For almost a year, Sony and Microsoft have been revving up the hype-trains for their semi-new console releases. Both are releasing an improved version of their front-running consoles. The question: Are they worth getting or paying attention to?

Come early November, console gamers are going to experience what has been labeled as a mid-generation refresh. Console gamers experienced one of these years ago with the last-generation consoles.

Basically, before the next generation of consoles are even close to being released, Sony and Microsoft release upgrades to current consoles to hold gamers over until the next generation.

In the PS3 and Xbox 360 generation of consoles, we saw the PS3 Slim and the Xbox 360 Slim, which were slimmer sleeker upgraded versions of the previous models.

Now, Sony released the PS4 Pro and Microsoft is releasing the Xbox One X on Nov. 7. Each of these have some very impressive specs and are really pushing the boundaries of possibility in gaming.

These new, shiny consoles are awesome and all, but we have to remain skeptical for two reasons. The first is that these companies are out for a profit; they love their fans but they love money more. The second is that they are doing this in competition with each other.

On the other hand, they are very much something to be excited about because they both interact with the latest 4K technology in ways that the current platforms do not.

The best way to holistically measure the processing power is in FLOPS which takes all aspects of its specs into account. The current Xbox one had a top performance at 1.31 TeraFLOPS. Microsoft is also releasing the Xbox One S which is replacing the original and becoming their streamline console and it comes in at about 1.4 TeraFLOPS which shows a very marginal difference.

The current PS4 comes in at a slightly higher 1.84 TeraFLOPS. Now the mid-gen upgrade consoles pretty much dwarf these specs. The PS4 Pro comes in at a whopping 4.2 TeraFLOPS which is more than twice that of the last gen.

The Xbox One X has been marketed as the most powerful console on the market and it delivers by clocking in at 6 TeraFLOPS, which is over three times that of the previous consoles.

The Xbox One X also as stated before can output graphics in true 4K, something that gets thrown around a lot but no one really makes an adequate effort to explain what that means.

4K describes the amount of pixels in the video rendering. Most flat screens are 1080p which means the display has 1920 by 1080 pixels. True 4K outputs at 3,840 x 2,160 pixels. The higher the pixels the clearer the picture this is why those old games like Mario seemed blocky because there were so few pixels you can see them.

Anyone can hook a console to a 4K TV but it doesn’t tap the full potential of the display. The Xbox One X does making it the only console so far to do so. The PS4 Pro outputs in mostly 4K but not in true native 4K. It renders 4K in a process called checkerboarding to mimic the clarity of 4K.

As far as storage goes, I think the 1TB hard drive is extremely lackluster. The original models came with half that and they filled extremely fast and these new models will feature bigger games in terms of storage space due to the new 4K games.

The most pressing issue for many gamers out there is the price tag on these fun new toys. The PS4 Pro will come in at $400 and the Xbox One X will come in at whopping $500. These are hefty price tags for these upgrades especially for people that already have hundreds of dollars sunk into the previous models.

The things is none of the new consoles will have exclusive games. All games will still be playable on the previous models you just won’t get the cutting edge experience. So, it isn’t that pressing to upgrade your console now. If you have the money and are excited for this new 4K experience, go for it. Otherwise, you don’t have to buy into the gaming industry’s latest money making scheme.

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