Xbox One + Kinect

by Microsoft

• With Xbox One, you can quickly jump from TV to movies to music to a game
• Only Xbox One unleashes the vast and scalable power of the cloud for your games, entertainment and apps with Xbox Live
• The console is driven by a powerful combination of CPU, GPU and 8GB of RAM, governed by an innovative OS architecture, to deliver power, speed and agility
• Kinect is included with every Xbox One. Completely reengineered to be more precise, responsive and intuitive with unparalleled voice, vision and motion technology

Product Details

• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B00CMQTVUA
• Product Dimensions: 14.5 x 7.5 x 12.7 inches ; 15 pounds
• Media: Console
• Release Date: November 22, 2013
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (2,260 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #918 in Video Games (See Top 100 in Video Games)
  • #4 in Video Games > Xbox One > Consoles

Product Description

Get more with Xbox One.

Introducing Xbox One. Where the best games, multiplayer, and your favorite movies, music, sports, and live TV come together in one place. Xbox One games look and feel incredibly real, with cinematic gameplay that rivals Hollywood. Watch TV or chat with friends on Skype while you play, and keep on playing while smarter matchmaking happens behind the scenes. With Xbox One, you can snap two things side-by-side on your TV, and switch from one to another instantly. Cloud-powered and built for the digital age, Xbox One is designed to keep getting better over time.*

Xbox One delivers an all-new gaming and entertainment experience that will transform how you play. Xbox One brings together the best games, the most reliable service and rich entertainment all-in-one system that is built for today and tomorrow.

The best games.

• The most award-winning exclusive games at E3.
• Get it first - all Call of Duty: Ghosts downloadable content and many more.
• Adaptive AI that learns to play like you.

The best multiplayer and service.

• Better matchmaking with Smart Match.
• No jerks - reputation system helps keep annoying players out of your games.
• No waiting in lobbies - play, watch TV, or surf the web while matchmaking happens.

Games plus entertainment.

• Never miss a moment - get multiplayer alerts while you watch TV.
• Switch instantly from a game to TV, a movie, music and more.
• Snap an app next to a game and do two things at once.

Built for the future.

• The Digital System - built for the digital age using the latest technology and the power of the cloud.
• Keeps getting better - "cloud powered" means Xbox One and games grow with you over time.
• Advanced voice and motion control open up new game experiences like never before.

Get the facts.

Play Xbox One games online or offline.

Your Xbox One does not need to be connected for you to enjoy offline features of games. In fact, you can take the Xbox One anywhere and play any disc-based Xbox One game on it. The only times you need an online connection are for initial set-up of Xbox One, and to get the latest system and title updates before you start playing some games.

Share, trade-in, resell, gift, & rent game discs to your heart's content.

Use Xbox One's disc-based games just like you do today. There are no limitations to using and sharing them: it works like it does today on Xbox 360. If you'd rather get your games digitally, you can purchase from Xbox Live and get instant access to playing.

Play anywhere with your own Xbox Live Gold account.

A single Xbox Live Gold membership works across both Xbox One and Xbox 360 – your membership covers both. And you can log into a friend’s Xbox One and access all your downloadable games, preferences, and apps.

You control your privacy.

You decide how personalized Xbox One is to you and your family, including privacy settings, manual or automatic sign-in, and how data is used. And when you play games or enjoy apps that use sensitive personal data, such as videos, photos, and facial expressions, no one except you can access it, without your express permission.

Kinect or Controller: There are a variety of ways to interact with Xbox One.

Depending on the game or app, you can control Xbox One using voice commands and gestures, a controller, a remote control or your Xbox One SmartGlass device. It is designed to interact with you in multiple ways.

Easily turn Xbox One and Kinect on or off.

To turn off your Xbox One, just say "Xbox Off." This puts Xbox One into standby mode where it's only listening for the voice command, "Xbox On." You can also turn off your Kinect through the system settings, or you can simply unplug it. Xbox One does not require a Kinect to be plugged in for the system to function.

Your Gamertag and Gamerscore follow you to Xbox One.

No need to worry: you can bring your Xbox Live Gamertag and Gamerscore with you to Xbox One. Your Gamerscore will be automatically updated once you have connected to Xbox Live.

Communicate with Xbox Live Gold friends using messaging or Skype.

With Xbox One and an Xbox Live Gold membership, you can use Skype to voice chat with any platform that supports it. If Skype isn't supported (like on the Xbox 360), you'll still be able to see which of your friends is online and message them.

Your NFL on Xbox One.

