Xbox – Make Kinect V2 listen longer

Yes, the Kinect will work with every Xbox 360, old or new.

Check the main page:

http://www.xbox.com/en-us/kinect

You are the controller

Kinect brings games and entertainment to life in extraordinary new ways – no controller required. Easy to use and instantly fun, Kinect (formerly known as “Project Natal”) gets everyone off the couch. Want to join a friend in the fun? Simply jump in. And the best part is Kinect works with every Xbox 360®*

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*Kinect coming November 2010.

Since the Kinect is an totally new concept, old games will not support the Kinect out-of-the-box.

However, the publishers have always had the option to ship updates to games (via an Xbox Live update), and it is completely feasible for developers to retrofit their games with support.

Kinect is based on the hardware, and possibly software, of PrimeSense. They use a flashing IR light-source and a filtered camera to measure time-in-flight and compute a depth map from that. Presumably, objects that are near-field and/or moving are detected as people, while static and far-away stuff is treated as background.

In contrast, the Wiimote has an IR camera and accelerometers built into it. The sensor bar that you put on/near your TV contains a pair of IR LEDs. The hardware in the Wiimote tracks those LEDs and determines which way it's pointing based on their position.