RIP Kinect: 2010-2017(ish)

Discontinued USB adapter is the last nail in the coffin for influential tech.

Read the whole story

 

[TheNinja]

The problem with this analysis is that Microsoft is one of the top R&D spenders in the world. They are the #1 spender in internet/software, more than Google and Apple.

I'm not saying they spend too little, I'm saying they scatter in too many things, many that don't see the light in the end. There are stories where this clearly harmed their market position.

 

[Rommel102]

Worst part is that they neutered the OneGuide voice controls in the last update to the point that it’s virtually useless now, for no particular reason at all.

I rarely game nowadays but used to control my STB with Kinect voice commands every day. Now it only controls power and volume. You can tune to a specific channel, but it misheard the likes of CBS, TBS, and PBS half the time. That functionality is still present, though. But the cool voice-navigated TV guide is outright gone.

After they did that, I vowed to never buy another Xbox or Xbox game again. Microsoft deliberately broke working functionality that I paid good money for on launch day for no reason. I want my money back.

Try re-configuring. Mine still works fine even on XBX.

 

[bioadam]

Kill off the Kinect, fine. But give us really good microphone options then.... (not something where I need to wear a microphone)

It is funny that when you set up a new Xbox, it wants to you to use Cortana, but neither the Xbox nor the controller come with a microphone. If Sony can put a touch pad, lights, motion control, and a speaker in their controller, surely Microsoft can put a microphone in its controller. Meanwhile, my TV remote has microphone and it works well enough.

 

[TD912]

I think where Microsoft really screwed up Kinect was with regards to Cortana and smart speaker/assistant integration.

Literally years before Amazon Echo and Alexa ruled the landscape and defined a market, Microsoft had a computer (Xbox One) with a powerful microphone array (Kinect) in people's homes that could be used with their own personal assistant service.

Instead they completely botched what was a potentially groundbreaking piece of technology, which in the 2010s now, is par for Microsoft.

Back then there was a bunch of hoopla about the Kinect and mics spying on people. There's still one or two people in the comments here that reflect that. Although the claims were pretty much unfounded, it did damage the Kinect's reputation somewhat.

 

[xpxp2002]

Worst part is that they neutered the OneGuide voice controls in the last update to the point that it’s virtually useless now, for no particular reason at all.

I rarely game nowadays but used to control my STB with Kinect voice commands every day. Now it only controls power and volume. You can tune to a specific channel, but it misheard the likes of CBS, TBS, and PBS half the time. That functionality is still present, though. But the cool voice-navigated TV guide is outright gone.

After they did that, I vowed to never buy another Xbox or Xbox game again. Microsoft deliberately broke working functionality that I paid good money for on launch day for no reason. I want my money back.

Try re-configuring. Mine still works fine even on XBX.

You can navigate the OneGuide? There are other people who reported it being gone after the update. You can open OneGuide still, but page up/down, what’s on channel, etc are all gone.

https://twitter.com/heyyjonny/status/921169999586254848
https://twitter.com/trusttee/status/83063635946340352

 

[yet_another_wumpus]

I'm one of the few that loves the Kinect. My wife also really like to work out to the Zumba game as well. I'm kicking myself for not getting an adapter, because now I have an XboxOneX and no way for the wife to Zumba on the good TV.

Maybe motion games aren't fun for most, but the Kinect is a better idea than it was given credit for.

Whether or not the Kinect is ok as in input really wasn't its problem. The Kinect has two big issues:

It raised the price of the Xbox1 ~$100 at launch and handed the market to the PS4.
It bugs any room it is in and sends all audio (and plenty of video) back to Redmond.

As an optional bit of gear it apparently can't justify the price (thus being canceled), but as a mandatory bundled item it was unacceptable.

 

[shradical]

Hopefully Microsoft will at least keep their promise of teaming up with Amazon to enable a voice assistant crossover between Cortana and Alexa. At least that way it would still be relatively easy to control the Xbox One X and S with voice controls from an Echo device. They were supposed to have this available by the end of 2017 but it hasn't happened yet.

https://www.engadget.com/2018/01/02/ama ... -deadline/

 

[dmoan]

I think the tech will remain, it's how they are gathering info on users, but the Cortana brand will die because Microsoft has no idea how to market to consumers.