With Xbox One, step into the huddle and experience the NFL in an all-new light—where you are at the center of your NFL world. With the NFL on Xbox One, stay connected to all the latest NFL news, video highlights and stories around-the-clock, and keep tabs on live stats and scores from around the league. Personalize your experience to follow all the latest from your favorite team, and with built-in NFL.com Fantasy Football you can even keep tabs on your Fantasy points in real-time while watching live TV broadcast games.**

All your NFL, all the time.

The NFL on Xbox One brings together the best of NFL.com, NFL Fantasy, and NFL Network all together on your TV in an integrated way. Get all the latest news from around the League, customize your highlights based on your favorite team, and track real-time scores and stats on Sunday.**

Fantasy Football on your TV.

NFL Fantasy Football comes to life on your TV with Xbox One, allowing you to manage your team and track your League in your living room like never before. Built-in NFL.com Fantasy allows you to set your lineup, watch highlights from your players or prospects, and even receive real-time scoring updates as you track your games on Sunday. Snap your Fantasy next to live TV or gaming and never miss a scoring update again.**

Personalized for your favorite team.

Personalize the My Team channel so that it follows all the stories, video highlights, stats, standings, and news from just your favorite team and its players. Watch all the highlights from over the weekend, or get ready for next week's game with tailored news segments and a curated Twitter feed. It's the best of your NFL team, all in one place on your TV.**

What's in the Box

• Xbox One Console
• Kinect Sensor for Xbox One
• Wireless Controller
• Chat Headset
• HDMI cable
• Power Supply

* Advanced TV hardware required. Games, add-ons and media content sold separately. Initial set-up and some games and features require broadband internet; ISP fees apply. Online multiplayer, Skype and some features also require Xbox Live Gold membership (sold separately) and/or additional requirements. See xbox.com/xboxone.

** The NFL on Xbox One, including NFL.com Fantasy Football, requires advanced TV hardware, broadband internet, and Xbox Live Gold membership (sold separately). To view NFL Network content users must have a television service provider that carries the NFL Network channel. Additional requirements may apply for some features. See xbox.com/live.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

1,272 of 1,410 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Not perfect, but very good. Time will only make it better. November 29, 2013

By Vdub TOP 500 REVIEWER

I got my Xbox One on launch day, so I've had about a while now to play with it and find out what I think about the system. It is an excellent follow-up to the Xbox 360, but not without some minor flaws.

*What I like:*
[+] The dashboard is integrated WAY better than the Xbox 360 and PS3. There is no longer the feeling of "in a game" or "in the dashboard". You are ALWAYS in both. Say you are in the middle of a game but want to spontaneously change a system setting or launch another app etc. Both the 360 and PS3 had some semi-dashboard functionality built into the dashboard/home button, but most everything required you to first exit the game and go to the dashboard (aside from some shortcuts to go straight to a different game). Now, you press the dashboard button and without interrupting your game in any way, you now have access to the full dashboard and settings, etc. There is really no such thing as being required to "quit" a game anymore, which is awesome.

[+] Speed. I always was surprised that through the entire life of the Xbox 360 (including the 360 S and 360 E), there was an unacceptable amount of lag on many core dashboard functions. Something as basic as showing your list of games, or list of gamerpics to change to, or achievement lists, or loading marketplace screens, would often take several seconds of waiting to populate. The Xbox One's startup is acceptably fast, but basic things like loading marketplace content or my list of installed apps, achievements, etc, is very quick. Switching between game and dashboard is no longer the slow annoyance it used to be, but rather is nearly instantaneous.

[+] Dashboard Layout: The Xbox 360 dashboard was too cluttered and poorly organized, in my opinion. There were many different 'sections' to scroll through with LB and RB that made it take longer than necessary to get around. The Xbox One dashboard only has three now, it's much cleaner and simpler. Your pinned games/apps, main section to switch back to currently in-use game/app or browse your other apps, etc, and the third section is for browsing/downloading new games/apps. Very easy to navigate. It's also completely add free. Though at launch, the Xbox 360 had very few ads, and over time Microsoft worked a lot of extra advertising space into the design. So let's keep our fingers crossed that doesn't happen again, especially when you are a subscribing Xbox Live Gold member! I also like the notification and achievement changes. You can earn 0-point achievements in random apps, like for watching videos and such. It's admittedly pretty pointless, but if you don't like the idea of pointless achievements, you can easily ignore their existence.

