High resolution teardown of the new Time-of-Flight Kinect One.

[Nathan Monson]

Hi guys,

A while back, Microsoft purchased Canesta, inventors of a very
promising low-cost Time-of-Flight depth camera. I have been dying for
this technology to come out, since it lacks the weaknesses of
structured-light/Kinect sensors.

Here is a high-rest picture of the Kinect One internals:
http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/gadgetlab/2013/05/20130514-XBOX-ONE-TEARDOWN-016.jpg

It is clear it is using ToF technology. The projector is gone, and
now only an IR flash is used. As before, there is a second camera
video nearby for 1080p color.

Compared to the structured-light Kinect, the new ToF Kinect is higher
res, higher precision, and does not suffer from shadowing effects:
http://immagini.z-giochi.com/2013/05/xboxreveal00048-620x350.jpg

The field of view is also larger, at 60 degrees.

I don't want this to turn into an advertisement, but I am genuinely
excited by the possibilities of hacking this sensor into low cost
robots. USB 3.0 is required. Apparently, the depth info is sent
uncompressed at 30FPS along with a 1920x1080 color image. Microsoft
claims it will be sold separately as a Windows accessory, so drivers
will exist. As before, there is a microphone array, too.

Get your USB analyzers ready... Hopefully we will have it reverse
engineered before the end of the year!

Nathan