it was driving aggressive and was winning most of the races! Haha. 

 

During one Forza race I came in to some trouble with a few shunts, lost control and barrel rolled the car a few times. This was the perfect time to use the 'Xbox, Record That' command. Paused the game, entered Upload Studio, reviewed the clip, trimmed it and uploaded it to SkyDrive. Here it is for you guys.

 

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Grand Master

Showan

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Overall I'm a very happy with the One. I only have 2 games (NBA 2K12, and KI:UE).

I believe, they actually went a bit too small with the controller. Voice can be improved, and will be with updates. Having to say a games full name to go to it is nuts. Especially when you have to say the title and subtitle of the game.

Despite what the Kotaku's and IGN's say, and I'm basing this strictly of the evolution of the 360. The One will be a special box, once Microsoft starts rolling out the updates for the One.

Games are where the similarities begin and end, in comparison with the Wii-U and PS4. When Microsoft said they wanted to dominate the living room, they were very serious about that. The One doesn't make any noise when idle, and very little in terms of the DISC Drive, when spun up. It can be in for hours at a time with only the vents on top being warm (not hot at all) for air flow.

It hard to explain, but everything the One can do feels natural to the experience. Nothing feels like, 'let's throw a bunch of things in the box'... Apps from 3rd party developers feel like a natural part of the One's DNA.

do the current launch games warrant the $500 price tag? I can honestly say, No it does not.

I say the $500 value will be there come Fall of 2014, when titles like TitanFall, Destiny, and Halo have released. 3 heavy hitters in a 6month span. And I'm sure there will be a much needed RPG (or 2 hopefully) along the way as well.

Grand Master

trooper11

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I've been watching my wife play through Zoo Tycoon and its a pretty cool game. Anyone that is a fan of sim games like this will get a lot out of it. Its in depth and seems to have a nice mix of challenge and enjoyment. The visuals are nice as well. You have three main views: The 'Tycoon' overview where you do the Zoo construction tasks; The ground level view where you can walk around your zoo (or drive in your cart) in order to interact with the animal exhibits and get an up close idea of how the guests feel about your zoo; and a view that will follow any animal you choose to do things like get an idea of how the environment is working for the animal, and how its getting along with others. The animals character models are excellent along with the animations they have. You can clearly see the Kinectimals influence shine through regarding how will the animals themselves look and interact with the world around them. If your a fan of cute, you wont be able to get enough of this game :laugh: There is also a co-op mode for those that want to join friends in a zoo.

You can of course use Kinect and voice controls, but that is all optional. My wife mixes in voice commands with the controller. Voice commands come in handy when she is trying to multitask around the zoo and they work reliably.

So yeah, I'm impressed with this being a launch title. I know the type of game it is makes it more niche, but its well done for what it is and its one of those games that casual and core gamers (core sim gamers that is) can enjoy. Even non-gamers like just watching it played :laugh:

Proficient

LightEco

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The dashboard is my biggest disappointment so far. Its just been such a buggy and inconsistent experience. Some examples:

 

-Sometimes the dash is quick and snappy and other times I'll have to hit a button 3 times for anything to happen, only for it then to assume I actually wanted to hit it 3 times and preform multiple actions.

-Many times I'll enter a screen and what was previously on the screen will be shown for second before showing what is supposed to be there

--Example: I hit "Send Message" to compose a message to a friend, it shows "Message Sent!" from a previously sent message before showing the actual message creation screen

-When a friend sends me a message, I hold the guide button, but then I need to select "Read Message" to actually view it. Why is that step even there? There's nothing else I can do on that screen, just show me the message.

-Why do I need to join a party, then enter chat in 2 steps? On Xbox 360, entering the party enabled chat automatically. On top of that, I've gotten "Chat cannot be enabled right now, please try again later" countless times this weekend.

-Why is there no separation of patch download and actual game installation? Inserting a new game disc and it starts installing, but I'm prompted with a "Download Patch?" dialog. Selecting yes results in the "Installation" just chilling at 0% until the download is done, with no way to view its progress.

-2 of the 4 games I tried over the weekend actually didn't even register that a game was inserted. Instead of it auto installing, I just had a tile on the home screen that said "Install Disc". Didn't even say the game name. Only hitting the tile did it update with the name and prompt for patch.