[+] Built-in game DVR. Very cool feature that removes the need for external recording equipment for anyone interested in that. Even if you don't plan on using this feature, it could still benefit you in the form of more & better guide videos from other people that will likely be swarming onto YouTube.

[+] The controller. Controller design has come a long way since the old Atari joysticks or uncomfortable NES gamepads. I have used Sony's Dual Shock 3, Nintendo's Wii U Pro controller, Xbox 360 controller and Xbox One controller. They are all fantastic. But I must say I always liked the 360 controller the best. The Xbox One controller is simply an improvement upon that one. The only downside to the 360 controller was the mediocre D-pad, which has definitely experienced a massive improvement in the XBO update. They also moved the guide/dashboard button higher, which I like since I used to accidentally hit that when I meant to hit Start/Back. I even like how they redesigned the battery to go inside the controller. It takes slightly longer to swap a battery out, but since I use the USB cable to charge instead of swapping batteries (no Quick Charge Kit yet exists for the One like the 360 has), that doesn't matter at this point. The only thing I don't like is renaming the Start and Back buttons. "Press Menu" sounds way less cool than "Press Start" you're used to on any game's splash screen.

[+] Noise levels and cooling/reliability. Anyone who had a launch Xbox 360 or launch PlayStation 3 (I have both) knows what I'm talking about. Those things were LOUD. Distractingly loud. Even over my high-end surround speakers. The Xbox One's internal fan is very large compared to the launch 360 (google photos if its internals). Large fans can move more air and are not as loud as small fans. This also helps with its reliability, as the Xbox 360's biggest launch issues were overheating problems. Microsoft learned from this and I guarantee that will not be an issue here. I wanted to make sure of this, so I have literally had my Xbox One powered on almost 24 hours a day for the last week since launch day. This is because if it's going to overheat, I want to know now rather than down the line after the warranty is up. And I'm killing two birds with one stone because Killer Instinct has some goals related to how long you are in practice mode, so I leave it idling in practice mode while at work. Yeah, call me crazy. But anyway, so far, it has handled being constantly on for days at a time with not a single issue.

[+] The HDMI-In is definitely a unique feature to the Xbox One that the other consoles can't touch. It's not for everyone; you might not care about it. But it certainly opens up some neat possibilities. Any other HDMI-enabled device you may be interested in using can be switched to and from at a moment's notice. I plugged my PS3 into mine, not for the purpose of gaming (since there is a tiny bit of input lag), but to be able to have a game disc in my XBO and a Blu-ray movie in my PS3 so I can switch without removing the game. I could certainly live without the HDMI input, but since it's there I may as well experiment with some interesting ways to use it.

[+] I obviously can't speak for everyone else, but my Xbox One console, disc drive, controller, and Kinect, all function flawlessly and had absolutely no issues.

*What I don't like:*
[-] Launch line-up. If you are on the fence about buying the console and you're not immediately sure what game(s) to even get for it, you could easily wait it out a while longer. Forza 5 and some of the multi-platform releases are pretty cool (like Need for Speed Rivals), but I'm not sure they're $60 cool. If you are buying the Xbox One now, you're doing it for the novelty of being among the first to have a cutting-edge system. This is true with the PS4 as well. Anybody who swears by any of the launch game is just a fanboy drone. There are a handful of *pretty good* games for both systems, but I see them as more of $30-40 titles. Honestly, I've enjoyed the downloadable Xbox One games the most, such as Killer Instinct, Peggle 2, Halo: Spartan Assault, or the free Kinect Sports trial. A big disappointment is that digital versions of full retail games (like Call of Duty Ghosts) cost MSRP. Until Microsoft shares some of the cost reduction from going all-digital (no marketing, manufacturing, shipping, middle-man retailers, etc), I will ALWAYS buy my games in the form of the retail disc version. A $60 retail game should be $40-50 tops from the Xbox Live Store. It's so backwards that all the retail games are a flat $60 at all times via the Xbox Store, when already Amazon has had various sales that have at some point put them at $39 (Lego Marvel Superheroes) to $49 (almost every launch game). Have some digital sales and permanent price drops and I might actually buy some of them!

[-] No backwards compatibility. This would have been an even more important feature now than it was on the Xbox 360. We've now had eight years to build up a game library on our Xbox 360s. Mine is quite large. Not being able to use that collection as a buffer between Xbox One launch, and when all the great XBO exclusives hit, is very disappointing. The original Xbox only had four years to amass its game library, and since it was the first of Microsoft's consoles, there were far less owners with far less games than now exists with the Xbox 360. A lot of the same sentiments apply to the PlayStation 4. Both consoles could have benefited greatly from a backwards compatibility feature, since neither of their game libraries will be very expansive for at least a year or so. It's also disappointing that I need to keep both consoles connected to my TV. When I bought my Wii U (and PS3, Xbox 360, PS2, Wii), I could give a nostalgic farewell to my Wii (and PS2, Xbox, PS1, GameCube) and disconnect them from my AV setup entirely, while still playing all my games.

