HTC Vive (Steam VR) is now available for pre-order | Hacker News Reader

HTC Vive (Steam VR) is now available for pre-order

htcvive.com

199 pointsTimucin114 comments

Games/experiences like Budget Cuts, Hover Junkers, Tiltbrush, Modbox, and Fantastic Contraptions are what sold me on the Vive. These are fundamentally new approaches to gaming that just can't be replicated without everything the Vive is offering, including the tracked controllers.

Seriously! Room scale is the difference between a fancy monitor strapped to your face and a whole new medium.

We've had a dev kit at work for a while and it's the first headset that I've not wanted to take off. The ability to move around a scene and the wand make the interaction really intuitive and rewarding. As for the social implications of 'VR lockin', it'll be interesting to watch.

Frankly your opinion is only interesting if you've tried the Oculus Rift CV1.

I'd assume that if @coalescence works somewhere with a Vive devkit, they would most likely have tried a CV1 as comparison.

So I get downvotes, because you're all assuming rather than directly asking, like I did.

Thanks, HN.

You didn't ask. You told him his opinions were meaningless because you assumed he hadn't tried the Rift. I mean, maybe that's not what you were trying to communicate, but that is 100% what you communicated.

Yeah, you're in the wrong here pretty obviously. you didn't "directly ask", you pretty much just shot down what they said and borderline insulted them.

Really, just reason it out. How many places just have a Vive devkit laying around? You'd specifically need to get one which means they're most likely working on a VR game or software. When you're working on something using new and innovative hardware you're going to check out all the options and competition to make sure you're using the best or most accessible.

I'd say you should take a step back and look over what you've said and consider if it really conveys your meaning well.

I shot them down IF (the most important word in my post) their comparison of the consumer versions of the two most important VR releases is instead a comparison of the consumer version of the Vive, and the DKs of the Rift (or no Rift at all).

I agree, I could have worded my post directly as a question, and if I could edit it, I would.

I'm stunned that you're all allowing coalescence to sit at the table and IMPLY that the Oculus Rift CV1 makes him want to take it off, is not intuitive, and is not rewarding.

> I shot them down...

Yeah, don't do that. It makes you seem like an asshole no matter the context.

> allowing coalescence

That's the thing about opinions. Anyone can have them and they change from person to person.

"it's the first headset that I've not wanted to take off."

You would've been much better off asking if they had tried the CV1 and what they liked/didn't like about it, rather than saying their opinion is uninteresting. It's good that you're starting to recognize that though.

I AM in the wrong that I should have asked. I've explicitly admitted that my wording was wrong.

coalescence IS in the wrong that he impled that the Oculus Rift CV1 is a crappy product, without directly saying it.

If you could go ahead and recognize that second part, it would be nice.

I recognize your opinion and understand what you're saying, but I feel like you're being antagonistic and trying to find a fault that doesn't exist.

@coalescence saying they like the Vive the most does not by default equal that they hate the CV1. You keep trying to say they're implying something whereas I really don't see it that way.

"I've not wanted to take off" can mean that they were engrossed and didn't want to leave, like when you're in a really good game and don't want to stop. It doesn't mean that they didn't like a hypothetical competitor right away, just that it maybe wasn't as spectacular.

In your other comment, this is what I'm talking about: "did it make you want to take it off?"

There was no implication that that was the situation, you've created this in your mind.

I'm going to end here, so reply if you like but as I said before, you should look over your comments and recognize that you're coming across as like an angry conspiracy theorist.

Sorry again, this will be needlessly verbose... And I don't intend to sound antagonistic, I'm merely trying to explain my viewpoint, and don't have time to condense this. (I won't be offended if you don't read or respond, especially since you said you were going to end, and I'm posting a wall of text. The fault is mine, not yours.)

There are two main competitors, the Vive and Rift. And prior iterations of the Rift, the DK1 and DK2, have caused the "I want to take this off, because I'm motion sick!" problem.

That's widely known. No controversy in that, at all. (I haven't "created" that "conspiracy"... it's documented history that maybe you and other HN posters are unaware of.) The main remaining question is, "Has the Oculus Rift CV1 solved that better than the HTC Vive CV?"

The. Remaining question.

