Microsoft’s Steve Baller has announced that the next version of Windows (possibly Windows Eight 8) would support a “System on a chip (SOC)” technology widely used in mobile and portable computing devices. The SOC technology, can be defined as the integration of all necessary electronic circuits that perform various functions onto a single chip, to produce a complete electronic system that performs a more useful final function. Thus, the technology will integrate discrete chip components in desktop PCs used to handle graphics and data in a single package thereby reducing energy consumption and boosting battery life. The announcement was made as part of a keynote speech in the 2011 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas.
Furthermore, Mr Ballmer revealed planned updates for Microsoft’s Xbox games console and Windows Phone 7. While upcoming Windows Phone 7 updates would increase response times on its devices and come with a copy and paste functionality, perhaps the most eye-catching announcement of all was related to the Xbox Kinect. Kinect users can look forward to an update that would tie motions made by the user to what their avatar does in the social spaces of the Xbox Live gaming service in future. The update, called Avatar Kinect, will use the Kinect to detect a user’s body movements and translates them into their Xbox Live avatar. This means that users will be able to use the Avatar Kinect System to host and attend virtual meetings and events or chat with other individual avatars acting out their real life actions, in one of fifteen virtual settings.
With over eight million Kinect devices sold already, a successful implementation of these updates could potentially attract even more users.
Talking Point
Can Xbox Kinect be compared to the Nintendo Wii console or is there no basis for comparison?
let’s go for a virtual dance !
Okey dokey LOL 🙂
I have not use Nintendo Wii console before, so it will not speak well to say there is no basis for comparison of the two device.
We have a Wii, and from what I have heard about Kinect from a friend who owns one, I believe the two cannot be compared, really. I think Kinect is taking Wii to another level completely.
It all sounds a bit fantastic and too futuristic for me. We all had better engage into offline connections than attend virtual meetings. The very idea is great,of course, but I’m afraid it will help people become too distant from each other.