[-] There are not yet many ways to show the system off to your friends. The games are nowhere close to pushing the graphics to their limit. The cars on Forza 5 are gorgeous. But Call of Duty and any other multiplatform release will disappoint as far as graphical difference between 360/PS3 and One/PS4. But that's expected, and happens with every new generation. I'm sure the games further down the line will be much more graphically impressive (Titanfall, Destiny, Gears of War, Halo, etc).

[-] Two steps forward, one step backwards: There are many features absent from the new generation of consoles that my last gen consoles have. Firstly, playing 3D Blu-ray movies. My old PlayStation 3 had this feature, but neither the PlayStation 4 nor Xbox One's Blu-ray drives can play 3D movies! Why the step backwards? I know both will likely eventually get an update to add this feature, but it is so lame to see features missing that my old consoles have. Another example of this is the Xbox One's hard drive. 500GB is your only option. There are no higher tiers you can buy like they have for the PS3 and 360, and unlike last generation, this hard drive is *not replaceable*. You also can't view how much of that space you've used, like I could on my 360. I know 500GB sounds like a lot, but I guarantee it will get eaten up much faster than last generation, and you have no way to expand it. And unlike on the 360, you can't add a flash drive or hard drive or any type of external storage. Not just for game saves, but you can't even put music or video files on a flash drive to play from your Xbox One. I still have to turn on my PS3 or 360 for this. There are also fewer USB ports than the Xbox 360 had, and I don't think you can ever have too many USB ports. On the front of the 360, 360 S, and 360 E, there were two USB ports. There are *zero* USB ports on the front of the Xbox One, which makes playing with the Play and Charge USB cable connected undesirable. There is one USB port on the left side, but that means if someone trips on a Play and Charge cable when it's plugged in there, it could damage the port or cable much more than if they were on the front. Another feature we used to have that is mysteriously absent is a recent players list. Just finished a game with someone not on your friend list? Good luck sending them an invite, message, or viewing their gamertag in any way; there is no longer a way to see a list of people you just played with. All hope is not lost though, most of these issues can be resolved in a future system software update, if Microsoft chooses. Some of them will require waiting for a console redesign though, such as swappable hard drives and front USB ports.

*What I'm neutral about:*
[*] The Kinect: Luckily, you aren't required to even have this plugged in so it's not a big deal. But you are forced to buy it with your console anyway, so you might as well find out what it has to offer. Unlike the Xbox 360 Kinect, this one does not scan vertically or self-adjust. The initial setup has an on-screen meter to tell you when the Kinect is pivoted to the perfect vertical angle. Kinect's voice commands are *kind of* cool, but I'm still more of a controller person. I prefer to navigate with my fingers than with my body or voice. I'm glad they made the new Kinect look a little bit neater than the 360's Kinect though. It does have a very much improved camera though. Skype calls with the Kinect are awesome (though outside of the novelty & testing factors, I probably won't use Skype that much). When the full version of Kinect Sports Rivals, and other games designed specifically for Kinect are released, I will probably see more of the value it offers. But for now: eh.

[*] The console's physical design: It actually looks very nice to me. But it does have a small amount of boring-ness to it. It's just a big black box, basically. The key will be to keep the glossy part free of scratches and dust. Glossy consoles are notorious for aging much worse than matte consoles. It's also quite a bit bigger than the Xbox 360 redesigns (but on par with the launch Xbox & Xbox 360 sizes). But I do have to say, I am very glad they are taking precautions to avoid the overheating issues of the launch 360s. The giant cooling heatsink/fan inside, and ample ventilation room inside this ominous monolith, will make it much more reliable and less susceptible to failure; an acceptable trade-off in my mind. I'm sure down the line there will be a smaller version of it. But I didn't want to wait 3-4 years to get it.