RE: Zune, Windows Phone, Windows Media Center, Surface, basically anything that isn't Office or a consumer Windows OS.

I fully expect them to give in on even Bing and Azure at some point because they just keep burning money on tech they can't seem to expand on. I've been on too many of Microsoft's "us too!" rides to give them the benefit of the doubt anymore.

Azure isn't going anywhere:

"Microsoft's cloud business hauled in $7.4 billion in revenue during the quarter, an 11% year-over-year increase. That was powered by Microsoft Azure, the second-largest cloud platform behind Amazon Web Services, which posted a 97% increase in revenue. (Microsoft does not break out specific dollar figures for Azure.) Cloud server products and services revenue increased 15%."

 

[Caffarius]

I think the tech will remain, it's how they are gathering info on users, but the Cortana brand will die because Microsoft has no idea how to market to consumers.

RE: Zune, Windows Phone, Windows Media Center, Surface, basically anything that isn't Office or a consumer Windows OS.

I fully expect them to give in on even Bing and Azure at some point because they just keep burning money on tech they can't seem to expand on. I've been on too many of Microsoft's "us too!" rides to give them the benefit of the doubt anymore.

Azure isn't going anywhere:

"Microsoft's cloud business hauled in $7.4 billion in revenue during the quarter, an 11% year-over-year increase. That was powered by Microsoft Azure, the second-largest cloud platform behind Amazon Web Services, which posted a 97% increase in revenue. (Microsoft does not break out specific dollar figures for Azure.) Cloud server products and services revenue increased 15%."

This is true. And I don't expect the cloud frenzy to stop any time soon, but the fog compute model is starting to gain some traction among organizations. Add to that there are some signs that the profitability may dip in the very near future (was going to post the [H}ardOCP link but Ars beat me to it!). It's starting to look, at least to me, that they might be doing the exact same thing they've been doing with their other products in true Microsoft fashion here. Only time will tell.

Alluding to the previous poster's comments on how Microsoft is dogfooding Azure to it's other departments, this image is the only thing that comes to mind as a beta tester for SQL Server on Linux in an internal cloud:

To take it back on-topic a bit, I'd love to see them move Xbox Live matches onto Azure hosted servers. Anyone who has had a host drop in a match knows the pain.

 

[cmacd]

Kinect was a cool piece of hardware they never found a good use for. I've played some of the games and they were terrible, I think the main issue is that as a gaming controller it's nearly worthless.

Yeah, I defended it for a while (while simultaneously complaining about Nintendo's "also a tablet" controller, yikes) but in hindsight it never really panned out for gaming. I still defend it as a pack-in on XB1, because if you're going to have Kinect and you want any games to actually use it, it has to be included with every console. So you do it or you don't. The moment it was no longer a pack-in on every new console, it was dead.

That said, in hindsight maybe "don't" was the better option.

Ah well. Mine will continue to gather dust until it becomes a collector's item.

 

[sidran32]

Was Microsoft just never able to address some of the problems/limitations mentioned in the article? This seems like something they should have been able to continue R&D on and get to be a fantastic piece of hardware, beyond just a gaming peripheral.

I remember thinking that the Kinect could eventually give us something like Minority Report hand control of things. That clearly never happened, but I struggle to understand the limiting factors that prevented that.

Kinect 2, with its increased resolution and ability to track individual fingers, could have. I remember using the Kinect 2 motion controls on the Xbox One dashboard briefly before they removed that feature. It felt more Minority Report than Xbox 360, and was magical. I still can't get over how good it felt to "grab" the screen mid-air and pull it to the side to scroll pages.

 

[sidran32]

Kill off the Kinect, fine. But give us really good microphone options then.... (not something where I need to wear a microphone)

It is funny that when you set up a new Xbox, it wants to you to use Cortana, but neither the Xbox nor the controller come with a microphone. If Sony can put a touch pad, lights, motion control, and a speaker in their controller, surely Microsoft can put a microphone in its controller. Meanwhile, my TV remote has microphone and it works well enough.