The history of how many iterations Oculus and other vendors have gone through is way, way less interesting. To me and many other people who have made, or are about to make, a $600 or $800 or $1400 (buy both!) purchasing decision.

Since the history of VR is littered with devices that have made the users want to take them off, it's no surprise that someone would have tried one, or two, or even a dozen of them (including the Oculus Rift DK1, and the Oculus Rift DK2), and then they tried the HTC Vive (Pre or CV), and they finally, amazingly, delightfully, did not have the "ohmygod I have to rip this off my head!" response. That's what most users of the Oculus Rift Crescent Bay or HTC Vive Pre reported when they first tried one or both - stunned delight that the products had finally become usable.

So, now someone has tried a bunch, and finally the HTC Vive. That person could easily report, "The HTC Vive (DK or Pre or CV) is the first headset that I've not wanted to take off."

The information content of that is very, very low. No surprise. And yes, they probably did "want to take off" all the previous ones - they were bad. I know I did.

Even if their experience includes the Oculus Rift DK1... and to a slightly lesser degree, the Oculus Rift DK2. Still very little information content in that statement.

BUT, if they've ALSO tried the Oculus Rift CV1 (or Crescent Bay, really), then they have jumped all the way to having an informed decison, on the two most important products on the market right now.

Then, the information content of their comparison leaps a great deal.

I should have asked. I completely acknowledge that. I should have been more polite. I completely acknowledge that.

I really want to see more and more reports from people who have tried both the Oculus Rift CV1, and the HTC Vive CV. I really don't care about the opinion of someone who has tried dozens of VR devices, and the Vive, if they haven't also tried the Rift CV1. Which is entirely plausible.

When someone reports that the Vive is the FIRST that gave them the "I don't want to take this off" experience, I really need to know if they've ALSO tried the Oculus Rift CV1, and if they ALSO got the "I don't want to take this off" experience from it. If they haven't tried the Rift CV1, then, frankly, their opinion is not informed enough to be interesting to me, or to anyone else about to decide between Oculus Rift CV1 and HTC Vive CV.

Since you put a lot of effort into this post, and it's a normal discussion now I'll respond.

I haven't personally tried any VR sets other than Google Cardboard, but I am aware of the motion sickness problem. I have heard that the older Oculus kits were worse than the CV1 and Crescent Bay models. I feel like I remember reading that some new technology to do with the Vive's front camera fixes or at least helps with the motion sickness problem.

It would be great to hear more from @coalescence to see if they were talking about the motion sickness or not. I got the idea that they meant "not wanted to take off" like it was just really good and didn't want to put it down, not anything to do with not getting sick.

Sorry for getting into the argument above with you, I think we both just misunderstood each other and were focusing on and interpreting things differently.

Just wanted to give you kudos and respect for this post. I wish I saw this sort of acknowledgment more frequently in internet debates.

I think most of us here understand that it's easy to sometimes enter a discussion with an overly antagonistic tone. It's a lot harder to recognize that mistake after-the-fact.

What other headsets have you worn?

SteamVR uses OpenVR, which is a public API anyone can implement, I believe.

I'm hoping OSVR is successful from Razer.

Valve deserves to be beaten with an internet flamebat for naming a SteamVR-specific compatibility layer "OpenVR".

If I'm incorrect and there are merits to it, please enlighten me, but everything I've read about OpenVR (and seen in their git repo) seems to only be an accurate name for where the meaning "Open" == null.

The API is BSD licensed[1]. Anyone can use it, it is just not some consortium standard, but anyone can fork it.

https://github.com/ValveSoftware/openvr

If API + binary blobs + single company control + BSD license is the new definition of open, then... hmm.

They should have called it ValveX. It's the best bad option among worse options (and that's probably why Valve won't put more effort into opening it up until the market matures), but it's not an open standard.

It's not unlike OpenGL though, which does not have a open source reference implementation either. Only the API specifications are open.

Most implementations are closed source binary blobs. Of course there is Mesa, but that is is also a 3rd party implementation. No one would prevent you from building an open source OpenVR implementation.

That's just a bunch of binary blobs though.

I probably doesn't understands everything and you probably have more knowledge than me on that but as far as I understands that's more a standard that a library. You still need to write the actual drivers for your headset and as far as I know, the one for the Vive isn't opensource. OpenVR is still open, it's just the Vive drivers that are not.

