14 DAY TRIAL // The Xbox 360 has received a massive upgrade with the recent launch of the Kinect peripheral, which allows you to control the console's functions with your voice or your hand gestures, but it can't let you start or stop the console with just your voice.
Microsoft's head of the Kinect project, Alex Kipman, recently explained why this futuristic feature was excluded from the new system.
According to him, if Kinect would allow you to start the console with your voice, it would mean that it had to stay on all the time, consuming electric power, so it would lead to bigger bills for the owner and unnecessary consumption.
"To be able to listen all the time for you to turn it on means there [would have to be] some amount of power going to the sensor," Kipman said. "We wanted to make sure there's no power going when the system's off, to be good world citizens ... We want to be green compliant and more green more times."
Because the Kinect doesn't allow you to turn on the Xbox 360 with your voice, the feature to shut it down was also scrapped, in order to stop people from thinking that they can also turn it on with their voice.
Perhaps this is for the best though, as lots of gaming experiences would've been ruined by annoying friends, family members or others, who just stepped into the room and said 'Xbox off' or something like that.
Still, the Kinect peripheral, through its camera, microphone and sensors allows you pause or play videos, control the dashboard interface with your hands and do lots of other cool and futuristic things, so perhaps the removal of the on/off function might have been for the best.
Kinect was launched last week for the Xbox 360 and according to both analysts and retailers, it will go on to be the best selling device of the holiday season.