When asked at CES 2011 by the BBC if Kinect was going to be made available to PC users Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer replied:
“We’ll support that in a formal way, in the right time,” Ballmer said. “When we have an announcement to make, we’ll make it.”
This quote has surfaced all over the Internet since it was uttered a couple of days ago.
Here is my question – is anyone at all surprised by this? I’m not.
Even if they waited to see the phenomenal success that the Kinect has experienced in its first 60 days on the market, 8 million sold as announced during the Microsoft CES 2011 Keynote, this was going to be a reality. The Xbox 360 console has the Kinect Hub that allows you to control several elements of the console including the Netflix and HuluPlus which will be added this Spring.
Connecting the Kinect, say that 5 times real fast, to a PC makes complete sense and not just for the gaming piece but I think more so for the control aspect. Again I refer back to the Kinect Hub on the Xbox 360 and all the control aspects it gives for music, videos, etc. Of course the games will get ported over to that platform and don’t forget the Kinect has a built in color camera for video teleconferencing too.
Even if Microsoft sold half as many Kinect for PC units as they have so far for the Xbox 360 this will be a great success.
They have proven that Kinect will sell at the $149.99 price point as well so I expect that will remain as it moves over to the PC.
Now the guessing begins as to when we will see Kinect for the PC – I say within 12-18 months.
What do you think?