This is why when I got my Xbox One X (and my Kinect stopped working), I got this.

Spoiler

It's not quite the same. It's push to talk only, and when you push the button to enable the microphone, the speaker mutes, which is annoying when chatting with someone. But, at least I have a microphone in my hand that lets me use voice controls relatively casually, otherwise.

 

[niwax]

I think the tech will remain, it's how they are gathering info on users, but the Cortana brand will die because Microsoft has no idea how to market to consumers.

RE: Zune, Windows Phone, Windows Media Center, Surface, basically anything that isn't Office or a consumer Windows OS.

I fully expect them to give in on even Bing and Azure at some point because they just keep burning money on tech they can't seem to expand on. I've been on too many of Microsoft's "us too!" rides to give them the benefit of the doubt anymore.

Azure is not going anywhere. Everything except Windows is also available on top of Azure now. I think Azure costs are essentially free, as they pay for them by charging the other divisions for running their software on Azure (Office, Exchange, CRM, SQL, whatever). It inflates revenues and costs for all the divisions making the top line look nice.

The low price also meant it could be used in larger quantities. Several departments at my CS university literally have stacks of them lying around. Want to build a holodeck? Just take eight and don't worry about spending weeks fine-tuning some task-specific product. It still costs less than any specialized sensor. There's enough that projects that use one are more like projects that need some hard drive space or a monitor rather than high tech real-time geometry processing magic.

 

[Sharra]

This seems to be Microsoft's M.O. lately, screw something up, then overcorrect and screw up the fix too. They pushed the kinect too hard, forced it on people who didn't want it, and put the price of their console too high. Why that means the Kinect could not live on as a standalone product I don't know. I don't like the kinect much for gaming, though there are a few that are fun with people, but I loved it as means of interacting with my xbox. I feel that had Microsoft not decided that rather then adjust their offering, they would just nuke the Kinect, there could still be uses for it.

I agree with other posters who said that Microsoft blew it by focusing on the Kinect primarily as a gaming device, and ignoring all the other options.

Fortunately I managed to find a cheap used usb adapter for mine, so I was able to keep my kinect for my One X. I like using Cortana to turn it on and kick off a movie easily.

It's like everything they do lately, half-ass the development and production, and then go overboard on the marketing, ensuring people will be disappointed.

 

[Rommel102]

Worst part is that they neutered the OneGuide voice controls in the last update to the point that it’s virtually useless now, for no particular reason at all.

I rarely game nowadays but used to control my STB with Kinect voice commands every day. Now it only controls power and volume. You can tune to a specific channel, but it misheard the likes of CBS, TBS, and PBS half the time. That functionality is still present, though. But the cool voice-navigated TV guide is outright gone.

After they did that, I vowed to never buy another Xbox or Xbox game again. Microsoft deliberately broke working functionality that I paid good money for on launch day for no reason. I want my money back.

Try re-configuring. Mine still works fine even on XBX.

You can navigate the OneGuide? There are other people who reported it being gone after the update. You can open OneGuide still, but page up/down, what’s on channel, etc are all gone.

https://twitter.com/heyyjonny/status/921169999586254848
https://twitter.com/trusttee/status/83063635946340352

Are you using Cortana or the regular XB1 interface? I use regular and as recently as last night I could say "Xbox Watch Fox" etc. I admittedly didn't try Page up or Page down, I'll take a look tonight.

 

[Uncanny Valley]

In many cases, the Kinect is a tinkerer's dream for body interaction / face detection, and super cheap. I still use it all the time.

BTW, if you still want to adapt it to a PC, you can hack it if you don't mind cracking it open :

http://www.tatsch.it/kinect-2-usb-3-modification/

 

[nootau]

I wanted to say I loved the original kinect and did some great early Oculus (DK1)/Kinect work and Wiimote/Kinect work via PC. The kinect v1 was an amazing piece of kit. There is some great early work projecting 3D texture maps on surfaces, or scanning entire rooms. check out https://arsandbox.ucdavis.edu/ some info (also hunt around for "kinect 3d room scanning").

