A 2.1 inch made-for-VR LCD panel, the same likely used in Huawei’s ultra compact VR Glass, has now entered mass production.
The size of current VR headsets is primarily dictated by what field of view current lenses can achieve (without uncorrectable distortion) with a given panel size. The smaller the panel, the more difficult this is.
The Oculus Quest, Oculus Rift, HTC Vive, HTC Vive Pro, and HTC Vive Cosmos all use dual panels between 3.4 and 3.6 inches diagonal. Other headsets like PlayStation VR and Oculus Rift S use a single panel, but these panels occupy essentially the same total space.
The HP Reverb was formerly the most compact position tracked PC VR headset, using 2.96 inch panels.
Specifications
JDI’s new panel is 2.1 inches, with the following specifications:
Panel Type: IPS LCD
Resolution: 1600×1600
Max Refresh Rate: 120 Hz
Subpixels: 3 (RGB)
Brightness: 430cd/㎡
Response Time: 4.5ms (gray-to-gray, worst case)
The company states that it is “used in VR glasses that have already been introduced to the market”. Given the above size, resolution, and panel type (and that the refresh rate is within the max) the only known headset on the market this could be is Huawei VR Glass.
Huawei VR Glass
These smaller panels, alongside pancake lenses (a fundamentally different design to all other headsets currently on the market), enable the incredibly small size of the Huawei VR Glass.
However, keep in mind that that product doesn’t have built in positional tracking or cameras. If these panels are used for a position tracked PC VR headset the size would likely be larger. And of course if they were used in an Oculus Quest competitor it would need to be much larger to house a battery and compute hardware.
The relatively standard resolution and use of LCD may make this panel significantly cheaper than high resolution OLED microdisplay alternatives like what Panasonic showed at CES. Huawei’s product is only officially available in China, for the equivalent of roughly $430.
It’s important to note, however, that when we tried Huawei VR Glass at CES we noted that it has a narrower field of view than typical. It may require a larger design to solve this.
Size Matters
Most current VR headsets are not comfortable to wear for extended periods of time. For some, they are even uncomfortable after a matter of minutes. This can be because they push a relatively heavy weight against the sinuses, where humans are particularly sensitive to pressure.
The weight’s fundamental cause is the the size of the panels currently available and the lenses used with them. Smaller panels of the same resolution are more difficult to produce, and more difficult to magnify over a large field of view. But JDI appears to have solved the first hurdle and Huawei demonstrated that the second can be shipped too (with a few tradeoffs).
With smaller panels, and suitable pancake lenses, VR could soon start to become a more comfortable medium that people can spend hours in without wanting the bulky heavy box off their face. Current VR might one day be looked back on like we look at the earliest cellular telephones or CRT monitors.
Whether this display system paradigm will stay in the realm of media viewers or come to gaming focused headsets is yet to be seen, but we’ll keep a close eye on JDI and companies likely to use its new panels.
Out-of-Home entertainment, and Immersive Technology industry specialist Kevin Williams reports in his latest Virtual Arena column on the further growth in recognition that virtual reality VR is receiving from the Enterprise sector. Moving from entertainment, he now covers the major developments VR is having in shaping the future Education Technology scene.
The British Educational Training and Technology Show (BETT) was held last week at London’s ExCel exhibition convention centre – representing the leading trade event representing the Education Technology (EdTech) and training scene – drawing some 800 corporations to the event, that covered multiple halls of the London venue and attracted some 34,000 industry professionals. The latest trends including touchscreen, tablets, 3D Printing, programmable robotics and smart learning technology were presented.
Image credit: KWP
This column previously covered the 2018 BETT show and how VR was immerging as a possible EdTech trend – but with BETT 2020 the event cemented this movement, with a vast array of new developments and applications for this technology, and growth of previous early adopters.
Yet again, the biggest presence of VR at the show was from Avantis – the company had powered into VR and was one of the first to offer educators a dedicated package. Proving successful with its ‘ClassVR’, comprising a 3DoF mobileVR headset, combined with its software package – Avantis was celebrating over 1 million students having used the company’s ClassVR platform to-date – with over 30,000 classrooms operating the system across some 60 countries. A system that took much of what had been achieved with mobileVR in 2016 and packaged it into a reliable and compelling solution for the education sector, becoming a world leader deserving much more recognition.