Nah, SteamVR is their implementation of OpenVR.

The API is open, the SteamVR-specific runtime is a binary blob.

Anyone can implement a driver, they have example driver code available. The documentation is here: https://github.com/ValveSoftware/openvr/wiki

The purpose of OpenVR is to create a common API for HMD drivers, so that other platforms can implement their own proprietary equivalents of SteamVR or what have you, and everyone's HMD drivers will be interoperable.

You've implied that you have tried the Oculus Rift CV1, and that you wanted to take it off.

HAVE you tried the Oculus Rift CV1, and did it make you want to take it off?

Its not necessarily that he wanted to take it off, it may well be that he just didn't want to keep it on.

I like how Vive is shipping with purpose-built VR controllers instead of an Xbox One controller (ala Oculus Rift). That said, having the option to forego controllers entirely would be preferable, and a nice way to reduce cost.

Both have a 2160x1200 display.

I'm curious which headset will be a) more comfortable and b) offer superior stationary head tracking. The room-scale tracking on the Vive is nice, but I'm thinking most people will prefer whichever has superior stationary tracking.

Supposedly the integrated headphones on the Rift will approach audiophile-grade quality. The Vive is shipping with earbuds, so presumably less fidelity there. Personally I wish both would ship without any audio equipment at all since I'm just going to use my existing headphones and microphone.

>That said, having the option to forego controllers entirely would be preferable

It's not good for HTC if it means splitting up the control schemes for the platform, which forces developers to avoid games that only work with motion controls.

Yes, exactly. I've stalked around VR communities for a long time, and control fragmentation is a serious and persistent concern. There's also a perception that a lot of people with a $1000 gaming rig will have gotten a gamepad at some point -- part of why the "XBone" controller was seen as a joke when announced (but also because it was the same event they reeled in Oculus Touch launch time frame expectation).

The community is already split, if you look at this from another perspective it allows developers to focus on the visual game play related aspects of VR and perfecting them while deferring tackling with motion controls.

This reduces the gap that game developers have to breach, and also allows you to add easy VR support for games which will not be dedicated to VR platforms.

So far motion controls were nothing more than a niche, Wii included.

The positional tracking tech valve is using seems like the most elegant, robust solution I've seen yet, so I certainly hope it becomes a standard. The best part about it is that the cost per device is so low to implement it (the tracking components on the objects are dead simple and very cheap to make) so there's a good case to be made for using this standard, because you could proliferate all sorts of low cost tracking controllers to use with it.

>That said, having the option to forego controllers entirely would be preferable, and a nice way to reduce cost.

Although it is a third party peripheral the leap motion is what you're looking for:

http://store-us.leapmotion.com/

Plus it's half off today.

After using a kinect for a few years, I think buttons and controllers are very important for most applications.

Having that tactile feedback for input helps for so many situations. Also it will make it easier to port existing games/apps. The learning curve will also be much easier.

I have a leap motion on the way. I don't have very high hopes of seeing wide adoption and integration due to it being a third party controller but this should hold me over until the oculus touch controllers launch.

If I wasn't getting a Oculus CV1 for free I'd probably be ordering a vive today.

I already have the controller I want to use with VR, it's a steering wheel, pedals and shifter set.

It seems like the Vive should be able to play all the oculus launch games from a technical standpoint, but not vice versa because every Vive game really takes advantage of the finely tracked hand controllers and ability to wander through a room.

Being able to intuitively grab and throw things in games like Job Simulator and budget cuts was a really eye opening and amazingly fun experience.

For those trying to order one: If you get an "Out of Stock" message, try starting your order over in a new browser. Not sure if there was some weird session issue, or maybe they released more preorder slots, but that did the trick for me.

The @htcvive Twitter account is recommending refreshing, also.

I don't think refreshing is working. I tried that and had to remove and re-add it to the cart to get it to work.

Does anyone have the word on Linux support?

Since Valve's SteamOS is Linux-based, then SURELY the Vive will work on Linux machines out of the box.

The lack of a Linux version of their VR Compatibility tool has made me a little nervous, though.