-The Avatar Editor wouldn't work at all on Friday, simple stating "Something terrible had happened, please try again later". On Saturday I got in, but it crashed 3 times.

-I've also had issues with the actual notifications not appearing or taking forever to show up. I did the "Xbox, Record That", and saw Kinect recognized it, but didn't get the "Game Clip Saved" notification until 5 min later. I thought it failed.

--On this point, why does it take so long for notifications to actually, well, notify you. First they animate in for 2 seconds, they display some generic text, then finally the context. To see what achievement I just unlocked I have to wait until it goes through all 3 steps, animating in, saying "Achievement Unlocked", then finally the achievement name and value.

--On consistency, why does the achievement notification look different than all the others? It looks totally out of place.

-Going to the achievement screen for a game directly after unlocking an achievement results in a 2 second refresh delay where the achievement is still shown as locked.

-I've also noticed that pretty much all screen flash for a second while they refresh after opening. Why not refresh the screen's data before displaying it?

 

Some More Oddities:

 

-Why is there no way to sort the "My Games and Apps" view?

-Why is Game DVR and Achievements under "Friends"? Why not call it "Social" or something?

-Why is Game DVR actually called "Upload" yet it isn't the same as "Upload Studio"?

-Why is the messages screen a list of huge tiles that I have to scroll through with no way to group? Can't we do conversations or something?

-Why is the friends screen bright white when the rest of the dashboard is black? Really hurts the eyes in a dark room when switching between them.

-Why is there no reputation detail screen? How do I know how rep is determined?

-What is the weird character in the multiple circles on my profile?

-Why can I only pin certain screens to home and only from the app's tile, not from within the app?

-Why can't I clear my notifications queue?

-Why in privacy can I select "Custom", but have no way to view what that means?

-Why does the clock fade away on the home screen with the only way to view it again to hit "Home" again?

 

I really am trying to love my Xbox One, but its been a bumpy weekend. I can't wait to see what the system can do once a few patches have hit, but for now, its really quite a disaster on the dashboard. The worst thing is that we had some things that worked super great on the Xbox 360 and when implementing it on the Xbox One, they either took a step back or lost features in the process. I'm not saying I even expected it to be perfect or on par with where the 360 was after 8 years, but the whole experience just feels like a tech preview to me. No polish or final features that a RTM release should have.

Grand Master

trooper11

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The dashboard is my biggest disappointment so far. Its just been such a buggy and inconsistent experience. Some examples:

 

........

 

I really am trying to love my Xbox One, but its been a bumpy weekend. I can't wait to see what the system can do once a few patches have hit, but for now, its really quite a disaster on the dashboard. The worst thing is that we had some things that worked super great on the Xbox 360 and when implementing it on the Xbox One, they either took a step back or lost features in the process. I'm not saying I even expected it to be perfect or on par with where the 360 was after 8 years, but the whole experience just feels like a tech preview to me. No polish or final features that a RTM release should have.

You made a lot of good points. I'll run down a few I wanted to remark on:

Game DVR is not called Upload.

There are 3 apps at work there:

Game DVR

Upload

Upload Studio

Game DVR is where you can go and create a manual clip that shows up to the last 5 minutes of play or to clear the 'DVR' to start a new 5 minute block. This app only works as a snapped app. Once you save a clip, your sent to Upload. Upload is the app that allows you to look through all of your clips. You can choose to save these or view them and then edit. If you choose to edit, you are taken to Upload Studio. There you edit a clip and then upload it.

As far as your other issues, I'll run down some thoughts:

1. A lot of them seem to be network related with notifications, achievements, etc, being flaky. I haven't run into those issues yet.

2. You mention performance issues when trying to go to the dash. I have yet to see this either, so I wonder why it would be different from console to console. When I hit the xbox button, it pops over to the dash. If I hold down the button after seeing an achievement flash up, it pops open the achievement page.

3. I did hit the Avatar issue on Friday, but its been fine since. There doesn't seem to be an Avatar store anymore though, but at least you have everything you acquired on the 360.

4. I also ran into the issue of some thing not pinning. The weird thing is, that also cleared up over the weekend. I can pin any tile without getting an error.