Another exhibitor that has grown its investment into VR since our 2018 coverage was Redbox VR – providing a versatile and robust solution for schools to be able to field VR for education. Redbox VR has also partnered with the leading providers of VR based educational content. Fielding not only its own mobileVR powered headset but also working with the latest developments including from Pico.
The Redbox VR platform supports content such as the 360’ educational virtual trips using the Richo Theta camera. And part of the RiVR Link (“classroom in a Box”) offering a turnkey VR solution, and Google Expeditions platforms. But also revealing its partnering with MEL Science, provider of the ‘MEL Chemistry VR’ educational experiences; the group proudly promoting winning the prestigious BETT Award for 2020 – “innovator of the year”, for their work in this field.
Image credit: KWP
Some aspects of VR promotion had changes since our previous feature – Google though still heavily committed to the education sector had dropped its investment in VR headsets to focus on the content. As with the suspension of the Google Daydream VR system, no VR was represented on the corporations’ vast booth at BETT 2020, but the company was still fully committed to immersive education through their Google Expeditions platform – offering virtual field trips to students.
Likewise, the VR presentation on the Microsoft booth at the education show was muted – rather than the bewildering array of Windows MR headsets seen two years ago, the company promoted the virtual learning systems on only one provider, with the Samsung Odyssey on display giving an example of the education content. Along with seeing VR as a major educational tool, the corporation was also promoting the use of its videogame content as a teaching tool with ‘Minecraft Education Edition’ being played avidly on the stand. (“edutainment” a factor in the deployment of virtual education).
Image credit: KWP
There was no visible presence from Acer, Asus or Dell VR headset at BETT this year – but there was still much interest in VR as an educational platform. Lenovo has a major presence at the EdTech event, promoting its computer and tablet technology in schools – but along with this the corporation as grown its VR education operation, announcing recently a significant investment with their ‘Lenovo VR Classroom’ kit that supports the Lenovo Mirage Solo headset (schools having access to plug-n-play VR setup). Lenovo was presenting its technology on the booth with the Oculus Rift S (developed in partnership with Oculus), the system running educational content using CAD designs. The VR Classroom 2 platform looking beyond just mobileVR towards the high end of PC VR.
Image credit: KWP
Lenovo was also represented on other booths through the show, with Oculus Rift S headsets being put through their paces – these exhibitors chose to promote the application of VR through entertainment. The Unity booth showcased their educational content development – but also hoped to educate the educators towards what VR has to offer the future classroom, running on its booth an Oculus Rift S and Beat Saber. Another exhibitor using Beat Saber and the Oculus Rift S was Nutanix.
Image credit: KWP
No official Oculus presence was at the education showcase – but the corporation has been increasing its investment in Enterprise, and education and scientific development is a major part of this new interest. Only one Oculus Quest was seen in operation at BETT, on the Konica Minolta booth, the education service provider running the Quest as an example of how virtual lessons could reshape education.
Image credit: KWP
Another VR headset developer represented at BETT 2020 was HTC – residing on the Korean Pavilion at the show, the exhibitor VRANI promoted its ‘Kooring XR Coding Adventure’, a virtual experience created to help students in programming. The company brought examples of the virtual lesson running on the HTC Vive Cosmos, and the standalone HTC Vive Focus Pro headsets. The ‘Kooring XR Coding Camp’ offers innovative education through multiple users, employing “virtual textbooks”.
Image credit: KWP
On the HP booth, working in partnership with Intel, the company brought examples of its new HP Reverb headset as well as its new backpack PC – offering a new and immersive education platform for schools and colleges. The ability to utilize this platform to navigate the virtual environment in free-roam a growing application in design as well as education (not to mention also in location-based entertainment (LBE)).