On a sad note, I had wanted to continue experimenting using the Kinect v2 (as did most of the hacker community). MS pulled a fast one using a proprietary connector (explanation at the time was USB 3 was not "good enough"). There was no PC version released (unlike the original Kinect) so I was stuck with looking at other competing products (mostly RealSense...which pales in comparison BTW). Fast forward to the One S release, and a magic USB connector appears that allows the Kinect v2 to work with the PC.

I have yet to purchase one as MS artificially kept the price of the Kinect v2 high (at $99) to even out XBOne bundle prices. With prices are finally dropping, I am extremely tempted to pick up a few of them and start tinkering again with my Oculus CM1, GearVR and Vive (I work in AR/VR...dont judge! lol).

 

[Ogre_]

Microsoft sold the company that made the Kinetic to Apple. They made it smaller and put it on the new iPhone X. That's what they're using for facial recognition. So, with the tech being used by another company, of course Microsoft would discontinue manufacturing, etc.

Half right.

Apple bought Primesense, but Microsoft never owned them.

 

[mohaine]

Classic MSFT. Sick of the introductions of tech and getting everyone onboard just to let it languish and then be taken out back and shot (I'm looking at you Windows Phone, the I'm not dead yet Surface line, InfoPath, etc, etc).

Hit refresh indeed.

I visited M$ HQ once in 2009 if memory serves (bought my Xbox360 Elite there with Knect) and one thing that struck me as my friend (and employee) showed me around is how they have plenty of ideas circulating even if they do look 'old' from the outside. I think there are 3 problems (and I emphasize it's my *opinion*):

1- They stretch their R&D budget too thin
2- They are very bad at marketing
3- They don't quite get market timing overall (which is partially due to 1)

For all my $ on their name and my general fun poking at M$ I'd stick my money on the company even with those problems. Eventually they will squeeze something awesome.

The problem with this analysis is that Microsoft is one of the top R&D spenders in the world. They are the #1 spender in internet/software, more than Google and Apple.

Yes but (almost) nothing ever seems to come of that research. It all just seems to die on the vine. I'm not sure but my guess this is due to internal politics and protecting the marketshare/profits of existing products.

 

[sviola]

MS inability to do the right thing at the right moment is incredible. Just now that the world is buying the Home Assistant idea, they kill the hardware that could give them this, the irony could only be bigger if Kinect was installed in over 10 million homes...

 

[Exnor]

I don't know about you guys/girls but i find it extremely funny, sad and stupid (at the same time) that when it came out with the Xbox One everybody (well maybe the majority) was outraged by the "always on and listen" function and now past 3 years the same people are spending about 150 bucks to get the same thing (minus camera) in the form of Alexa, Dot, etc, etc....

So now we are all ok with paying for the "possibly" spied on 24/7 devices....(?)

 

[richten]

"It's the games, stupid".
When it comes to consoles it's always about the games. You can have a great technology but if you don't have the games people will not care and it will die soon.
Say what you want about the Wii, but despite being rather crude in terms of technology, Wii Sports worked (bowling and golf in particular) and sold the console. Kinect rode that same wave initially, but without games to truly justify it, it just sank.

 

[Iron Clad Burrito]

Too bad. It was an odd choice to make it about gaming.

Response to the Wii's incredible sales.

I liked the idea, thought it was innovative (unlike Playstation's entry, which was an uglier version of Wii's controllers), but the games that took advantage were less than stellar, and the gamers spoke.

(Next time they tell you they want innovation, just nod, roll your eyes, and move on.)

Personally I only really used Kinect on the One for renting Dance Party 201x for my daughter, and controlling netflix -- and then Netflix made it a little more annoying to try to use voice controls.

 

[azazel1024]

'Gosh, I really liked that, I got used to it, and I'm going to miss it..."

This. I was just considering upgrading my xbox one to an xbox one s now that I have a 4k tv with hdr (I can't justify the price of a x currently). But I rather like having voice control. I game on my console, but less and less these days. It's what made my tv 'smart' for a long time, and I'm near dependent on the voice control to get in and out of things. Without the adapter (which is stupid hard to get now) I'll lose that.

