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Oculus Rift

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Re: Oculus Rift

#291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your use case is particularly apt for frequent fliers. I've almost had a tray table-supported laptop destroyed on more than one occasion by a reclining passenger in front of me. It would be amazing to just set up a small keyboard+trackpad on my lap and not have to even pull the computer out of its bag. If I could do this, I wouldn't even care how ridiculous I looked.

Also, consider a future where a laptop is just a ~silicone skin over the current "bottom half" of a laptop. Batteries could also be smaller since the screen currently eats so much juice, or it could stay the same size to power the VR headset (but I imagine that the smaller screens would use less juice).

This exists: http://www.aliexpress.com/item/2015-Newest-Vmsart-X1-windows...

15.1x8x1cm x86-64 computer with a built in 3000mAh battery

Re: Oculus Rift

#292

I recently returned my Oculus Rift, not even two weeks after buying it. Dropping Linux support is not okay.

It's strange, but when I think about it, DK1 was a much more positive 'product-y' experience for me than DK2 was. Perhaps part of that is that DK1 was my first VR headset, so much of the initial awe factor had worn off by the time I got the DK2.

The DK2 was/is plagued with software teething issues. Totally acceptable as it's a developer kit, but still frustrating and a little worrying. The other thing I found disappointing coming from DK1 to DK2 was the vastly decreased field-of-view. I think it's a combination of things that contribute/contributed to that (over-zealous vignetting in the earlier SDKs being one of them), some of which may have been fixed since in software. I say this as, to me, the Gear VR FOV seems wider than DK2's despite having a slightly lower quoted value.

My DK2 is basically a brick now. There's been a compatibility issue with AMD cards running it in extended mode, which goes all the way back to September of last year which has not been fixed on my system by any driver updates or Oculus SDK updates since. Given that the cool stuff I'd like to use with it (specifically VR Desktop and VorpX) doesn't support direct mode and only does extended, I've almost given up on it (this affects dev too - I believe the latest Unity editor still doesn't support running stuff in Direct-to-Rift mode from the editor, for example).

Re: Oculus Rift

#293
post #19
post #7

I am still not sold on VR, but I feel that AR (Augmented Reality) really is the future. 1) AR seems to help in real world situations vs VR which actually makes you feel vulnerable due to lack of vision and impaired hearing of what is around you. 2) VR also has the issue with physical issues with nausea and 10% of people with lazy eyes or other optical issues that make them unable to see 3D clearly. 3) Star Trek Holos…

But AR requires several technological leaps beyond VR in terms of transparent screens and location tracking. So I'd expect to see usable VR headsets to appear in homes a generation two before AR ones. I mean, the HoloLens is additive . That means if you want to show a dark object in a room with white walls, you cant .

I wonder why we need transparent screens though. I see AR as a subset of VR, not a superset of it. Once you've solved the field-of-view, screen resolution and (I'd also argue) dynamic range/colour accuracy of VR, you add a front-facing, wide-FOV stereo camera to it and there you have it, AR with the dark object problem already solved for you.

Re: Oculus Rift

#294
post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your use case is particularly apt for frequent fliers. I've almost had a tray table-supported laptop destroyed on more than one occasion by a reclining passenger in front of me. It would be amazing to just set up a small keyboard+trackpad on my lap and not have to even pull the computer out of its bag. If I could do this, I wouldn't even care how ridiculous I looked.

A podcast I listen to recently discussed the theoretical horror of flying while being stuck next to a passenger strapped into an Oculus Rift who is totally oblivious to how annoying they are being to their fellow passengers with their gestures and reactions to the VR experience that no one else is seeing. Please don't be that guy.. :-)

This guy?

http://gizmodo.com/that-vr-guy-riding-the-subway-now-with-ex...

Re: Oculus Rift

#295

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it is more than Facebook being MS "friendly". Like it or not, Windows is still the dominant platform for PC gaming period. As much as many would like this to change, it is not even close to happening.

Oculus not bothering means they're just part of why it's not happening. Valve on the other hand seems to fully embrace OSX/Linux (with both Steam and the Vive) and have done plenty to improve gaming on those platforms. I think I know which HMD I'll be purchasing.

Vive doesn't support Linux or MacOS.

Re: Oculus Rift

#296

I recently returned my Oculus Rift, not even two weeks after buying it. Dropping Linux support is not okay.

It's strange, but when I think about it, DK1 was a much more positive 'product-y' experience for me than DK2 was. Perhaps part of that is that DK1 was my first VR headset, so much of the initial awe factor had worn off by the time I got the DK2. The DK2 was/is plagued with software teething issues. Totally acceptable as it's a developer kit, but still frustrating and a little worrying. The other thing I found disappo…

That's an acknowledged AMD bug which is fixed but I don't believe it's available yet. Oculus v0.6 apps can always just run in direct mode and avoid that problem.

Re: Oculus Rift

#297
post #249
post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> the perceptual resolution available for a virtual monitor would probably be less than VGA It's a shame we weren't able to program on VGA monitors. :(

VGA had 480 scanlines. When was the last time anyone seriously programmed on a display worse than that? My guess would be Commodore 64 with an NTSC TV for display. That's pretty close to the text fidelity you can reproduce on a "virtual monitor" in a current-generation VR environment. (I think a lot of people underestimate the amount of resolution lost due to lens correction -- the rendered screen image is heavily di…

For one of my projects, I am writing code Thet is meant to be read by the 99%, i.e. formatted to be readable on a phone. 40 chars wide, and I rarely look at more than 10 lines at a time.

It's generally fine. Every now and then I feel like I want to see the broader context of the code, but it's rare. In general it forces me to write much cleaner, more readable code, and to structure things better so that concerns are truly isolated and I don't need to look at a lot of code to see how things work. Overall I think it's a positive experience.

Re: Oculus Rift

#298
post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's strange, but when I think about it, DK1 was a much more positive 'product-y' experience for me than DK2 was. Perhaps part of that is that DK1 was my first VR headset, so much of the initial awe factor had worn off by the time I got the DK2. The DK2 was/is plagued with software teething issues. Totally acceptable as it's a developer kit, but still frustrating and a little worrying. The other thing I found disappo…

That's an acknowledged AMD bug which is fixed but I don't believe it's available yet. Oculus v0.6 apps can always just run in direct mode and avoid that problem.

Do you have a reference? I'm really curious to read about it.

Re: Oculus Rift

#299

I really want VR computer monitors so that I sit at a desk with no monitors so that I can run 4,5,6, any number I want or just 1 big monitor. Also it would give me a lot more privacy as no one else could see my monitors unless I shared the monitor to them which I imagine would be a little easier to do with virtual monitors than when physical ones (even considering screen sharing which is iffy sometimes).

Hi. FOVE's screen is WQHD (2560*1440). Also we are planning to make Iris recognition for securing privacy. It will be suitable and very secured headset for personal monitor. (bit.ly/FOVEKS)

Re: Oculus Rift

#300
post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I, too, want to be a gargoyle. The abundance of virtual space is one of the main draws that I don't think people really understand yet. But if you have a sufficiently hi-resolution display, you could easily watch an imax movie or put an insanely large amount of data in front of you in an intuitive, customisable way. This is one of the main points where I think people really need to see it done well to understand the…

Resolution is the main concern. Is oculus detailed enough to do programming on a virtual monitor?

I'd think the best approach for something like this would be to have higher pixel density in the middle of the display -- that is, where your head is looking -- and lower pixel density in the perhipheral. That's tough to do with an LCD, but it could be done with a specially designed projector or two different LCDs that you combine optically.
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