Kinect Installation Issues

[alfredtwo]

There have been some reports of teams having issues installing the Kinect software. Some teams may be deciding that since they are not going to do any programming on their own that they can skip some steps. Having Visual Studio 2010 Express or some other edition of Visual Studio is actually a requirement though. That may (or may not) change in the future but for now you need to install it.

Summarizing from the Readme file:

Supported Operating Systems

• Windows 7 (x86 and x64)

Software Requirements and order of installation for installing the Kinect for Windows SDK

1. .NET Framework 4.0 [prerequisite install even if you don’t program] - http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/netframework/aa569263
2. Microsoft® Visual Studio® 2010 Express (C++ or C# or other Visual Studio 2010 edition [prerequisite install even if you don’t program] - http://www.microsoft.com/express/Downloads/
3. Kinect for Windows SDK beta (choose the appropriate version x86/32 bit or x64/64bit to match your copy of Windows 7) - http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/.../download.aspx

[rclothier]

Does that mean we can't use the Kinect if we don't have Windows 7? I'm running Windows Vista.

[slijin]

Originally Posted by rclothier

Does that mean we can't use the Kinect if we don't have Windows 7? I'm running Windows Vista.

You might be able to use it (there's a measure of backwards compatibility between 7 and Vista) but you're liable to run into complications arising from your use of Vista.

[Ashley Painter]

Is this connecting to the drivers station computer or any computer that you need to instal these things?

[rclothier]

I'm trying to install it to my personal laptop, which runs Vista. It won't let me install the Kinect Software, says it need Windows 7 or higher. So I guess I'm outta luck.

[Greg McKaskle]

It may be possible by modifying the installer scripts, but I wouldn't recommend it.

Greg McKaskle

[rclothier]

Turns out none of our school district computers run Windows 7. I assume the Classmate does, but programming on the Classmate is slow and difficult. So we are left with either spending $100 to purchase Windows 7, or being limited to a tiny, slow computer for our programming.

If it's true that only computers running Windows 7 can use the Kinect, that is going to leave some teams in a bind. If so, it would be gracious and professional of Microsoft to donate a copy of Windows 7, or at least give a reduced cost.

[markgryzwa]

We are one of those teams with no Windows 7 available. Too bad it looked like fun to try out.

[RufflesRidge]

Windows 7 should only be required to (optionally) modify the FRC Kinect Server code (in C#) and on the computer being used as the Driver's Station.

WPILib appears to have interfaces and examples for accessing the skeleton data on the robot (with the Kinect plugged into the Driver's Station) which should not require Windows 7 to develop.

[Greg McKaskle]

Correct. The Win7 dependency is for the Kinect drivers. The rest of the tools work on more OSes.

Greg McKaskle

[jawebste]

Students with an edu email address, usually colleges (maybe a team alumnus), can buy Windows 7 at a discount http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/...UB_4up_Windows . They can also get a discount on the upgrade, though I am having a hard time locating it again.

Maybe that will help.

Good luck.

[alfredtwo]

High schools can get access to Windows 7 for academic/teaching use involving computer science education, generally for computer science labs, via the MSDN AA Developer program (see http://msdnaa.net for more information on that). This program also lets school provide copies of software to students for their own computers.

If you can have someone from your school who is in charge of school computer labs (generally a computer science teacher or technology coordinator) get in touch with me at Alfred.Thompson@microsoft.com I will arrange for a memo of grant so the school gets this program for free. The FIRST Team would be concidered a valid acadeic use under the licence for the program. It includes a whole lot of other development software BTW such as Visual Studio professional.

I’m looking into some additional options especially to see if I can help home schooled or other non-school based teams. More on that when I have it.

[jawebste]

Thanks so much for the info. We will definitely be contacting you.

[alfredtwo]

Two other options for you to try. Windows Server 2008 R2 will run the Kinect for Windows SDK. A bit over kill in some ways but it works even if not officially supported for all application. And students can get it for free if their school signs up for DreamSpark which is also free. http://www.dreamspark.com is the place and a faculty member from your high school can sign up and give access codes to students. If fact if you are interested in software development this is much too good a deal for you not to jump on. :-)

Next option, for those of you who really like living on the bleading edge of technology Windows 8 Developer Preview is supported and is a free download from http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/apps/br229516 Read all the warnings first as this is pre-beta and cannot be reoved with an uninstall procedure.