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Microsoft wants to bring Xbox experience to Windows handhelds

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Marees

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Microsoft is combining ‘the best of Xbox and Windows together’ for handhelds​

Microsoft’s VP of ‘Next Generation’ says changes are coming in 2025.
by Tom Warren and Sean Hollister

Microsoft has done compact modes for Xbox apps on Windows that are focused on improving the handheld experience, but it’s a lot like putting lipstick on a pig instead of addressing the core experience. “I think we’ll have a lot more to share later this year,” teases Ronald. “I think it’s going to be a journey and I think you’ll see a lot of investments over time that you’re starting to see already, but we’ll have a lot more to share later this year.”


“I think, at the end of the day, our goal is to make Windows great for gaming on any device,” says Ronald. “The reality is the Xbox operating system is built on top of Windows. So there’s a lot of infrastructure that we built in the console space that we can bring to the PC space and really deliver that premium gaming experience on any device.”

Specifically, Microsoft has to tackle a lot of the very basics of making Windows more friendly to controllers and getting that Xbox experience to really drive things instead of the taskbar, Start menu, and other elements. “There’s just certain things in Windows that were not designed for if you don’t have a keyboard and mouse, like thumbstick support or joypads and stuff like that,” Ronald admits.

“There’s fundamental interaction models that we’re working on to make sure that regardless of the operating system details it feels very natively like a gaming-centric device and a gaming-centric experience.”

Ronald says the goal is to put an Xbox experience at the center — “not the Windows desktop that you have today.”

https://www.theverge.com/2025/1/7/24338778/microsoft-xbox-handheld-pc-gaming
 
the Xbox work that has hit the headlines this week is actually called Project Kennan, not Keenan. I’m told that Kennan is the codename for a handheld that is being manufactured by Asus, and it’s part of a larger effort from Microsoft to unify Windows and Xbox towards a universal library of Xbox and PC games.

I’m told that Asus is one of the launch partners for these efforts, with an Xbox-branded handheld likely to debut later this year. I say likely because a lot of this platform work is still ongoing, so until Microsoft officially announces it, timelines could change.


Some of this platform work is codenamed Project Bayside, part of an Xbox UX framework that is designed to ensure there’s a common Xbox UI across multiple devices to help combine Windows and Xbox. Together, Kennan and Bayside represent some of the work that Ronald was hinting at, opening up the benefits of Xbox to the broader Windows ecosystem.


Windows Central reports that Microsoft is working on a “premium successor” to the Xbox Series X alongside its own Xbox handheld that is tentatively slated for release in 2027. I’m fully expecting Microsoft’s next Xbox console to be a lot more PC-like, so the Kennan and Bayside projects will likely give us an early look at how the next-gen Xbox will take shape on the software side, at least.

These Xbox platform changes could also help fend off the threat of SteamOS. I wrote last year that Microsoft is now in a handheld gaming PC race, with Valve allowing device makers to offer SteamOS on their handhelds instead of Windows. Microsoft has been slow to respond to the Steam Deck, particularly around improving the Windows experience on handhelds like Asus’ ROG Ally. Valve opening up SteamOS last summer and then Lenovo introducing its own SteamOS-powered handheld in January will have sounded the alarms inside Microsoft, because if one Windows OEM has already been tempted by SteamOS then what’s stopping more of them from switching?

This is particularly relevant beyond the emerging market of handhelds, too. Valve is now in a far better position to make its console-like Steam Machines a reality, thanks to the success of the Steam Deck and its Proton work. If OEMs get comfortable with SteamOS on their handhelds, the next logical step is a demand for SteamOS on something more like a miniature PC or game console.


https://www.theverge.com/notepad-mi...icrosoft-xbox-handheld-project-kennan-notepad
 
Its here

This is how Microsoft is combining Windows and Xbox for handheld PCs​

Two new Xbox Ally devices introduce Microsoft’s much-needed improvements to handheld gaming PCs.
by Tom Warren
Jun 8, 2025, 10:40 PM GMT+5:30

Microsoft and Asus have just announced two ROG Xbox Ally devices that include a new full-screen Xbox experience for handhelds. After promising to combine “the best of Xbox and Windows together” for handhelds earlier this year, Microsoft is now revealing exactly how it is overhauling the Xbox app, Game Bar, and Windows itself to better compete with SteamOS.

https://www.theverge.com/news/68201...pc-combination-features-rog-xbox-ally-devices


The Xbox full-screen experience is very much the compact mode of the Xbox app taking full control of the ROG Xbox Ally devices, instead of the familiar Windows desktop and taskbar. “When the player boots into the full-screen experience there is a whole bunch of Windows stuff that doesn’t get loaded,” says Beaumont. “We’re not loading the desktop wallpaper, the taskbar, or a bunch of processes that are really designed around productivity scenarios for Windows.”