HP also partnered on their booth with Springboard VR – a specialist in VR content distribution and commercial licensing that also provides a ubiquitous content management platform for commercial deployment. The company may be more familiar to readers for their presence in the VR arcade scene – but recently has promoted investment in VR education content, offering a VR content and management platform for schools, museums and libraries, offering the latest licensed virtual educational content. The company showing its latest virtual lessons on the HP platform during BETT.
Image credit: KWP
BETT 2020 had a much more international reach, and with that, the impact of VR from an international standpoint in EdTech was revealed. One such example was on The Norwegian Classroom booth at BETT which along with the promotion of advancements in the Norwegian education system, they were running demonstrations on the Lenovo headset – running the vreducation.no. This represented work by Norway University into utilizing VR to support mathematical assignments and offer a unique and compelling education tool.
The Sultanate of Oman – Ministry of Education was one of many that ran mobileVR headsets demonstrating the deployment in schools utilizing this innovative technology. Even the UK government represented VR in their marketing promotion for the hard work that the Department of Trade and Industries (DTI) did towards promoting the leading role that British developers have had in expanding this new area of EdTech.
Image credit: KWP
Exhibitors from across the UK and the globe all included VR applications hoping to find homes in the education system, with companies such as Entab InfoTech, Apelab, and Medicus XR. The ability to create compelling and immersive content was demonstrated by Flyover Zone Productions, using a mixture of drone footage and 360’ immersion had created ‘Rome Reborn’ – “a virtual field trip to Ancient Rome”. Created as mobileVR content offered to schools as a virtual field trip to a historic landmark, it offers an experience for the students that brings their history books to life.
Image credit: KWP
One of the many interesting exhibitors at BETT was a Chinese developer of a simple and effective Eyesight and Colour Blindness testing system. The company selling their units to be used in schools and hospitals, the simple test allows for the sight of both eyes to be tested in a quick and easy examination that supplies at the end a printed receipt, able to detect issues at a young age, quickly and effectively. With the deployment of so much virtual display technology, this kind of system seems a very sensible precaution.
Image credit: KWP
And finally, following on from our 2018 coverage, another speculation that immersive projected environments (representing another aspect of the virtual reality scene) would become a growing aspect of the education sector was proven by a plethora of new systems. Examples included several surface and floor projection system – as well as the use of motion-tracked projection walls for digital sports.
Image credit: KWP
In conclusion, it’s only the beginning of the year and already we have seen at CES, EAG and now BETT – enterprise applications of VR are at the forefront of sold investment. The direction of the virtual reality community has migrated from the niche of the consumer PC hyperbole and has started the long and productive lifecycle of achieving its true potential. Regarding its deployment in EdTech, the 2020 education sector seems to be working hard to find the best way to deploy this new tool in educating the future workforce.
After a slow start, 2019 rounded out to be an undeniably strong year for consumer VR, setting up a springboard into a big 2020. Here’s an overview of the major happenings in VR over the last year, and a glimpse of what will come in 2020.
5 Major New Headsets and What They Mean for the Market
2019 started out slow as the industry waited with baited breath for the launch of the latest wave of headsets, but things started heating up once they finally hit the market. Here’s a look at the biggest headset launches of 2019 and what they’ve meant to the industry so far.
Oculus Quest
Image courtesy Oculus
Oculus Quest is surely the most important headset to launch in 2019. We called it the “first great standalone VR headset” in our review, thanks to a reasonable $400 price point, full 6DOF tracking (which allows it to play games functionally on par with high-end VR headsets) and no PC required.
As a standalone VR headset built on smartphone hardware, Quest can’t compete in the graphics department against high-end PC VR headsets, but there’s no question that it’s the class leader in ease-of-use (a place where tethered headsets are still struggling). And if you happen to have a gaming PC anyway, Quest also doubles as a PC VR headset.
On those fronts, Rift S seems to have largely succeeded; its $400 launch price was half of the launch price of the original Rift with Touch controllers, and we certainly haven’t been missing the external sensors of the original since getting our hands on Rift S. Thanks to the backing of a strong content library, Rift S packs a lot of value, making it easy to recommend as the best entry-level headset for PC VR.