SteamOS currently doesn't support SteamVR there were (unconfirmed AFAIK) plans for "day-one support" but last time I've checked (maybe a month ago) there isn't support for SteamVR-Vive (driver and software) yet in the beta version of SteamOS.

There were also some comments from HTC last year that most of the SteamOS based Steam Machines could not support SteamVR in their current state so they will be focusing on the "core gamer" demographics initially.

However it needs to be mentioned that even if Vive will support SteamOS it doesn't mean that it will have Linux support, all the binary parts of SteamOS including Steam, it's various components, drivers etc. are closed source.

SteamVR doesn't support Linux yet AFAIK. Here are the min requirements:

http://store.steampowered.com/app/323910/

The SteamVR API works on the OSX and Linux versions of Steam (it's some what missing from SteamOS oddly enough).

It's not enabled by default and seem to be buggy as hell but no Vive software support has been implemented, you can use (older versions before the support was dropped) Oculus with SteamVR on Linux but it won't be pretty.

They've claimed day one Linux support[0], but I think waiting to see if they actually deliver on that is probably prudent.

[0] https://www.gamingonlinux.com/articles/htc-vive-plans-linuxs...

Vive doesn't come with it's own middleware so it will require Steam and SteamVR to function so while it might eventually "work" on Linux it wouldn't be the open Linux support people might expect at least not initially.

Valve has another project called OpenVR (which still somewhat requires the closed source SteamVR to work) and it's reportedly (again unconfirmed) working with Razer on OSVR. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Source_Virtual_Reality

There are some hacked together OSVR drivers for Oculus but they are barely functional atm, the biggest problem with OpenVR, Unity VR and various other VR projects is that they only offer part of the middleware which will serve as an abstraction layer for the proprietary device drivers, OSVR seems to at least try and solve it by developing vendor agnostic drivers and open vendor specific ones.

Oculus went the other way saying that open source API's are a bad idea atm as the technology is too immature for generic abstractions and that vendor specific low level access is required to utilize current headsets efficiently which might be very well true.

Valve's OpenVR will eventually work great with Vive through SteamVR as they can still maintain low level vendor specific access and while Oculus, GearVR and various other VR/AR headsets might also work the results might necessarily be that stellar.

So ATM there is a mishmash of VR API's Unity is doing their own thing by providing integrated VR API with their engine, Unreal supports Oculus and is also working on it's own generic API, Oculus has it's own VR middleware (which is also the one for Samsung's GearVR) and lastly there is Valve with OpenVR/SteamVR.

Eventually the winner will not be the best implementation but who's going to have the better 3rd party support, Oculus being the older guy in the block currently has it but Valve has a monopoly on the digital distribution and isn't shy of using and even abusing their power.

The VR wars of 2016-2018 will be the new Betamax vs. VHS / HD-DVD vs. BluRay.

And as far as future predictions go I wonder how Apple will play into this, given their track record of emerging technology adoption (or in Appleish "invention") I expect a "VR/AR" addon around 2018 and Apple isn't exactly known for embracing multi-vendor open ecosystems.

Since mobile/integrated computing is the future of VR as it will allow you to dump all the cables and other nonsense by the time the market will look like it's about to settle Apple might actually disrupt it again which is something they've haven't really done in about a decade.

I've been following this closely. While there has not been any official word recently, here's what I've observed:

Every update of OpenVR/SteamVR does include updated builds/fixes for Linux and Mac[0], but parts of the drivers are out-right missing right now so it's not possible to run an HMD (at least an Oculus one) end to end on these systems right now.

I'm speculating that they had good support for a while, then they ran into some cross-platform bugs so they cut support temporarily to rush towards a full release, then fix it later. I'm hoping full Linux and Mac support will become viable after things cool off with the Vive launch.

Another thing worth noting is that almost every game shipping on launch is using Unity or Unreal Engine 4, both of which have full cross-platform support. Only thing stopping studios right now is good VR SDK support.

I really do wish there was more official word about this. I've emailed gaben but no response yet.

[0] https://github.com/ValveSoftware/openvr

Just about the best comparison you'll be able to find: http://www.tested.com/tech/564110-should-you-pre-order-oculu...

959.69 € with Tax and Shipping to me in Germany.

Not something of an impulse buy for me.