“Some of our early testing with the components we’ve turned off in Windows, we get about 2GB of memory going back to the games while running in the full-screen experience.”

“If you’re booting your device into the full-screen experience and you’re putting it down and it’s going to sleep, it draws one third of the idle power draw than if it was booting the same device into the [Windows] desktop experience,”


Sones says Microsoft is “working closely with leading storefronts to have them optimize their full screen experience,” to make it easy for everyone to play a full library of PC games from Steam, Epic Games Store, and elsewhere.
“The aggregated gaming library within Xbox on PC will be available for all Windows 11 devices,” says Sones, so you’ll soon be able to see all of your Steam games within the Xbox app on any PC.


“The Xbox full-screen experience will first come to the ROG Xbox Ally and the ROG Xbox Ally X, and our next focus will be updating the in-market ROG Ally and the ROG Ally X,” says Sones. “Similar full-screen Xbox experiences will be rolling out to other Windows handhelds, starting next year.”
 
would like trying it that clean OS on a regular desktop-laptop..... plugged on a TV, in the pass they could have worry to sell a non-bloated/ad-product pusher less version of windows to people, but gamepass could turn that around, Gamepass machine, easy enough to sales gamepass gold past for those and over time if the store get good enough get confident enough in their own store, getting people entry to it via some gamepass app common interface.
 
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Microsoft would be targetting series S like sales. But the prices could be close to $1000


In February, industry research firm IDC told The Verge that the Steam Deck as well as Windows-based handhelds such as the ROG Ally totaled 1.5 million units sold in 2024.

Without numbers directly from the manufacturers, the estimates vary a bit.

Ampere Analysis sized the market of Steam Deck and other PC gaming handhelds at 5.3 million units sold, projecting growth to nearly 13 million in 2028, in data Ampere analyst Piers Harding-Rolls shared with Game File. The figures preceded today’s Xbox news.

Regardless of which count is more accurate, the totals are far less than the home consoles. Sony said PS5 sales from April 2024 through March 2025 reached 18.5 million units (Xbox doesn’t disclose their hardware sales but is assumed by analysts to be outsold by Sony by as much as two to one, still way more than the non-Switch handhelds).


https://www.gamefile.news/p/rog-xbox-ally-x-microsoft-handheld-windows-asus-hands-on
 
Xbox Ally X handheld using new AI tech in 'ways that haven't even been imagined'
Microsoft's Xbox engineering team is leveraging AMD's Ryzen AI chips in new innovative ways to help power its new Xbox ROG Ally X gaming handheld.

In a recent video published on the Xbox YouTube channel, key people from AMD, Xbox, and ASUS all discuss the Xbox Ally.

Head of Xbox devices Roanne Sones had something interesting to say about AI on the new handhelds:

"We have integrated in the power of AI experiences in ways that haven't even been imagined."

"Think of all the use cases that would blend AI based audio, AI-based gaming assisting functions, AI-based rendering capabilities," said AMD exec Sebastien Nussbaum.

Read more: https://www.tweaktown.com/news/1056...ays-that-havent-even-been-imagined/index.html
 
Marees said:
Xbox Ally X handheld using new AI tech in 'ways that haven't even been imagined'
Microsoft's Xbox engineering team is leveraging AMD's Ryzen AI chips in new innovative ways to help power its new Xbox ROG Ally X gaming handheld.

In a recent video published on the Xbox YouTube channel, key people from AMD, Xbox, and ASUS all discuss the Xbox Ally.

Head of Xbox devices Roanne Sones had something interesting to say about AI on the new handhelds:

"We have integrated in the power of AI experiences in ways that haven't even been imagined."

"Think of all the use cases that would blend AI based audio, AI-based gaming assisting functions, AI-based rendering capabilities," said AMD exec Sebastien Nussbaum.

Read more: https://www.tweaktown.com/news/1056...ays-that-havent-even-been-imagined/index.html
Click to expand...
Think of all the pain in the hindquarters it will be to disable all that microshit.
 
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