The Xbox One Will Make Your Cable Box Look Like a Relic

When the Xbox One showed up back in May, showing off its slick, boxy body and collection of Kinect tricks, we were treated to a little taste of how it was not only going to play games, but also take charge of your TV. Since then, we haven't heard to much more, but we sat down with Microsoft to find out more about what this will all look like. Turns out it looks like pure future.

Menus and moreWe've seen plenty of TV and plenty of Kinect voice control in teasers so far, but they only scratch the surface of what's lying underneath. Thanks to the HDMI passthrough that runs your cable from your cablebox, through your Xbox One, and theninto the TV, the console can take total control of your content and it's glorious.

Instead of dealing with the sluggish, unintuitive, remote-requiring cable menu that comes by default, the Xbox One instead pulls all of that information into its own tile-based overlay called OneGuide, which is not only prettier, but waaaay better than anything coming out of your cable box.

SEXPAND

Through this Xbox-enabled channel menu, you can browse through channels with your controller instead of a stupid remote, or just issue commands by voice if you've got your Kinect set up. Can't be bothered to remember channel numbers? No problem, the Xbox One is perfectly capable or responding to commands with channel names. We saw the future of turning on AMC by saying "Turn on AMC," and seeing it in real life for the first time really makes you feel like you're in Star Trek.

And while you still might be stuck getting a bajillion cable channels you don't care about with the five or six you actually want, the Xbox One can at least help clear the menu clutter by letting you organize your own customized menus that feature just the channels you want. What's more, is that this should work with all major cable providers out there. The Xbox One controls your cable box with a built in IR blaster, so basically it's just a giant remote. It's not like your stupid little box has to have any crazy features or compatibility; the Xbox One is doing all the heavy lifting. All your cable provider has to do is offer up access to its schedule, and it does that for DVRs already.

Don't have cable? You can still set up "channels" from your favorite on-demand video services. That, plus your cable faves if you have any, makes OneGuid everything you want—and justwhat you want—all in one place. And virtually any place you can use your controller, you can also use your voice, for added futuristic sci-fi flair. It can be a little weird now and then, but it never gets old.

SEXPAND

Naturally, streaming video on the Xbox One is only going to be as good as its apps. Here's a list of partners who are working to be on the system at launch.
Amazon Instant Video
Crackle
CWTV
ESPN
FOX NOW
FXNOW
HBO GO (coming soon)
Hulu Plus
Machinima
MUZU TV
Netflix
Redbox Instant by Verizon
Target Ticket
TED
The NFL on Xbox One
Twitch
Univision Deportes
Verizon FiOS TV
VUDU
Casting from the cloud

Of course you may have other things you want to put up on your TV too. Maybe you've got some photos from a vacation you want to slideshow, or a stupid video you took with your cell phone, or some perfectly legal video files you downloaded to your computer from a perfectly legal source. The Xbox One can help you out there too. Through deep integration with Microsoft's cloud app, you can stream videos directly from your Skydrive to your TV through the Xbox, or pin albums of pictures to your channel menu for easy showing off.

SEXPAND

On top of that, you can also beam media from your Windows 8 computer directly to the Xbox One through the Charms menu, so long as both devices are on the same network. Sure, you can also do that with Windows 7 and Xbox 360, but now it's literally at your fingertips.
Magical, but not mandatory

And all that's just the new stuff. We also took a Skype call that came in over what was playing on TV, swapped from Internet Explorer to Forza Motorsports 5 to Xbox Music to Skype and back again in seconds by barking commands. We watched a video game and live TV on the same screen at the same time. You know, stuff we've know about from the start, but that is still awesome to see finally coming together. This is the beautiful future.

But maybe the best part of all this is that if you don't want to run full-speed into the future, or cede control of your channel surfing to a Kinect or Xbox controller, you don't have to. All of this just sits on top of what you already had. So any luddites who are particularly set in their ways remain completely undisrupted while you shout at your TV and giggle to yourself with glee.

It's a pretty impressive suite of functionality, and it's exciting to start seeing it really come together in person. And even better is the fact that this box also plays really terrific video games. The set-top box part is its part-time job. But anything worth doing is worth doing well, and the Xbox One seems to know that. Yes, we're excited to play Titanfall. But hot damn, changing channels is going to be awesome too.