I just pre-ordered. Despite the clearly better quality of the Vive according to every review I've read (specifically around the full body tracking) I am worried the Oculus has much better brand awareness and will leave this in the dust. Hoping I am wrong, as those $800 will go to waste. Anyone interested in PS VR, also ?

Vive doesn't do full body tracking, I think you mean room scale tracking, if so I hope you have a dedicated 15x15 room for that :)

I prefer to let other than me use the 1st generation of any new technology.

This way, I benefit from the improvment, and a lower price point.

The other side is the excitement of being one of the first experiencing this new technology. It's always a tradeoff.

E.g.: Would you rather go to space now, or wait until it's easy and comfy? For me, curiosity wins.

It depends. From the point of view of a consumer ? easy and comfy wins. I would not pay to go in space now.

I'm not sure what this means?

Even early adopters are "consumers". Just a different customer segment. One that places more value on the excitement of a new technology than comfort and cost.

I meant that if I intented to work with VR, I would act differently, as I would see it as an investment, rather than a simple consumer item.

As a consumer, I'd rather wait for the current gen to age a little, and buy it cheaper and with less bugs.

In 2016, going to space is no longer a novelty. Now, if you asked me if i want to be the first to hook my brain to a computer ...

And be the first person in history to actually catch a computer virus? ;)

STD - serial transmitted disease.

Resistance is futile, you will be assimilated.

:-)

Only 536 people have ever been to space, I think it's still novel.

I don't think history books remember "The 537th person to do X"

I'd rather wait until they have a good in-flight entertainment!

I can already picture some billionaire space traveler watching images of earth on the in-flight 4K monitor while the real thing floats by outside the window next to him.

He won't be watching earth. He will be watching Justin Bieber singing "happy birthday Mr Prisident" to Donal Trump.

This reasoning that made innovation stall and VR is not an immature new tech. It was initially launched back in 2011, tendency is that you gonna get a very mature product out of the bet. If you haven't tried yet, the vive is quite impressive.

I understand the perspective but I think this is one of few situations where that perspective is wrong.

Expecting a VR headset with roomspace support to ever be cheaper than a high-end single LCD like a ROG[0], then you'll be waiting a long time. At least until high end LCDs are driven lower and that's not even a 4K gaming LCD- the prices on those won't be lower than a HMD.

There's amazing value in that $800 package and this is essentially 3rd gen in my book. Oculus Rift would be closer to 2nd gen and the 90s headsets were the 1st gen.

As well as the price never dropping to something like $199 or $399 (without an inferior experience like GearVR)- if you're old enough to have owned a 3dfx Voodoo card in 1996, you'll know there will never be anything quite like the "1st gen" experience ever again. The magic isn't the same down the road. Even for people who are having THEIR first experience later on- because everyone else around them has done it.

I'm sympathetic to the folks who don't want to or can't spend $800 on this, but I think this is one case where it's worth going in.

[0]http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16824236...

When I was younger, I was excited about 'being among the first to try someting new'. Nowadays, meh. I don't really feel it anymore.

Just remember you'll pay the same or near what they cost today, just get the same experience later on. Therein lies the rub. If that doesn't bother people, and I know it doesn't you then that's ok of course. I just like to understand where people are coming from. I spend very little money most of the time, I'm not wasteful, rich or foolish- but kind of splurge on big-moments like these with the Vive.

Oculus may be playing some catch-up with Vive's roomspace and other features, but I can't see Vive 2.0 adding a lot of features without bumping the price up even further. I'm guessing 2.0 will have incremental improvements on the existing stuff (resolution, cameras, controllers) which would be lucky to drop it in price. So it's as safe of a bet as anything can be for those willing to dive in.

> Just remember you'll pay the same or near what they cost today, just get the same experience later on.

Given the pace of this space and related technology (gaming, mobile, displays) for the past two years, I heartily disagree. If anything, new areas of technology have a steeper New-and-Shiny Tax than most other types of consumer goods.

You disagree but don't cite anything at all. Are you expecting a holodeck in another 2 years?

This is 'it' for the forseeable future, roomspace VR. If you have knowledge of better ideas that are feasible for less than $1,000, other than incremental upgrades to what HTC has put together here, you could become a very wealthy person.

You've got to be kidding.

