7 Settings to Change on Your Xbox One

The Xbox One is a powerful video game console with the apps and features that entertainment users need. That’s a long way of saying that it can sometimes by a complex and unwieldy machine. There are multiple ways to do everything, plus apps and software that improve your experience if you know where to look.

Here are 7 settings I’d suggest users change on the Xbox One when they can. Some of these feature changes only involve a specific thing. Other changes can completely alter the look and feel of your Xbox One.

 

Read: 21 Tips for a Better Xbox One Experience

Assign a Background

When it launched back in 2013, the Xbox One only offered a very basic bit of customization. Like Windows Phone before it, Microsoft opted for no backgrounds on the Xbox One. Instead, the company simply let users change their Live Tile color.

Late last year, the company rolled out customizable backgrounds for the Xbox One. Then it spent a few months improving on the feature. Now you can choose any picture available from a device on your network or hard drive as your Xbox One background. Additionally, the achievements that users earn themselves can become backgrounds. Live Tile color customization and the ability to add some transparency to some Live Tiles is available now too.

Read: How to Set Xbox One Backgrounds

Change all of your personalization settings from the My Xbox area in the Settings app on the Xbox One.

Boot Directly to TV

The Xbox One is a pretty viable all-in-one entertainment solution. Millions likely have an Xbox One connected directly to their cable box and controlling their television. The Kinect 2 sensor and media remote are aimed at making use of that Live TV functionality easier, but you’re never going to convince everyone in your house to use either of them.

For those people ,Microsoft added the Boot to TV feature. Turn Boot to TV on and your Xbox One goes right to the television app instead of the Xbox One home screen. This way, you get to keep your Xbox One connected to your television and the less technically savvy members of your family don’t have to fiddle with the Xbox One home screen at all.

Turn Boot to TV on in the Power & Startup area of the Settings App. It’s labeled “On Start, go to TV.”

Setup The OneGuide

One of the most underrated features of the Xbox One is the OneGuide. That’s because most people associate it with the console’s Live TV functionality. That makes sense, the OneGuide is how users quickly change channels and see what’s airing next in the TV app. What most people don’t realize is that the Xbox OneGuide offers other features too.

Download an Internet TV app – like ABC News – and the Xbox One treats those streaming live channels as digital channels. Also, there’s the App channels. From there you can get glances at the latest stuff from your favorite entertainment apps.

App Channels in the OneGuide are automatically added when you download an app from the Windows Store. You access them by saying “Xbox OneGuide” if you have a Kinect 2 sensor or pressing the menu button inside the TV app. The Xbox One Media Remote also includes a dedicated OneGuide button.

Make Your Xbox One Your Home Console

There was a time when video gamers found it actually acceptable to purchase a video game twice if they wanted to play with their friends or family on separate consoles at the same time. Fortunately, that’s no longer the case. The Xbox One uses something called Xbox Live Home Gold to make gaming easier for the other people that live in your household.

Read: How to Share Xbox One Games with Friends

Users who buy digital can give everyone on their Xbox access to their games when they’re not signed in by making their Xbox One their Home Console. Additionally, everyone gets Xbox Live Gold privileges if that’s present on the host account too.

Go to the My Xbox area in the Settings app to set your console as your Home Console. Note that you can only switch the Home Console on your account three times a year.

Rebalance Audio

The Xbox One isn’t the first video console to allow you to do multiple things at the same time. That being said, it is the first to allow you to use an app at the same time as you’re playing a game. This is called Snap, and it’s a great feature.

Say you want to listen to songs from Microsoft’s Xbox Music service, snapping the Xbox Music app is how you’d do that. Unfortunately, the Xbox One’s sound mixer puts audio from both apps at the same volume.

Don’t let the music from your games drown out what you’re streaming. Instead, adjust the audio priority in the Xbox One’s sound mixer. The feature is available in the Settings app by selecting Display & Sound.

Good luck with your Xbox One. GottaBeMobile recently compiled a list of tips for new users too.