Valve Index
Image courtesy Valve
After tons of speculation, Valve finally jumped into the VR headset space with its own first-party hardware in 2019. While the company had originally collaborated with HTC to create the Vive, this time around Valve opted to handle everything on their own.
In our review we called Index “the enthusiast’s choice” thanks to category-leading visuals, ergonomics, and audio, as well as solid controllers. And while it’s a lovely headset once you’re inside, there’s no denying the significant $1,000 price tag and sub-par ease-of-use due to external tracking sensors and last-gen boundary setup.
Still, Index is a hugely important headset because it acts as a high bar that future headsets can strive toward and demonstrates the continued existence of an enthusiast class of VR consumers who are willing to pay for a high-end VR experience. But it’s also made for an awkward relationship between Valve and HTC who are now positioned more as competitors than partners.
Vive Cosmos
Image courtesy HTC
In 2019 HTC launched Vive Cosmos, its first true successor to the original Vive headset. Like Facebook with Rift S, HTC opted to make its latest headset easier to use by ditching external tracking sensors for inside-out tracking.
In our review we called Cosmos “a decent headset up against stiff competition.” Indeed, worst-in-class tracking and iffy ergonomics has left Cosmos overshadowed by the considerably less expensive Rift S and the more expensive but higher-fidelity Index. And while HTC had positioned Cosmos as a move toward a more user-friendly headset, the device’s awkward reliance on Steam (despite a Viveport front-end) arguably takes it a step back in user-experience compared to the original Vive.
While Microsoft and its other VR partners seem to have largely abandoned the Windows VR platform, HP surprised us in 2019 with the launch of Reverb, its second VR headset. While it’s still stuck with Windows VR (and the worst-in-class controllers that come standard with such headsets), Reverb leads in pixel density, making it a compelling choice for simulator enthusiasts who tend to value resolution above other specs.
While Reverb’s launch in 2019 shows that HP is seriously committed to PC VR, it hasn’t done much to alleviate the feeling that Microsoft is knowingly allowing the Windows VR platform to wither away.
Big VR Game Launches and Growing Developer Success
Since the first consumer VR headsets hit the market in 2016, developers have been steadily honing in on what makes a great (and successful) VR game. While it’s been a painfully slow process for developers and consumers alike, 2019 saw the launch of games which have objectively moved the needle forward in VR game design and set new records for developer success. Here’s a look at the most important moments in VR gaming in 2019.
Beat Saber’s Full Release and Developer Acquisition by Facebook
Image courtesy Beat Games
It wasn’t long after Beat Saber’s early access launch in 2018 that it was a clear success for its small indie developer Beat Games. Later that year the game launched on PSVR where it remains one of the best rated games on the platform. In 2019, Beat Games added new music & features and brought feature-parity to all versions of the game, culminating in a full launch out of early access alongside the launch of Quest on May 21st, 2019.
Even before the game launched on Quest, it reached a huge milestone as the first VR title—as far as we know—to have sold 1 million copies. This staggering success caught the attention of Facebook, leading to the surprise acquisition of Beat Games. This was likely primarily a defensive move in order to keep platform competitors from getting their hands on what is surely Quest’s most important game. But there’s an offensive element too: Facebook seems keen to accelerate the game’s adoption of new Oculus platform technologies aimed at driving user engagement.
Asgard’s Wrath Delivers the First Great VR RPG
Image courtesy Oculus
Purportedly VR’s largest game production yet released, Asgard’s Wrath capitalized on the longstanding desire for a meaty VR-native RPG. Players were treated to some 30 hours of content and a game which has been called a “must buy” by many. We thought enough of the title that we gave it our 2019 Game of the Year Award for the Oculus Rift.
The Oculus Studios-backed title appears to have been a success, but it also sets a very high bar for third-party (and mostly indie) developers to follow.
Stormland’s Innovative Open World and Developer Acquisition by Sony
Image courtesy Insomniac Games
Developed by veteran game and VR studio Insomniac Games, Stormland raised the bar in VR open-world game design with an innovative take on locomotion which offers players a sense of large scale freedom rarely seen elsewhere in VR. The game successfully combines a handful of different locomotion schemes and integrates them with satisfying combat for a core gameplay loop that’s easy to love.