Displays are becoming smaller, higher resolution, and cheaper. Already, people who couldn't stomach the VR of 2014 are enjoying the VR of 2016.

Graphics cards are about to jump from 28nm to 16nm, later this year, leading to laptops that can run cards that outperform today's desktops at a fraction of the power consumption. One of the biggest issues of the current generation of VR is the necessity of being plugged in via a physical cord to a beast of a machine.

Carmack has stated that his primary focus right now is bringing positional tracking to mobile VR. We haven't even cracked the inside-out tracking barrier yet, so while my GearVR is fun, it doesn't fulfill its potential as a room (or field?) scale VR system.

I'm happy that fellow early adopters are buying the very clunky current generation, but it's ridiculous to suggest that the state of VR is 'it' for the forseeable future. That would be a depressing future of VR indeed.

Those are all incremental improvements, what I meant was the general platform being seen with the Vive is 'it'. We'll get all the things you mentioned though over time, higher res, mobile VR but neither of those are game changers like the Vive kit itself is. High res, at a a certain point will be a game changer, but it's going to be many years until we have what we need for it to reach game-changing level (dual 4K and the power to push it). I don't think the necessity of being plugged into a beast of a machine is going away soon.

I don't find an incremental build on the Vive to be depressing at all. But in 5 years the Vive 3.0 will have incrementally better resolution, tracking, and maybe a custom wireless method to transfer 8K video with positional information. Not worth passing on the Vive today just for incremental improvements. If it were the holodeck incoming, I'd agree.

How do you figure that the Vive is a full generation ahead of the Rift? Just based on the fact that the Vive is targeted towards moving around (FPSes), and the Rift towards sitting in place (Vehicle sims)?

Other than that one difference, both devices are very similar in their specs.

They both target the same type of games, the few room scale tracking games that are currently in the Steam Work Shop / SteamVR portfolio aren't exactly FPS games.

Oculus is betting that most gamers would still prefer to sit down while playing and that roomscale tracking will be a novelty (which with the current limitations of Vive it is).

This is pretty much the Wii vs Xbox360/PS3 type of control bet. The Wii did well but the best games for it were more or less the ones that used traditional controls, even the best first party games didn't really use the motion aspects of the Wii that much/at all.

The Kinect and what ever the PS Eye camera thing was called also ended up as being niche products that didn't really managed to build a sustainable ecosystem.

Oculus is betting that sitting / standing with limited movement will be the preferred gaming environment and I think they will be correct in that assumption.

Agreed regarding price, but a first generation product could still have a bunch of issues that might only surface after public availability. The second generation might not be cheaper, but it will almost certainly be better (better performance, more features, less bugs, bigger library of games and apps, etc).

Needless to say, I'm gonna be waiting as well.

It's not about the price it's about what you are getting for it.

The first few generations of "Gaming" LCD monitors were pathetic, shitty TN panels and more ghosting than a TV oriented LCD panel.

Spending 800$ (or 600$ for that matter) on a 1st gen that will most likely be obsolete before there is any substantial market for it isn't something most people are willing to do, especially when you currently have to make a bet on a horse that might be dead in 1 to 2 years.

Anyone know how well this works on lower-tier video cards? I have an Nvidia 950 and I'm tempted to buy the Vive. The problem is that the suggested specs are a 970 minimum, which easily has 30% more performance than my 950.

There's a benchmarking tool available on Steam, which will give you an idea.

I would assume you could play VR games with reduced texture quality and/or other gfx settings.

I have a 660, which is a very similar level of performance.

It seems strange to be willing to drop $800 on a headset and not spend $400 on a video card. However, the next generation of video cards is the generation that finally gets off the 28nm node, so I'm expecting a huge performance bump. It would be nice to be able to wait for that.

HTC claims their 16nm process is 65% faster than 28nm, takes 1/2 the area, and 1/3 the power. For a video card, doubling the # of transistors basically translates into double the performance, and even the lower power requirements enable faster cards because high end cards are often power limited. Throw in a bit of performance improvement from architectural improvements, and it's certainly possible that the next gen of video cards will have 3X the performance of current cards.

