Microsoft has revealed an exciting new feature of the Xbox One which allows it to detect when it's overheating and take steps to cool itself down.
Messy gamers rejoice! Microsoft has confirmed that the Xbox One will be able to automatically detect when it’s overheating and will also be able to adjust and fix said overheating on the fly.
According to Xbox General Manager of Console Development Leo del Castillo, the Xbox One was intentionally designed with extra room in its frame to help combat overheating as well as internal sensors so it can monitor its own temperature:
“We can’t prevent misuse of the product, but we can certainly anticipate it. The way we designed the box, we don’t actually intend it to ever have to go to maximum speed under normal environmental conditions. But there is overhead. So we’ll allow the fan to go all the way up to its maximum speed and if that solves the condition without the user having to do anything."
Castillo also explains how the Xbox One can actually tone down its power-usage when it detects severe overheating. This naturally comes at a cost of game performance but I’d imagine many gamers would rather have a laggy game instead of a melted console.
"One thing that we have more flexibility with is that we can dial back the power of the box considerably. We had a little less flexibility with the 360. And so basically, if we couldn’t dissipate the heat, there wasn’t a whole lot of leverage we could pull to keep the heat from being generated, so we had a limited amount of time before it just shut down. Xbox One can actually dial it back to a lower power state, so low in fact that it can [be] in a mode that uses virtually no air flow."
Naturally such functions will require a lot of balancing and tweaking but Castillo is confident that they’ll go a long way in maintaining the Xbox One’s longevity.
