Will we reach Varjo's level of polish? No way. But I'm confident we can get 80% of the way there at least.
Like, I'm certain I cannot work in my Index, not for any prolonged time. It's awesome for games, but not for any text-heavy stuff. I've tried a few times, my take is that problem is the resolution is not good enough => I would need giant fonts => turning my head a lot => extra neck strain (as if headset, even with a counterweight not bad enough in this regard) => fatigue and headaches. If I could see a honest (simulated) rendering of what I'd see in an Index vs what I'd see in Simula One, that would be amazing.
I think the best bet actually would be for me to just take a camera and do a through-the-lenses shot through both. Our current optical train needs a second iteration for the mold, but once it meets our specs we'll do a blog post about it.
"high-quality AR mode" -- do you have public SDK documentation for this and does it have a mixed passthru VR / AR mode like the Quest 2? The quest actually is a bit underpowered for doing this properly imo so I can see a higher price point potentially being necessary to pack it with the right hardware.
Not that I'll ever build it but somewhere along the line some cordless headset is going to have great passthru and the ability to replace the windows in my house with the beach or a beautiful mountain vista.
Also just an observation -- x86 on your face makes me think it probably gets quite hot :)
We have two wide-angle RGB cameras mechanically locked to the users' PD. The cameras itself are around 2k x 2k at 90 fps. For the standalone mode, the data is pushed over a PCIe gen 3x4 link so we can hit <12ms latency. Tethered is a bit more tricky as we can't count on the bandwidth being available, but we'll either compress it or do a reduced resolution.
The actual sensor is still TBD. I'd like to do this properly with a global shutter sensor (IMX547), but they're a bit too expensive. If we don't have the margin for it, something like a IMX715 is the fallback.
The compute pack will be on the back of your head, so a bit easier to cool and not as severely annoying. Also helps balance the headset.
For the future, have you looked into micro LED displays with waveguide optics? It seems like the thing that is going to allow for glasses-style VR/AR.
To me it's a no-brainer to tether that type of display to a phone. Could just use a long cable going to a pocket or hang the phone around the neck etc.
uOLEDs with waveguides (for AR) or pancake lenses (for VR) are... really complicated. Both systems currently do not offer the visual quality that a traditional refractive system can offer due to low light transmission, ghost images, and so on.
The pixel size on a high-res uOLED is so small that getting the same PPD requires pancake optics to fit in the headset form factor. Otherwise your spot size (i.e. the minimum resolution of the optics) is too large and you lose the benefit of a high-res display.
Also, bandwidth is a big concern. Our double 2448x2448@90Hz displays require DSC to run even with a DisplayPort 4-lane HBR3 link. I don't think phones can drive that.
Are you guys confident that your headset will be more comfortable than the Q2? If so, how much more?
* Main heat generation is on the back of the head and pointed away from you
* If it's still required, active airflow for the user in the front of the headset
* Weight will be balanced
* IPD is auto-adjusted, so there's no chance of having the wrong setting and hurting your eyes.
* Better optical quality leads to less eye strain
* Adjustable padding
That being said, I'm not a Quest 2 user. I don't know what things it does wrong, so it's possible I missed a feature that we have and didn't list.
Reclining can be a nice way to take a break from weight and pressure on head and face. Which can require modding a headset, to pad a back-of-head knob, etc. And hmd thermals aren't optimized for reclined. But here, perhaps this compute unit might be made detachable?
I think you guys are making a mistake I once made, focusing on the hardware design for what is actually a software product. You’re building an Android phone, without Android.
We're not doing this lightly. Hardware design is expensive, and risky, and low margin. But we want a cultural victory, not necessarily a financial one. If that means doing it ourselves, then so we will.
Case 2, you build a window manager. Each window can be positioned individually and you can give specific windows custom handling, or even integrate 3D scenes. Problem is, now you're limited to Linux. Linux headset support is very limited. People don't have Linux installed, even.
How do you solve this? You build a Linux compatible headset. You minimize the friction. You allow people to put on the headset and get to work. Nobody cares that their Android phone is Linux based, after all.
That being said, right now this absolutely is an enthusiast, early adopter product. We'd like to get the costs down, but going into a costs battle when you're doing a new product type is insanity.
Respectful discourse is important and we strive for something better than the tone you're carrying here. I say "we" only because I like this little respectful discourse corner of the internet and because the site guidelines are fairly clear on the subject. It's the culmination of hard work, cool, and I too hope it finds a lower price point and ends up succeeding.
Fwiw I guess this xkcd applies to both of us :)
How exactly are they going to achieve the visual specs to achieve that at the price point you're expecting?
They are never going to sell something like this at high volume, not only because the market for it isn't there yet but because this goes beyond the specs of consumer level headsets - which means they wouldn't be able to source the required components to even address such a hypothetical demand.
I’m going to take it to the level above offensive tough love and just give up at this point. If you want a $5k headset to emulate a $100 1080p monitor, with a 3 hour battery life, and switches for every sensor so the secret service can’t see how messy your bedroom is, then this product is for you. Good luck
Elsewhere on this page, you literally said that you would have been happy to have paid 2000 for the quest 2 - which this device would utterly dogpile both in terms of optics and raw power.
Cute though that you feel the need to paint the completely normal aversion to having a corporation having the ability to depth scan your surroundings at all times as tin foil hat territory.
I'd rather you skip the hysterics and just "give up" if you have nothing constructive to say.
P.S. I own a Quest 2.
I just finished a 6 hour session on the OC2 with the elite strap w/extended battery
For the record, I’m sure I’m far from the only one who 1) never had a VR headset yet, 2) would not buy a Facebook product, and 3) could buy one for US$2k+ for experiments if that means no lock-in. It’s the price of a decent laptop. Weren’t the original Oculus prices in that ballpark, before FB came in with its billions?