I'm okay with another $350 for the card, but I want to avoid a situation where I spend almost $1200 today only to be told I'll need a new card tomorrow. I don't want a $350 card just as a 6-8 month stop-gap measure. I'd prefer to limp by with my 950 if possible. Seems like that might not work out considering the performance demands of VR.

Agreed. There are some blogs out there claiming that nVidia Pascal will be 10x faster than Maxwell[1]. It's been partially debunked, but there's no doubt that it's going to be a big improvement.

Fast video cards are important enough to VR that if that kind of power is available, it's going to be used. A 970 may be enough now, but I don't think it's going to be enough for long.

1: http://wccftech.com/nvidia-pascal-gpu-gtc-2015/

We have a 960 GTX at work, and it really doesn't cut it for the content currently available on the Vive. It seems 980 is really what you need to have to get a decent experience, and to be honest 980 TI would be ideal (although the cost is intense..)

Try the test tool on this page: http://store.steampowered.com/vive/

I have a Vive (Pre) and tested it on some older equipment. Less demanding apps like Tilt Brush will even work on older cards like the 750 Ti, but >50% of the available demos so far won't run at that level. A 950 is much faster and not too far from a 680 though, and Valve is working on lowering the performance requirements and made their portal demo work at 90fps at that level. They are going to be giving a talk at GDC in a couple weeks about their rendering technology to dynamically adjust quality settings to maintain FPS on lower cards, which they will be integrating into Unity so most developers will have access to it.

Anyway, I think it would probably be OK to order it now and expect to have access to a reasonable percent of the content, and then wait a few months to upgrade the GPU when the next gen from AMD and Nvidia comes out.

I'm very suspicious of HTC's staying power in the market right now - their phones sales are tanking and I'm not sure how long they'll be able to stay up - their market value is lower than their cash on hand. If HTC folds expect zero hardware support in the future regardless of how well this device does.

There are rumors that they will spin off a separate company for the VR headset to isolate it from the HTC death spiral

899 Euro. Oculus wins the price point!

I'm seeing $799.00 in the states. $829.00 shipped.

Plus tax for a lot of places.

He's talking about the price in Euro, which is 899€ (~$985, that would include about 23% VAT over the $799)

I still ordered the vive, the promise of valve software + the controllers sold me.

We'll see about that when the Oculus controller comes out. The Vive already ships with special controllers for VR (and how those compare, etc). Until then, it's hard to compare (only price-wise).

It's Treo vs PocketPC all over again! (only half joking)

I remember the back and forth comparisons and debates over price, feature set, compatibility, the companies behind them, form factor and all sorts of details. Regardless, they were some of the first "good enough" smartphones the average consumer could purchase even if their bulk and higher price kept them mostly in the realm of professionals, enthusiasts, and early adopters.

Then 5 or 6 years later we had an industry that was already becoming dominated by Apple and Google rather than Palm and Microsoft. Devices were much faster, more capable, and more accessible. Now you can buy one for $150 and get something that's actually somewhat decent.

This time it won't matter that much which one to pick. Developers will want to support both systems. The display code needs only small changes to work for both systems (or the engine supports it already), the controllers on the other hand should be interesting. If there won't be some standard and the input and haptics diverge too much, this will hurt adoption and/or game/software sales.

The really interesting thing will be room-scale.

Oculus Rift is inherently designed for a sit-down experience with optional controllers, Vive allows room-scale experiences with controllers included. That's a pretty fundamental difference in the way your users will experience your media. Also, room-scale will essentially require a dedicated VR room free of obstacles. As such I'm guessing many Vive users will be having a sit-down experience too.

I expect that a lot of the first-gen stuff will be cockpit simulators like EVE: Valkyrie, because it's the lowest common denominator. It's in HTC's best interest to push room-scale content because that is an effective lock-in for them at this point, but that means targeting a small minority of VR users, and I think that's going to be a difficult experience to adapt for the majority userbase of sit-down users.

> Also, room-scale will essentially require a dedicated VR room free of obstacles. As such I'm guessing many Vive users will be having a sit-down experience too.

This is the part which pointed me more toward Oculus. I simply do not have the space for a dedicated VR room, so all the work done into "room scale experience" is moot for me and Oculus focus on a seated experience seems to be a better fit for me here.

