Xbox Series X Dev Kit comes with 40GB GDDR6 RAM

Nivedita Bangari

Apr 25

While looking for a fascinating topic for a tech firm, gamers Nexus recently purchased one of Microsoft's Xbox Series X Developer Kits (XDK). The TechTuber bought the hardware on eBay for around $1,500 after receiving a tip from a reader. Unfortunately, before Gamers Nexus could do any software testing, Microsoft banned the system.

Nonetheless, Gamers Nexus persevered in their investigation of the mystery XDK's hardware, discovering, among other things, that it comes with 40GB of GDDR6 installed. The consumer console, for example, contains 16GB of GDDR6 memory.

Steve Burke, editor-in-chief of Gamers Nexus, demonstrated Microsoft's XDK hardware. Following the announcement that there will be no gaming/software tests due to Microsoft's tragic machine prohibition, we were given a tour of the machine's exterior.

The XDK resembles the Xbox One X dev kit and hence differs from the Xbox Series X 'tower' that was shipped to customers. Burke emphasized a front panel display that can indicate the status of various internal hardware components as well as customize shortcuts and the array of five buttons above the display, among other things.

At roughly 9 minutes and 20 seconds into the movie, the motherboard was finally revealed. However, before moving on to perform component tests, the host spent some time looking at the thermals and other features of the construction.

Watch the Xbox Series X Dev Kit teardown video below

Burke investigated both sides of the XDK motherboard at 16 minutes and 50 seconds into the video, verifying that 40GB of 14 Gbps GDDR6 is onboard. Furthermore, research has shown that the 20 memory modules (10 on each side of the PCB, encircling the APU socket) are each 16GB (2GB) in capacity, totaling 40GB GDDR6 onboard RAM.

When developers run debug software in the background, work with non-optimized code, and decompress builds onto the console, the XDK has a lot of RAM. Burke believes that the memory quota in this dev kit is one of the reasons why early rumors regarding the Xbox Series X consumer console stated it will come with a massive memory capacity. Instead, Microsoft's console received 16GB of GDDR6 memory.

Burke ended the video by asking his followers if they had any suggestions for how to play games on the forbidden device. Unfortunately, if that plea for aid goes unanswered, this gear will be dismantled, framed, and displayed on a wall.