*Xbox One vs. PlayStation 4 vs. Wii U*:
It's hard to really compare these in a fair way, because I think all three of them were built for a slightly different audience, and for different purposes. But everyone wants them to be compared anyway, so here I go. So far, I have gotten more mileage out of my Wii U than anything else. But this is simply because Nintendo has had an extra year to come out with some pretty good first-party titles. Its large touch-screen controller is another gimmick as the motion controllers were on the Wii, but many games do manage to use it in a very good way. I would put the Wii U's game library in 1st place compared to the other two consoles, which both have pretty mediocre launch libraries. But again, Wii U had the head start, and in a few years I'm sure all three consoles will have a plethora of great games to choose from. On the other hand, the Wii U gets last place in terms of power/graphics. Most of the games I play are cartooney Nintendo games, so graphical prowess honestly doesn't matter that much. But I have never and will never buy a first-person shooter or multi-platform release on the Wii U, because in those games, awesome graphics can really improve the experience. And the Wii U simply can't compare to the PS4/Xbox One in terms of raw power. Price-wise, obviously the Xbox One gets last place since it costs the most. The PS4 is the most true-to-form gaming console of the three. Hardcore gamers may not find much enjoyment in Nintendo's family-friendly Mario-type games, and the Xbox One was clearly developed with the hope of taking over your cable box and being a big media center instead of just a gaming console. The PS4, like the PS3, has a lot of media capabilities and video streaming apps and so forth, but it was primarily developed primarily to play games. I do have to say, I really like the new controllers on all 3 systems. I would personally give the Xbox One's controller the title of "best", but the Dual Shock 3 and Wii U Pro controllers are also both very good. Nintendo basically copied the Xbox controller on that (other than right thumbstick placement) which is probably why I like it so much. All three consoles are great, honestly. But I don't think you can say one is the best or worst, as they all have very different strengths and weaknesses. I usually just end up getting every console so I don't have to worry about engaging in fanboy "which is better" arguments. But if I could only afford one, I would probably buy the Xbox One due to its *FUTURE* game library (huge Halo fan), and also because, of the three, it easily has the best online multiplayer experience. But if I could only have one console right this second, it would be the Wii U since as of right now, it has the most games worth playing.

*The Bottom Line*:
The Xbox One is a great console with great potential, but as with most launch consoles, the games just aren't quite there to back it up, YET. If you are waiting to get an Xbox One because you're unsure of the game library, you are probably justified in continuing to wait. I honestly just got it because I knew for sure I would eventually get it anyway when Halo 5 comes out. But it the price is holding you back, you may have to wait YEARS for this to become affordable. So if you are okay waiting that long, great. But otherwise you might as well get it now so you can actually use it while you wait for the game library to improve. If you are on the fence over the console because of the 360's launch reliability, I would honestly not let that hold you back on this one since Microsoft learned a very painful & expensive lesson from that, and designed a much more reliable console this time around. Chances are, there won't be any price cuts on it for at least a couple years, and the price cuts aren't usually anything significant until around 4-5 years after launch. So if you have the patience (I didn't), definitely wait. But since I am 98.4% sure the price will still be $499 when Halo 5 comes out, I figured I may as well get it now along with the extra pre-order perks.

A solid system; I definitely do not regret my purchase. 4.5 stars.

Update 2013.12.07:
I've developed a few more thoughts after a couple extra weeks of use. First of all, I got my Killer Instinct milestone of 6000 minutes in Practice Mode complete. For this, I just loaded Practice Mode and literally left my Xbox One powered on for 6000 minutes straight. If you do the math, that is 100 hours or more than 4 straight days. And not just powered on at the Dashboard or a menu, but in a game where it is constantly displaying animated 3D models and doing millions of calculations per second. My point is, that's a pretty good amount of consecutive time to push the console. A launch 360 would probably have red-ringed from doing that, and it would also power the fans so loud you wouldn't be able to hear anything else in the room. The Xbox One stays ultra quiet and ultra cool. Success.

However, I've become less fond of the way achievements are set up. Simply, it takes a long time to scroll through and read what all the achievements are for a game. Each achievement has a hi-res image associated with it, and instead of a large grid of small icons you can quickly glance over and read descriptions for like the 360 had, you have only a few achievements on the screen at a time, and it is quite slow to scroll through, have it download the images and descriptions, and read them all. I hope they improve this experience in future dashboard versions.

One good/bad/neutral (depending on how you look at it) finding is how to invite a friend to a game. It took both me and my friend quite some time to figure out how to even invite each other into a multiplayer game. Coming from the Xbox 360, it is not intuitive at all. There is no "Invite Friend" option. You have to be in the same Xbox Live party, then start a private game, then it automatically tells the other person in the party that a game is ready, and they can choose to join it at that point. It was kind of annoying at first, but hopefully once you understand how it works, it may be quicker than the old way of doing it.