The whole point of room-scale is that it is the scale of your room. We'll see how well developers manage to make that work, Hover Junkers handles it by having different sized hoverships depending on your room size.

Have you considered getting a Murphy bed? Perhaps we'll see sales of those skyrocket with people trying to make space for room scale vr.

Not so far, thanks for the idea. I had a couch/bed combination before but I couldn't stand it for daily use. Good for one or two nights, but not longer.

In Belgium, including tax an shipping: 972.81 €

This includes two controllers as well though, so not entirely apples-to-apples.

You can't make a direct comparison because the Vive includes two tracked controllers and two Lighthouse basestations. The headset also has a forward-facing camera.

A true price comparison will only be possible once Oculus Touch is available (the Rift's motion controllers).

987€ to Spain, with shipping and taxes. Ouch!

$1200+ CAD, yeah I'll wait a bit.

Wins? Are you Charlie Sheen? How are defining winning here? These are two different products that ship with two different configurations. The Vive is a whole setup, which includes two touch controllers, one for each hand. The Oculus ships with a console gaming controller completely unsuited for what we think of as 'real' VR. With the Oculus you'll need to buy those separately and pay shipping on them, whenever they finally come out.

Also, the Vive has a front facing camera and 'whole room' VR. If anything, its something of a bargain at this price for those who want this featureset. The rumor mill up until recently was pegging this system at $1200 - $1500 which many analysts thought was practical.

> How are defining winning here?

Occulus wins on pure price point. Certainly you get more with the Vive, so it's not accurate to compare the two, and perhaps the Vive delivers a better experience with it's addons, but that is still TBD if the Vive packins provide a VR experience that people care about.

The nearest example I can think of is the XB1 vs PS4. PS4 won on price point, despite the XB1 shipping with the Kinect for $100 more.

I think it's worth pointing out that the Kinect didn't actually work. Perhaps things would have went differently if it had.

Also from what I understand, the underlying OS wasn't ready at launch time, and functionality was cut.

I just resetup my consoles, and didn't bother setting up the Kinect.

Except there were almost no Kinect games for the Xbox One and the Kinect, even in best cases, worked terribly. I think you're really stretching here. VR requires proper VR friendly controls. Game controllers won't be good enough.

A better analogy is imagine if the Wii shipped with gamecube controllers. It would have failed in the market.

The XB1 wasn't marketed as a gaming machine, but rather as the new center of your living room entertainment experience, and the Kinect was supposed to be a big part of that: using both speech and gestures to easily control your entertainment.

VR experiences [you desire], require proper VR friendly controls [also VR friendly physical space, and VR friendly PCs]. Occulus has had several successful demos without the use of VR friendly controls, with some using just a mobile phone as the backing CPU/GPU. It's still yet to be determined if initially the streamline experience that comes with the base Occulus/GearVR setup is what the market wants, compared to the more fully immersive experience that comes with the Vive (at the additional cost).

With a newborn at home, I don't have the luxury using VR, but I am excited to see how this all shakes out. While my personal preference is for something I can use while at my desk (270 virtual desktop?), I also see how compelling a fully immersive VR experience can be.

HTC Vive is £746.60 and VW Beetle is £795. https://www.gumtree.com/p/volkswagen/volkswagen-beetle-2.0-3... lol

I think the Beetle gives a much more realistic 3D experience.

No seriously... About 10 years ago I was at a conference, and there was going to be a discussion about something. This conference was organized by the people behind a discussion website - the subject is not relevant. The website forum had moderators.

Now this girl who was leading the discussion was explaining to us that the discussion was just like an online discussion, except without keyboard and screen. She would act as moderator, just like online, and guide the whole thing.

I was amazed that she explained it like it was a complete new concept, to have a discussion in a theatre hall, with people present, talking to and interupting eachother.

Anyway, how long will it be that someone proposes to make a drive in a real beetle, just like one in VR?

It's actually kind of an interesting question: How many kids born today (or in the next 5 years?) will experience driving cars only in VR?

I am pretty sure HTC Vive will cost significantly less after 16 years and 90k miles :)

That is definitely a badass promo video. Makes me want to scrounge up some dollars and plop down $800 for one. I am in no position to do that but it makes me want too!

So exciting, 2016, year of consumer VR/AR!

Reply on news.ycombinator.com