Kill off the Kinect, fine. But give us really good microphone options then.... (not something where I need to wear a microphone)

Not sure if it is an aging kinetic (I doubt it), or OS changes or "machine learning" because I don't use my Xbox One all that often, it is more my kids.

My Xbox one basically no longer responds to my voice commands. I can 80% of the time get it to give me the prompt dialog box if I say "xbox", but things like "Xbox...turn off".

Nope, don't do a thing for me anymore. My kids can get it to work about 50% of the time, but even then they are often repeating themselves multiple times.

When new it was about a 90% success rate without having to repeat myself, maybe 60% of my kids.

 

[MontyPython]

Was Microsoft just never able to address some of the problems/limitations mentioned in the article? This seems like something they should have been able to continue R&D on and get to be a fantastic piece of hardware, beyond just a gaming peripheral.

I remember thinking that the Kinect could eventually give us something like Minority Report hand control of things. That clearly never happened, but I struggle to understand the limiting factors that prevented that.

It's just the simple fact that nobody wants motion controls. I know you'll find a few odd people commenting on here that do, but the vast majority hate them. That's why it failed, and it cost Microsoft this generation in the process. Good riddance.

 

[MontyPython]

Was Microsoft just never able to address some of the problems/limitations mentioned in the article? This seems like something they should have been able to continue R&D on and get to be a fantastic piece of hardware, beyond just a gaming peripheral.

I remember thinking that the Kinect could eventually give us something like Minority Report hand control of things. That clearly never happened, but I struggle to understand the limiting factors that prevented that.

It's just the simple fact that nobody wants motion controls. I know you'll find a few odd people commenting on here that do, but the vast majority hate them. That's why it failed, and it cost Microsoft this generation in the process. Good riddance.

 

[Richard Cranium]

I don't know about you guys/girls but i find it extremely funny, sad and stupid (at the same time) that when it came out with the Xbox One everybody (well maybe the majority) was outraged by the "always on and listen" function and now past 3 years the same people are spending about 150 bucks to get the same thing (minus camera) in the form of Alexa, Dot, etc, etc....

So now we are all ok with paying for the "possibly" spied on 24/7 devices....(?)

Idk about others but for me the camera was always the “step to far”.

I’m somewhat bothered by the microphones which is why I don’t own an echo or any similar devices (I have Alexa through my fire stick, but afaik “she” can only hear when the button on the remote is pressed), and I’m willing to make allowances for phone and tablet, tho the less the better, but the mandatory camera was the (beyond) creepy part, it was a step to far over the line.

Before you ask, no my PC does not have a camera, nor does my tv, and the cameras on my phone and tablet are taped over with black electrical tape.

 

[Ogre_]

Was Microsoft just never able to address some of the problems/limitations mentioned in the article? This seems like something they should have been able to continue R&D on and get to be a fantastic piece of hardware, beyond just a gaming peripheral.

I remember thinking that the Kinect could eventually give us something like Minority Report hand control of things. That clearly never happened, but I struggle to understand the limiting factors that prevented that.

It's just the simple fact that nobody wants motion controls. I know you'll find a few odd people commenting on here that do, but the vast majority hate them. That's why it failed, and it cost Microsoft this generation in the process. Good riddance.

They are certainly not very desirable for console gaming. They might be more useful for other uses like VR, AR, or something else. Particularly as the technology matures and enables finer and finer detail.

 

[Twilight Sparkle]

I hope Kizuna Ai stocked up.

 

[chi7891]

They just continue this right before everyone got an Xbox one x for Christmas had an opportunity to buy one. It’s bullshit. Now I have to disassemble my Kinect and rewire it.

 

[StitchesX]

I'm one of the few that loves the Kinect. My wife also really like to work out to the Zumba game as well. I'm kicking myself for not getting an adapter, because now I have an XboxOneX and no way for the wife to Zumba on the good TV.

Maybe motion games aren't fun for most, but the Kinect is a better idea than it was given credit for.

