Hasta La Gadget!

If you’ve been holding out on buying yourself a Kinect for your Xbox 360 because you thought the $150 price was too much, you may want to reach for your wallet now. Microsoft has announced a price cut for the Xbox 360 Kinect of $40. The price cut will apparently be permanent, so it sucks to be you if you just bought one at full price.

The new official price for the Kinect is $109.99(USD) in the United States. A price cut is also coming to the rest of North America and Asia-Pacific countries as well. In October, the price will drop in Australia and New Zealand. This will make European and Japanese fans of the Kinect angry. Apparently, there are no plans to cut the price in those countries.

This should spur adoption of the Kinect in the US for people who aren’t really are interested in the device for gaming. I’ll admit that Kinect games were interesting for about two days and then the motion controls lost their luster for me. However, with other Xbox 360 apps such as Netflix and the menus being navigable using the Kinect the device is becoming increasingly more useful outside of gaming, and is certainly the darling of the hacking and interactive community.

[via Neowin]

Welcome to Wednesday, folks. This particular hump day saw news that the Department of Justice and the FBI have brought down a trio of websites that dealt in pirated Android apps, while a picture of a mini dock USB cable for the iPhone 5 surfaced as well. Microsoft announced a number of things related to the Xbox 360 today, kicking off a search for people to beta test its new dashboard update, permanently dropping the price of the Kinect by $40, and announcing Xbox 360 Essentials packs, which come packed with accessories to accommodate Xbox 360 owners.

The FTC has ended its investigation of Facebook’s Instagram purchase, though the FTC wrapped things up rather silently. LG has a massive new 4K HDTV available now in South Korea, HP posted less-than-stellar results for quarter 3 of its fiscal year, and today NASA talked about how the Curiosity rover has been getting around on the surface of Mars. Today also brought some new sample shots of the Nikon CoolPix S800c Android camera, along with a new video demo for the device.

We got a closer look at the Archos Gen10 XS tablet line today, and the struggling HTC is planning to cut the price on its One series of phones after the line posted disappointing sales. T-Mobile announced that it will begin offering nationwide unlimited 4G next month, while Rockstar delivered a new round of Grand Theft Auto V screenshots today, and we have a feeling that move screenshots are coming sometime later this week, so keep an eye out for those.

AT&T has reiterated its decision to block FaceTime, and cited an FCC ruling in support of it. Verizon looks be gearing up to offer a Nokia Windows Phone 8 later this year, and sadly, Nintendo confirmed that Nintendo Power magazine will be shutting down in December. NASA has kicked off a simulation meant to test landing on a near-Earth asteroid, and there’s a new iPhone app on the scene that will help you determine which Super PACs are putting out those constant political ads. Black Isle Studios appears to have risen from the dead, but no one seems to know the circumstances surrounding the re-opening.

Finally tonight, we have a review of the new Archos 101 XS tablet by Chris Burns. Enjoy the rest of your evening, everyone!

SlashGear Evening Wrap-Up: August 22, 2012 is written by Eric Abent & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Well, it certainly looks like the news of that Xbox Essentials Pack isn’t the only thing coming out of Redmond today. As the communicative Major Nelson unequivocally notes, Microsoft’s officially dropping down the price of its “You Are the Controller” Xbox 360 add-on in the US to a mere 110 bucks. Additionally, he’s also said there’s a “permanently reduced” pricing scheme coming to other countries in North America, Latin America and the Asia Pacific regions (save for Japan) where the company’s Kinect is available for purchase; meanwhile, folks in the Middle East, Europe and Africa seem to be out of luck for now, since there are no price-slashing plans for the time being.

Filed under: Gaming, Home Entertainment

Microsoft permanently lowering Kinect price in the US to $110, slightly reducing it in other parts of the world originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 22 Aug 2012 14:30:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  Major Nelson  | Email this | Comments

Details of Microsoft’s next-gen Kinect 2 motion-tracking sensor for the “Xbox 720” console have emerged, with a leaked screenshot purportedly showing a camera-eye view of gamers. The screenshot, shared by Twitter user Superdae, is said to be from a Durango Xbox development kit with a considerably expanded degree of detail of the two users in-frame.

Although such a photo would be relatively straightforward to fake, sources familiar with the Durango setup apparently claim it is genuine. Based on the color coding of the picture, Kinect 2 will be able to recognize a greater degree of depth in the frame as well as potentially track individual movements more accurately.

The original Kinect sensor was something of a surprise hit, with the motion control system quickly expanded from simple game interactions to navigating Xbox LIVE services. More recently, Microsoft released a version of Kinect intended to be used with PCs, though more comprehensive functionality on the desktop is expected to roll out with Windows 8 later in the year.

The “Xbox 720″, as Microsoft’s next Xbox console has been unofficially dubbed, is still shrouded in mystery. Leaks earlier in the year – subsequently sniped down by Microsoft’s legal team – indicated that it would make use of augmented reality technologies and potentially have the second-gen Kinect built in. According to a Microsoft job listing, the new console is due for introduction within the next 18 months.

[via The Verge]

Kinect 2 leak tips boosted motion-control detail is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Microsoft’s Kinect has certainly had its fair share of hacks in the past, and I must say that some of those hacks are very impressive to say the least. Well, the latest information from the street would be Microsoft being granted a couple of patent applications that might just see Kinect capability being introduced into the world of mobile cameras – and definitely smartphones will be at the forefront of the action. One of the patents do point towards a depth camera taking the portable route, where it has been described as “mobile environment sensor” which will help determine its trajectory through a room, while coming up with a depth map as it moves about. Sort of like those pinging robots that we saw in Prometheus, no? Apart from visual mapping, this potential camera will also pin its hopes on a motion sensor such as an accelerometer in order to better judge its position as it is moved around.

As for the second patent filing, it will rely on Kinect technology that is already lying around the house to provide you with that directorial debut you’ve always dreamed off. You will rely on hand gestures to edit the movie, where the depth camera is also capable of generating a model of the environment while creating 3D props out of actual objects. What do you think of these patents?

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Microsoft patent uses 3D camera to determine user’s age, Apple patent sounds like the Xbox Kinect,