5. I believe they put Game DVR in the 'Friends' section because of the emphasis they put on sharing game clips. Clips show up in the activity feed for all to see, so it make sense from that stand point. But remember, you can pin Game DVR/Upload/Upload Studio to your pins if you need to. You wouldn't want to pin GameDVR though since its just a snapped app. Pinning Upload is all you need since you can jump into editing any clip from within Upload.

6. Regarding the 'custom' privacy setting. You can see what the custom setting means by clicking on 'custom'. It takes you to a screen where you can customize each privacy setting to your liking.

7. I actually like the clock fading away. It reminds me of the old guide on the 360. I just push the xbox button and can check the time when I need to. I'm not really interested in seeing it in a corner all the time.

Otherwise, the rest of your points I agree with and hopefully MS is eager to improve the UI and fill in the cracks. Things like adding sorting/filtering options to 'games & apps' and the store are prime examples of features that will be needed as the library of content grows. I think its a decent start actually and a good base to build on. All the issues are certainly fixable with software updates, so MS just needs to eager to bring things together. They seem to be aiming to do that.

Veteran

spudtrooper

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I've seen random issues with Xbox live logins, perhaps that is what is causing your achievement issue?   Achievements always popup as expected.

 

I never have performance issues in the UI, but i haven't had much time to mess around in there. I've just been gaming and watching a lot of hulu/netflix/amazon.

 

I definitely want some time to dig in and check things out in further detail and i expect we will get another update here soon to streamline any rough edges.

All in all though, this is the oddest console launch.  XBL has been running mostly well with all things considered but both consoles were shipped a weee bit too soon but, my wife made me a happy early adopter so i have no complaints :D

Grand Master

Showan

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I've yet to experience any UI or OS problems. My main complaint is, the controller is a tad bit on the small side.

But as far as the experience goes, I would like to have more control over the layout of certain sections of the UI.

My Games & Applications and Notifications should be editable, so that it can be laid out to the end users liking.

My notification section is already cluttered, and I've only had the One for 3days. I can only imagine how junky it's gonna look by the end of the week. Don't even want to think what it's gonna look like in a year.

Folders (even sub-folders) should allowed to be created in the My Games & Apps for better organization. So I can have a folder for games, and sub-folders for RPG's, Sports, Shooter, etc. And the folders can be pin'able

It does drive me up the wall, that the One seems to make a game clip, for every little thing... I don't need a million clips for dunking in NBA 2K14. At least I can manually delete them.

Grand Master

jerzdawg

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I wont add as much as everyone but here we go:

 

Setup - very easy and the first patch downloaded very quick.  The green xbox screen is a bit nerve racking the 2 times you see it (before and after the patch).  I was very nervous just waiting for something to happen... If I didnt read reviews about it already I would have really been stressing.

 

Use - love just about everything.  The voice commands work very well for me, Ive only used the TV ones like goto HBO etc and the record that feature while playng Killer Instinct.  The controller is great, I thought the 360 contoller was near perfect and this is even better.  I am still waiting on my games to come from Amazon so I was limited to KI and the Rivals demo (which I felt the kinect controls were great, big improvement from kinect 1.0)

 

DNLA - streamed a few avi and mp4 movies with no issues using the Play To function on my laptop.  As expected, mkv files did not..

 

One major gripe - I mentioned this in the other thread but felt it should go here as this is the one thing that really irks me.  The xbox does NOT passthrough hdmi while off.  While I enjoy using the tv features... I do not feel like my xbox should be powered on as long as the tv is on.  Sometimes on the weekend my tv is on for 12+ hours a day (football).  My receiver has a standby mode and when I press the power button the cable signal and audio passthrough over to the TV. Not the case with the xbox, xbox is powered off... no signal is being sent to my receiver.  I have decided to pick up a hdmi splitter (as suggested) so i can continue to use the tv features when I want.

 

So for now, I rate it at a 4.5/5 - overall very happy with everything minus the passthrough, just doesnt make sense that they didnt include this at least as an option

Grand Master

BajiRav

Posted
Posted

DNLA - streamed a few avi and mp4 movies with no issues using the Play To function on my laptop.  As expected, mkv files did not..

I know this is not really convenient but have you tried Play To with M2TS files? (They work for me on 360). Most common MKVs have H.264+AC3 in them which is same as M2TS. All PS* and Xbox* support that format.