Update 2013.12.29:
I've ran into a few more very minor disappointments relating to features the Xbox One doesn't have that the PS3/360 did have. You can read about this under the "Two steps forward, one step backwards" paragraph.

Update 2014.01.06:
My initial impression of the Kinect was mixed, but after you get over the awkwardness of talking to your Xbox, you can really get some good use out of it. I think game-wise, the best way (for now) to see what the Kinect can offer are the full body motion games like the free Xbox Fitness app, and Dance Central 2014. You can even just view what the Kinect sees by looking for the "What else does Kinect see?" option in your settings menu. It's really cool to see the infrared view, distance-metered view, along with the standard HD view. But for me, the best use of the Kinect, is to no longer need to search for the controller in the dark when watching a movie. "Xbox Pause" and "Xbox Play" commands have gotten a lot of use!

Update 2014.02.25:
As I predicted, Microsoft has addressed many of the shortcomings I mentioned through their February and upcoming March system updates. They have added the should-have-been-included-from-the-start feature to manage your hard drive's contents and see how much free space is available. They added a controller battery level monitor icon on the dashboard. March's update will be improving party chat and adding a recent players list that I mentioned was a last-gen feature mysteriously absent from this console. However, I am still (im)patiently waiting on 3D Blu-ray support, and USB storage support, among other nitpicks listed in my original review. Hopefully Microsoft keeps listening to user feedback. The updates thus far are promising, but they still have some work to do.

Update 2014.03.08:
This may be the final helpful tip I have on this review: The new Titanfall Xbox One bundle is the same thing for the same price, but includes a full download of Titanfall, so you should probably plan on purchasing that one instead of this. Enjoy! Read more ›

370 of 470 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars Surprisingly solid and responsive November 23, 2013

By John S. Dean TOP 500 REVIEWER

This is better than I had expected. I picked up the Day One edition, but since that won't be sold anymore outright, seems pointless to review on that one since they're identical other than the words on the controller and the code for the achievement. I'd rather the review is useful on the one people will be buying moving forward.

Well packaged. MS is finally picking up some from Apple in how well they design the packaging and how they fit things into smaller spaces, like they did with the Surface.

There was a 500MB or so update to run as soon as it was hooked up, which I did at work before I got this home.

The initial setup was easy. Since I have a gold Live account, I just told it who I was and away it went. The only thing that threw me off was I had been used to the extra layer of security on the 360 so I had my "app password" all set to set this up, but apparently they did the security on the Xbox One so that if you're like me and have two level security enabled on your Live account, this doesn't need the app password but can use the actual Live account password, it just needed me to put in the additional verification code it texted to my phone.

I got it home, and since I'm keeping my other Xboxes, I found a spot for this in my cabinet. I have ATT Uverse, so I ran the Uverse box to the input here, and this to the receiver I use as my HDMI switcher as well as sound.

I had spent time the past week trying to find things in google searches about whether or not it would use the HDMI to command the cable box or if I'd need some IR blaster, but hadn't found anything. Fortunately, it's all HDMI.

You specify your TV type, and it tests to make sure it can control it if the TV supports that via HDMI. Same with a receiver and the cable box - it will try different controls until it succeeds and you say "Yep that worked." Then it's set.

The unit is nice and quiet. I have five Xboxes in the house, although I'm giving the oldest one away since I don't need more than three 360's for what we use them for here. The one I'm giving away is the original one from 2006, still running, never had a red ring of death, but sounds like an F-14 taking off from a carrier. The Elite was quieter, the Slim quieter still, and last month I bought a new 360 E so I'd have a 360 still in warranty for a while since we need to keep one for all the games we have. I thought that one was nice and quiet, but the XB One is even more silent. It's so nice to NOT have all that fan noise even at idle.

The Kinect is pretty amazing. I've enjoyed the first generation one since its release with my now 10 year old son, and thought they did an amazing job with that, but this one just blows it away. I like that I have Live accounts for both my son and I, and if I'm in the room when I turn on the xbox, it recognizes me and signs me in automatically (and you can enable/disable this feature BTW). If he's the one it sees, it signs him in. I tested with both of us there, and wanted to see if it would offer which one to sign in, but it simply signed us both in. Impressive.

Voice control - it's surprisingly effective for everything, my only irritation is with the guide. That's where I dinged a star off of it. Telling it who my provider was, my zip code, and it gave me a guide. But I'm not a fan of the guide, it takes up way too much room, leaving you with a very narrow window of things to view as far as channel lineups. I am looking to try to see if I can collapse it some, but so far I've had no luck. But I'm expecting there will be several revamps over the next few months with updates and patches since this is all new release.

