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Phil Spencer Admits Xbox One Install Times 'Should be Faster' - News

by William D'Angelo , posted on 24 October 2014 / 6,344 Views

Xbox boss Phil Spencer admitted to IGN in an interview that Xbox One load times are faster than the PlayStation 4 for some titles. However, for many titles it is much slower. He says one of the reasons is the Xbox One was originally designed to always be connected to the internet.

"The change to having to deal with an offline-only state meant that all the install code-flows weren't as perfect as they could be," said Spencer.

"Our drive's obviously the same speed, moving stuff into memory takes the same amount of time; hard drive speed's basically the same, so what's going on?" he said talking about the PlayStation 4 install times. "I'm capturing the data. I want to be state-of-the-art in install times so people can start playing games as soon as possible. It's high on my priority list."

"There isn't one thing to say why are we two seconds slower on this game or frankly why are we two seconds faster on a different game," he continued. "The issues are a little bit in the weeds. It's really our developer pipeline and our ingestion system where we have to do the most work."

"I'm not defending it at all, because I do think install times should be faster," Spencer added.

"It's one of the things that's on top of my list in terms of the parity experience between us and Sony, and making sure that the install times aren't deficient on Xbox in any way," concluded Spencer.

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A life-long and avid gamer, William D'Angelo was first introduced to VGChartz in 2007. After years of supporting the site, he was brought on in 2010 as a junior analyst, working his way up to lead analyst in 2012. He has expanded his involvement in the gaming community by producing content on his own YouTube channel and Twitch channel dedicated to gaming Let's Plays and tutorials. Outside, in the real world, he has a passion for the outdoors which includes everything from hiking to having received his B.A. in Environmental Studies. You can contact the author at wdangelo@vgchartz.com or on Twitter @TrunksWD.


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18 Comments
adriane23 (on 24 October 2014)

The differences are a lot bigger than 2 seconds, and it will most likely stay that way, unless they re-engineer the Xbox to utilize a separate ARM chip for installs and OS functions like the ps4 does.

  • +5
radha adriane23 (on 27 October 2014)

Is funny how he does not mention that, but still I think they can put one in the a new SKU since is a low level OS thing it might not affect game development

  • +1
GodOfPeace3 (on 25 October 2014)

Weird that he says 2 seconds. The install time differences are more like 13 minutes on Xbox vs 2 minutes on PS4.

  • +3
GodOfPeace3 GodOfPeace3 (on 25 October 2014)

Since I can't edit my post, here is the source for my information:

http://www.thesixthaxis.com/2013/11/28/game-install-times-on-xbox-one-ps4-compared/

  • +1
r3tr0gam3r1337 (on 24 October 2014)

so why did they opt to use the cheapest 2.5" HDD when they could have used a 2.5" SSHD, SSD like performance with the reliability from a conventional HDD, link: http://www.scan.co.uk/products/500gb-seagate-25-solid-state-hybrid-drive-sshd-slim-7mm-sata-6gbs-8gb-ssd-64mb-cache-ncq-pc-mac and as their is now a 1tb XB1 link: http://www.scan.co.uk/products/1tb-seagate-st1000lm014-25-solid-state-hybrid-drive-sata-iii-slim-6gbs-8gb-ssd-64mb-cache-pc-mac
Add your comment...

  • 0
mutantclown (on 24 October 2014)

It will stay on your list forever, Phil.

  • 0
FujiokaMidori (on 24 October 2014)

Why does it seem that Phil Spencer is the only person who knows what the hell's going on. Nintendo DREAMS of having someone like him at the helm, BUT PLEASE UNDERSTANDDDDDDDDD

  • -1
viewsonic9 (on 24 October 2014)

I'm pretty sure the main reason the PS4 installs most games faster is because its GDDR5 memory is 3x faster than the DDR3 in the XB1. Anyone who has upgraded their PC memory knows exactly what a difference it makes to stuff like this.

  • -1
ICStats viewsonic9 (on 24 October 2014)

Games install from Blu-ray, and the Blu-ray read speed is 2000 times lower than the DDR3 memory bandwidth. Memory bandwidth is in no way the bottleneck, so I don't think you have a clue what you're talking about.

  • +2
CosmicSex viewsonic9 (on 24 October 2014)

Actually, the DDR3 should only change loading times, not install times. The reason the PS4 is faster from my understanding has to do with two things, a dedicated background process and how the game is broken up. The background process allows it to continue processing files without using main CPU. The install packages are designed in such a way that you only need a small chuck to get going.

  • +1
DM235 viewsonic9 (on 24 October 2014)

My understanding is that the XBox One does the install, downloads updates (the slowest part) and then lets you play.
The PS4 installs the minimum amount needed, starts the game, and then passes off the rest of the installation / update download to a secondary CPU. Faster memory doesn't really play a part in installation. It's all about that secondary processor.

  • 0
nanarchy viewsonic9 (on 25 October 2014)

I am certain you are wrong, as others have mentioned. memory speeds are exponentially faster than optical drive or HDD speeds, that you think memory plays any significant part shows you don't understand hardware, also anyone that upgraded a PC's memory and saw any difference in install times is telling you lies.

  • +1
radha viewsonic9 (on 27 October 2014)

The ps4 has a dedicated second CPU for background stuff like install and download, so unless they create a new SKU there is not much they can do.

  • 0
teamsilent13 (on 24 October 2014)

This guy should have been in charge way before x1's release. In some ways it's a little too late for all this talk because they can't redesign the console at this point.

  • -2
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