Microsoft announced today that will be discontinuing the sales of the first generation Kinect for Windows in 2015. The Xbox One-maker didn’t announce exactly when it will stop selling the motion detection system, however, they did say that it would stop after exhausting the existing stock.
The move seems completely reasonable and strategic as, if you remember, the company had launched the second generation of its Kinect for Windows sensor in October earlier this year. The second generation Kinect for Windows brings a lot of improvements over the first generations’ offerings, including enhanced body tracking, full 1080p high-definition video, and new active infrared capabilities, among other features.
Priced at $199, the Kinect is a motion detection system typically used around the Xbox One console. The setup lets users interact with several game titles and other applications with gestures and/or voice without using any other input peripherals.
“The original Kinect for Windows sensor was a milestone achievement in the world of natural human computing.” Microsoft wrote in a blog post. “It allowed developers to create solutions that broke through the old barriers of mouse and keyboard interactions, opening up entirely new commercial experiences in multiple industries, including retail, education, healthcare, education, and manufacturing.”
While the company hasn’t provided the updated number, in February it had announced that the company had managed to sell 24 million units of Kinect. The second generation of the Kinect for Windows SDK also allowed developers to build Kinect-enabled apps for the Windows Store. Earlier this year, the company had urged the developers to make Kinect for Windows apps with an Xbox One version of the sensor using the Kinect Adapter.