Try remuxing a MKV into M2TS and see if that works.

http://ps3muxer.org/

Proficient

LightEco

Posted
Posted
trooper11, on 25 Nov 2013 - 00:18, said:

Game DVR is not called Upload.

There are 3 apps at work there:

Game DVR

Upload

Upload Studio

 

I think this is the major issue at play here. It seems that Microsoft made the core dashboard launcher and then modularized everything else into individual apps that feel like they were made by different teams. This leads to a rather jarring experience when every other page you enter has its own splash screen and every app feels rather different from the others. Do I really need a splash screen to view a list of my games and apps or to go from friends to achievements? On the 360 everything felt like it was an integral part of the dashboard and had to be integrated carefully. While most "apps" here share the same UI design theory, they don't all follow it in practice, leading to a majority of my complaints above. I would love to see the rifts between the apps flattened out a bit more - kill the splash screens, enforce a common theming color (including background), etc.

 

As for the Game DVR example, its really jarring because the button in Friends is literally labeled "Game DVR", but hitting it opens "Upload". That is just terrible UI design. Its like clicking a shortcut on your computer called "Word Processor" and the computer opening Word.

 

Like you said though, I can't wait for future updates. The console has a lot of potential and I would hate to see it fail due to a ton of little problems like these.

  • deadonthefloor
  • Like 1
Grand Master

trooper11

Posted
  • Author
Posted

I think this is the major issue at play here. It seems that Microsoft made the core dashboard launcher and then modularized everything else into individual apps that feel like they were made by different teams. This leads to a rather jarring experience when every other page you enter has its own splash screen and every app feels rather different from the others. Do I really need a splash screen to view a list of my games and apps or to go from friends to achievements? On the 360 everything felt like it was an integral part of the dashboard and had to be integrated carefully. While most "apps" here share the same UI design theory, they don't all follow it in practice, leading to a majority of my complaints above. I would love to see the rifts between the apps flattened out a bit more - kill the splash screens, enforce a common theming color (including background), etc.

 

As for the Game DVR example, its really jarring because the button in Friends is literally labeled "Game DVR", but hitting it opens "Upload". That is just terrible UI design. Its like clicking a shortcut on your computer called "Word Processor" and the computer opening Word.

 

Like you said though, I can't wait for future updates. The console has a lot of potential and I would hate to see it fail due to a ton of little problems like these.

Great points. I agree that they can certainly work on unifying these apps more with the overall system in terms of design. There are definitely lingering issue that can be ironed out.

As far as the Game DVR thing, I agree that they need to either change the name or combine functions with say 'Upload'

Veteran

IceBreakerG

Posted
Posted

I've posted a few of the things I've thought about the system so far in the launch thread, but here's an "official" mini-review I guess:

 

Things I Like

  • The performance of the new dashboard is leaps and bounds better than the 360.  Switching in and out of apps is fast and fluid, and while it can get a little laggy, is still very nice.
  • The voice commands with Kinect 2.0 are very impressive.  It's very similar to the way speech recognition works on Windows now, but I'm sure it'll get better over time too.
  • The new controller is awesome in almost every way (I'll point out the negative below).  The feel, the triggers, the new dpad (which has a very nice feel to it), the weight.  All good stuff.  I also like that they moved the guide button further up as well, as this pretty much eliminates accidental presses (it's happened more than I care to mention on the 360).
  • The overall experience of using the system, from the controller to the voice commands together is great.  Just using the system in general feels completely different from anything else I've used.
  • Going back to voice commands, being able to quickly get to pretty much any app from anywhere in the system by just saying "Xbox go to <app name>" is so much faster in most cases than using the controller, not to mention other things that would be more difficult to get to (like the help menu).
  • Voice chat quality is much improved over the 360.