I missed that chance too. That said, the adapter seems to be just an USB pass-through with a power injector. I assume the Kinect sucks way more than the typical 5v/0.5-1A. Building your own shouldn't be too troublesome. In fact, I was looking at the ballooning prices online and managed to find someone offering a service on eBay to convert Kinects so they work on newer Xbox hardware and PCs (disclaimer: not me or anyone I now so can't vouch for them).

 

[Long Time First Time]

So today I read this, and it was the first I heard of the adapter. I scrambled but it was too late. The second hand market jacked up the prices. I purchased an Xbox One X day-one but didn't know about the adapter. I used my Kinect pretty much whenever I played to launch content or record videos. I skipped the S and now I'm not sure if I'll ever find this thing at an affordable price. I already shook my fists in the air, but that didn't work. I'll be reaching out to Microsoft tonight to see if I can get my hands on one. :-(

 

[Mr_Cynical]

Discontinued USB adapter is the last nail in the coffin for influential tech.

Influential primarily in the sense that it lost Microsoft this console generation.

 

[orangpelupa]

Btw you still can use standard USB 3.0 B CABLE to use kinect xbox one on pc or Xbox S. Sometimes called as USB 3.0 PRINTER cable


You will need to wire 12v 1.6A DC to pin 10 and ground. It's right on the USB port on top of kinect body.

The pins also have good spacing for easy soldering

 

[MyersVandalay]

Put Kinect next to their early tablet efforts in the "Microsoft, you actually can have decent ideas but your timing is awful" bucket.

Saddest thing is, it looks like they are flat out bailing on it, right when the timing looks like it's about right. I mean am I the only one who see's the kinnect's technology and VR the ultimate combination? I mean VR with no controller necessary, or optional anything can be a controller (IE playing an FPS with a nerf gun or whatever gunish shaped object you have in the house etc... no need for the "controller" to be expensive because it's litterally just there to fit in your hands while the camera judges where you move it)

 

[RoninX]

I think the big problem with the Kinect was the lack of good games that were designed from the ground up to match the sensor's capabilities.

If you can only determine approximate arm and hand position, then design your game around that. I always thought that using different arm gestures for spellcasting in an RPG would be an interesting application. For example, snap your arm quickly forward with an open palm to throw a fireball, or cross both arms in front of your body to cast a protection spell. Likewise, I can imagine an amusing (and fun to watch) version of an Eagle Flight type of game where you extend your arms to either side like a kid pretending to be an airplane and then tilt those arms to bank to either side.

 

[raxadian]

Nintendo did it better anyway. The fact the Kinect needed tons of space when the global tendency is for people to live the way of canned tuna doomed it from the start.

 

[Darkramuh]

I'm glad that motion fad finally died out. PS move, Wii, Kinect are all great similar ideas in theory but really horrible experiences when it came to the execution. I've had/played with them all trying to ride the hype train and with the small selection of kids' or workout games and poor integration all sent them back packing. I tried hard with my wife to really get into jumping around the living room like an idiot while the thing rarely picked up our movements. I think introducing this as a supplemental physical activity device to justify screen time was genius, but when it fails to pick up movement, there's no competitive element left to enjoy. I'd rather buy a $10 billy blanks dvd, pull a muscle and be done with it.

Perhaps VR will be the next thing to suffer a slow death, as it did in the 90's when it originally came out in malls for $5/play, and let's not forget Virtual Boy that was a bit ahead of it's time and extremely overpriced at the time Nintendo was gaining ground. I'm not salty about it all because to be honest I called it a long time ago when I said why not just come out with a console with a controller and be done. Stop trying to develop all this high priced hardware accessories that are unplayable with 90% of the core gaming IP. Switch did a pretty good job at making Nintendo relevant again, I just wish Sega would get a rebirth now.

 

[hammr25]

(Just don't put microphones on it. No need. Those should exist on their own; maybe on the console itself and/or each controller.)

They already have the microphone on the controller if a person kinects a headset to the controller or puts a microphone in the headset jack.

 

[Dark Jaguar]

I'm fine with Kinect no longer getting active support, except that they need to keep making that cable up until the XBox Two or whatever ends up the actual successor to the One comes out. Kinects are easy enough to find, but those adapters seem to have all been bought up by scalpers to be sold for something like $300 on eBay and Amazon.