2015 is shaping up to be a rather interesting year for gamers; we have a slew of new games to look forward to with plenty of third-party titles releasing on both the Xbox One, PS4, Wii U and just about every console under the sun. There’s also the first-party offerings on the horizon, namely Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End and Quantum Break.
That said, it’s not all about games this generation. Whilst Sony may have a more “gamer” centric console with the PS4, Microsoft has always billed the Xbox One as an “all-in-one” entertainment box.
A new job posting on the Microsoft careers website seems to indicate that the platform holder is looking to support some new Xbox focused hardware
Xbox platform team is hiring a rock solid Kernel device driver developer! Our team is responsible for major components of the XBOX platform which include all the low level device drivers related to Ethernet, WI-FI, Wi-FI-Direct, USB, and PCI, Audio, HDMI-IN, and Graphics kernel mode drivers. We work very closely with developers both inside and outside of Microsoft as well as with the hardware vendors to evolve, design, develop, validate and test many hardware components on the Xbox.
We are looking for a senior device driver developer who will be working on some exciting devices on XBOX. The ideal candidate has a passion in this space, loves creating new drivers, enabling other 3rd party hardware vendors to deliver the best drivers, and influence them to get the most from the hardware available, enjoys collaborating with Firmware teams and designers to get the best results, and keeps up to speed on all the latest protocols. Their background ranges from not just developing new drivers but also kernel debugging, to performance tuning on CPUs, integration of drivers into XBOX and solving tough problems in drivers and kernel components of XBOX. They want to work in a fun and healthy environment with passionate co-workers on products that will amaze the world.
Candidate responsibilities:
• Designing, developing and coding Miniport NDIS, USB, and other kernel mode drivers.
• Working closely with firmware developers and API developers, helping to define application/system drivers/firmware interface specifications.
• Using tools including WinDbg, Visual Studio Debugging, Wireless Sniffers, Prefast, and driver verifier, and kernel level performance profiling like ETL, tuning and analysis on a regular basis.
• Working closely with Virtualization and HyperV technologies.
• Working closely with 3rd party hardware vendors around driver and feature designs for XBOX scenarios and drives functional specifications with them.
At the moment there aren’t a great many third-party Xbox One peripherals. There are a handful of licensed third-party Xbox One controllers, but nothing substantial.
Could this possibly indicate some new peripherals? Maybe something in the vein of Rock Band’s many external controllers? Possibly, there is a new game coming from that very same developer.
Personally, I’m holding out for a full-on next-gen Rock Band though with full keyboard support. My inner Mozart needs to be released!
Join The Games Cabin on Facebook for the latest gaming news, reviews, rumours, trailers, giveaways and more.
Top Stories:
LittleBigPlanet 3 Developer Working On “Genre Defining” AAA Unreal 4 Project, Will Be “Industry Changing”
Joe Danger 2: The Movie Rated For PS Vita, Release Incoming?
PS Now Getting PS1/PS2 Games, No Plans For Annual Sub, Saves Are Cloud Based & More