Things I Don't Like (Or Needs Improvement)

  • The navigation can be very confusing at first.  Too many things are buried in other areas that make it difficult to get to (at least without using voice commands).  The UI navigation needs to seriously be reworked to make it easier to move around (ie. the store example, if you go to an app in the store, pressing the back button doesn't take you to the home page of the store, it takes you to the home screen.  Going back to the store takes you back to the app page.  This is not intuitive at all).
  • Party "chat" is muted by default.  Seriously?  Who made this stupid decision?  If I'm joining a party "chat" I expect to be able to chat.  It also seems that party chat can be a little slow in general too if you're in a game.
  • The whole 3 app deal with the Game DVR, Upload and Upload Studio.  Seriously, this needs to be one app.  Also, Game DVR really needs to allow for recording of clips longer than 5mins.  For something as small as a boss fight, that can take longer than 5mins.
  • Small gripe here, but when you use the voice command "Xbox Select...", often it stops listening on it's own too soon, especially if I'm waiting for something to load, by the time it loads I don't have enough time to read the options then say them before it stops, which makes me have to repeater the command.
  • Before yesterday and today, I never saw an achievement notification.  Apparently, you can only unlock achievements if you're online.  This is something that seriously needs to be fixed, because I'm always online.

Oveall, I'm happy with the system.  It's not perfect by any means, but all the issues I have with it can be fixed through software updates later on.

Grand Master

deadonthefloor

Posted
Posted

Time for me to chime in on my launch experience.

 

Due to my own stupidity, I had to make a 90min round trip to the next town over to pick it up.

 

Once I got home is when the problems began.

 

Unboxing:  Protective plastic on the shiny parts was not completely covering the unit, so there is some surface scratches.  This is a non-issue, just a sad inconvenience.

 

Controller is not assembled properly.  The left palm grip is off by about .5MM which means the outer edge has a ridge, and the inner edge has a sharp edge where the three plastic bits meet.  I felt soreness where the ridge was after playing DR3 for 3 hrs straight.

 

 

The rest of my experience is in line with the rest of the folks here.

 

I don't know how to join my friend's DR3 game though, as online seems to do automagic matchmaking.

Grand Master

Dinggus

Posted
Posted

I know this is not really convenient but have you tried Play To with M2TS files? (They work for me on 360). Most common MKVs have H.264+AC3 in them which is same as M2TS. All PS* and Xbox* support that format.

Try remuxing a MKV into M2TS and see if that works.

http://ps3muxer.org/

 

I have many files, how long does it take to convert? Can you convert multiple files?

 

---

 

The only issue I have right now is Kinect / voice commands. Apparently I need my Kinect to be mounted above the TV. What are people using to mount their Kinect to the top of the TV?

Grand Master

jerzdawg

Posted
Posted

I have many files, how long does it take to convert? Can you convert multiple files?

 

---

 

The only issue I have right now is Kinect / voice commands. Apparently I need my Kinect to be mounted above the TV. What are people using to mount their Kinect to the top of the TV?

why do you need to have it on top of your tv?  mine is not and I have no issues with the voice commands..

Grand Master

Dinggus

Posted
Posted

why do you need to have it on top of your tv?  mine is not and I have no issues with the voice commands..

 

Thought installation said Kinect works best high up. I don't know, I didn't set my Xbox One up, my roommate did and we have an Ikea media center, so it's like low-profile the ground.

Grand Master

jerzdawg

Posted
Posted

Time for me to chime in on my launch experience.

 

Due to my own stupidity, I had to make a 90min round trip to the next town over to pick it up.

 

Once I got home is when the problems began.

 

Unboxing:  Protective plastic on the shiny parts was not completely covering the unit, so there is some surface scratches.  This is a non-issue, just a sad inconvenience.

 

Controller is not assembled properly.  The left palm grip is off by about .5MM which means the outer edge has a ridge, and the inner edge has a sharp edge where the three plastic bits meet.  I felt soreness where the ridge was after playing DR3 for 3 hrs straight.

 

 

The rest of my experience is in line with the rest of the folks here.

 

I don't know how to join my friend's DR3 game though, as online seems to do automagic matchmaking.

have you tried join his party first?I havent had a chance to do the online co-op yet on DR3

Veteran

spudtrooper

Posted
Posted

Thought installation said Kinect works best high up. I don't know, I didn't set my Xbox One up, my roommate did and we have an Ikea media center, so it's like low-profile the ground.

Mine seems to work better right in the middle. The install game gives the same recommendation, up to something like 1.7m high but in some games it will complain it can't see floor at that height for me. I'm building a small shelf to go right under the tv

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