My Harmony Touch remote works great with it, Logitech made sure they had the Xbox One as a device on launch day.

Since I use multiple devices for my things, I don't just use the "xbox on" or "xbox off" to turn it on and off, but it's been spot on for my testing, it never fails to turn on or off via voice. Navigating the menus with voice is just great, making things quick and easy to get to. Watching TV could use a few more commands though, such as "channel up" and such.

The controller is nice, feels great. I always preferred the Xbox controller to the other consoles I have, and this one is a nice next version of it - comfortable, positive feeling on the buttons and triggers, not heavy.

In the settings, there's a Kinect setting where you can click "what does Kinect see" and it changes through different view options. The night vision is amazingly effective in a dark room. I was impressed.

The only game I have so far is Battlefield 4, and it's a thing of beauty.

This does support surround sound for your cable box, but it's disabled by default, and turning it on under the settings it shows as "beta", since apparently they had a couple bugs with a couple specific cable boxes, but it works well for me with Uverse so far.

I like the interface, easy to navigate and while some people think it's more cluttered, I actually think it's the opposite. There's less things there to get at on the top level, which makes it more pleasant to navigate.

The Kinect doesn't move at all like the old version did, and the cable is MUCH thicker. Keep that in mind when you're figuring out where to place it. For now I have it in front of my TV, and I've preordered an "above the TV mount" for it so it'll be up there next to the 360's Kinect and out of the way.

Other than my dissatisfaction with the TV Guide and navigation of the guide with voice, I can't find anything at all that I felt disappointed about with this new system. Blu Ray playing software was a free download from the store, and there's apparently a service for XB Live members to stream videos for free, something along the lines of what I get from Amazon with my Prime membership (which also ties in well here).

I'm so fed up listening to the fan boys of each side argue about the PS4 vs. the XB One. I have a PS3 but I have it for only two games, Little Big Planet and Infamous. Everything else, I've always preferred to play on the Xbox or Wii, or now the Wii U. I'm not worried about which has higher specs, since if someone REALLY is concerned about that, they'd be building their own high end gaming PC anyway that would blow both of these out of the water. PS4 has some things better, but the XB One has some things that are better for me as well. Both have their place, and hopefully both keep forcing the other to innovate. The complaint about the Xbox being $100 more is offset when you get the camera setup for the PS4 and puts it right back at the same price anyway, so I don't care that the PS 4 cost less, because you GET less. I'd expect to pay more when I get more.

All told, this is just an amazing piece of technology. I don't know if I'm going to leave the Uverse running through it or not, since I don't know how important it is that I control that via voice. I don't watch that much TV, and most of what I watch I record and timeshift to watch later anyway, either for me or for my 10 year old.

But in every respect, this is a solid hit. Worth the money to me. Read more ›

675 of 872 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Launch Console Impressions November 23, 2013

By Joshua B. Brackin

I'll start by saying that Xbox One is a console that has a lot of potential, and little of it is ready yet. I bought the standard edition on release night. I also bought Call of Duty Ghosts to go with it. I'll break my review down a little bit to talk about the good and bad things that I have noticed so far:

Kinect:

My first impression is that it is much larger than the original Kinect. The picture quality seems on par with my Samsung Smart TV camera, although it's nice that I can be much closer to the TV and still be seen. At first it wouldn't work with any games (for gestures). I had to go into the configuration settings several times before it finally pointed out that it couldn't identify my floor (I have very dark carpet). It allowed me to adjust where my floor was (by raising and lowering a virtual floor image) and then it worked. Movement is working ok at this point. Voice control is very hit and miss. I usually have to speak commands at least twice to get it to respond to my voice (and I speak and enunciate very clearly, and I don't have any sort of accent). It does not understand my wife at all no matter what. It's also pretty buggy as far as recognizing the people that are in the room. It will usually sign me in, and it sometimes will recognize my three-year-old daughter, but it never recognizes my wife. I always have to manually sign her in if we are switching profiles. My last gripe is that there is really no way to currently mount the new Kinect on top of the TV set as it's pictured in most advertisements. There is no official peripheral from Microsoft, and the only potential solution that may work is coming from PDP and is not yet released. I had to actually use tape to hold it on top of the TV (didn't want it below the TV because my kids would get at it).

Controller:

The new controller is also a little bit disappointing. It connects and responds just fine. It feels a little smaller in my hands than the 360 controller did. It definitely feels cheaper as well. The plastic that makes up the body of the controller is noticeably thinner and feels much less substantial. I'm pretty sure that it wouldn't take much to completely break it if someone accidentally stepped on it or dropped it on a hard floor (which I've done with my 360 controller with no adverse affects). The sticks themselves are noticeably smaller and have much less surface area than on the 360. I do like that there is more grip on the top of the stick, but I don't like that only half of my thumb fits on it when I'm using it (I have average sized medium hands). The sticks were much more comfortable on my 360 controller. The D-Pad is definitely more responsive, but has a loud annoying click when you press the buttons (which is intentional according to a recent developer video). I'd rather have a quiet controller, but this is my personal preference. Other than that, it works as expected.

Performance:

I'd have to say at this point that I'm really not getting a "next-gen" vibe from this console. Yes, the interface is different, but they could have done this with an update to the existing 360. They used a standard 5400 RPM hard drive inside, so loading times are just as long as they were on the 360. It switches Apps quickly, but then has to sit and load each one for a decent amount of time. It would have cost them about the same amount of money to put a 60 GB SSD in the console and then allow you to buy an external HD of your choice for larger games. This would have made the whole console a lot more responsive and would have felt a lot better. The only games that I've been able to play so far are Call of Duty Ghosts, Kinect Sports, and Killer Instinct. Call of Duty Ghosts looks identical to it's 360 counterpart. There is nothing that looks graphically better about it. I've seen other reviews that confirm that I am not the only one that feels this way about this particular game. In the same vein, Kinect Sports and Killer Instinct also look like they could run at the same quality on an existing Xbox 360. I am very much aware of the hardware that is inside of this console (I built a computer for a friend earlier this year that had similar components), so I have an idea of what it could potentially do. I also remember the first launch titles for the Xbox 360 and how bad they looked. I know that games will begin to look better on Xbox One as developers learn to get the most from the new hardware, however they haven't done much with it yet. And I also realize that I have not had a chance to test any of the other titles for the new console. I'll talk about that next.

Content:

This is the real subject that is upsetting me about the Xbox One. There is hardly any content to really jump into with this console. Yes, there are around 15 launch games, 90% of which will set you back at least $65. If you're a normal hard-working family man like me, there is no way that you can buy more than one or two of them in addition to the console's $500 price tag. They could have easily offset this problem in two ways. One is that they could have released some $10-$15 arcade titles to go with the console on launch day. There are zero arcade/indie type games on the Xbox One. There isn't even a section for them on the dashboard or in the store. Even Sony at least threw a couple of these in the mix with the new PS4. So it's really just crazy expensive games or nothing at this moment. It's a little bit hard to swallow after enjoying the pricing on Steam and on my iOS devices for the last few years. The second fix could have been with releasing a few demos of the new games to help get people excited about the potential better graphics and game diversity. There are ZERO demos on the Xbox One. In addition to the lack of content to play, there are only a small selection of Apps to try out on the console. We're talking about 30% of what is currently on the Xbox 360. This I don't understand at all. I realize that it takes a little bit of effort to build these Apps, but why weren't they here for Launch day? We're seeing that developers can make huge games in time for launch, but that other developers can't build a simple App? Essential Apps like HBO Go are nowhere to be found (although they are advertised as coming at some point). So instead of the Xbox One becoming the center of my entertainment experience, I constantly have to switch back to another device to enjoy content that should be on the Xbox One. What this basically boils down to is that I am mostly left twiddling my thumbs without much to do on my new console (and that's after a $600 investment to get a game and the system).

TV: TV is actually working ok. It was very easy to get the Xbox One to recognize my Samsung Smart TV and my Directv HD DVR receiver. I can easily pull up the guide and switch between content. You cannot currently control anything that has to do with DVR content, which I hope will be enhanced at some point.

Bottom Line:

The Bottom Line is that this console was clearly rushed out before it was ready. There is very little content, and essential content is not there. There are no little inexpensive games to fill the gaps. There are no demos to get a better idea of what this console can really do. The Kinect has yet to prove that its vastly superior to the original Kinect, and the controller feels a bit like a step back compared to the 360 controller.

With all of that said, these are mostly launch-window sorts of gripes. There is obviously more content coming, and hopefully some of it won't set me back $65 per purchase. I am also sure that some of these short-comings will be fixed with future updates. My review is mostly based on the lack of things to do with my new beauty and I'm sure that I'll be much happier with it in 6 months when I can do more with it. Read more ›