We expect VR game design concepts from Stormland to proliferate into VR titles in 2020 and beyond. For its contributions we gave the title our 2019 Design Award for Excellence in Locomotion.
While Facebook scooped up Beat Saber’s Beat Games, Sony acquired Stormland’s Insomniac Games in 2019. Though the company probably bought the studio primarily for its success in the non-VR space, it was a strategic blow to Oculus nonetheless.
Blood & Truth Proves PSVR is Still Going Strong
Image courtesy SIE London Studio
Blood & Truth was PSVR’s biggest game to launch in 2019 and managed to delight players with an action-packed narrative full of interesting moments. Blood & Truth is an impressively crafted experience that is not only expertly designed around the limitations of the aging PSVR, but even manages to raise the technical bar for character rendering and performances on any VR platform, even against much more powerful PC hardware.
By making nearly everything in the game physical and interactive, Boneworks delivers on player’s expectations of agency in a way that often goes far beyond its contemporaries. In the game, just about every object, enemy, and weapon is physically interactive, leading to moments where novel ideas—like, say, using a coffee mug as a melee weapon—actually work. While the heavy emphasis on physics can be frustrating and wonky at times, it’s hard not to feel a sense of added embodiment when your ideas about what’s possible in the game world are satisfied in a realistic fashion.
For its part, Boneworks is a flag in the ground which represents perhaps the most interactive physics sandbox seen in VR to date, and a proof point that glimpses the immersive benefits which come from more realistic virtual interactions—something we expect to see developers expand on into 2020 and beyond.
Star Wars: Vader Immortal Successfully Brings Big IP Into VR
Image courtesy ILMxLAB
While the number of great VR games is steadily growing, only a small handful of titles so far have been based on major franchises, and of those that are, even fewer still have actually been made from the ground-up for VR.
Star Wars: Vader Immortal is shining example of bringing a massively popular intellectual property into VR in a way that feels authentic and enjoyable. It’s key to have major franchises jumping into the VR landscape to pique the interest of mainstream consumers who may not be interested in VR as a technology unto itself; it’s even more important that the execution of big IP in VR is done well so that new users don’t get a bad taste from their first experience.
On that note, Vader Immortal—which was released in three parts over the course of 2019—hits all the right notes. It’s engaging and easy to play, thanks to a focus on narrative and immersion, rather than raw gameplay, making it a great first-time VR experience; it’s also one of the most visually impressive games available on Quest. So it’s no wonder why we gave the game our 2019 Game of the Year Award for Quest.
While only a small handful of indie VR studios so far have found this sort of ongoing success, Superhot VR shows that, for projects of the right scope, there’s considerable (and growing) developer opportunity in VR.
Peering Into 2020
So, 2019 was a big year for VR in many ways, but what does 2020 hold? Here’s a few reason why we think 2020 will be VR’s biggest year yet.
Oculus Quest 2
Image courtesy Oculus
There’s no doubt that Facebook has been happy with the traction of its latest standalone VR headset, Oculus Quest. The company is moving quickly to build out the headset’s software features—like adding hand-tracking and PC support with Oculus Link—and it’s all but certain that Quest 2 is already in the works. The big question is when.
While Oculus’ history with the Rift would suggest that it would be several years from one headset to the next, VR as a market is much more defined today than it was back in 2016 when the first headsets hit the market. With the resources Facebook is pouring into Quest, we doubt there will be a similar three year span (like with Rift to Rift S) until the next Quest headset.
There’s reason to believe that Quest 2 will be announced in 2020. The biggest, perhaps, is that the current headset is based on a fairly old Snapdragon 835 processor which puts a pretty hard limit on what can be done with the headset by both Facebook and third-party developers. Moving to a more advanced hardware platform like, say, Qualcomm’s recently announced Snapdragon XR2, would open the door to substantial improvements. Of course, that’ll only happen if the price is right; Quest’s reasonable $400 price point is a big part of its appeal.
And then there’s Oculus Rift 2. Facebook launched its second PC headset, Rift S in early 2019, but it was a bit of a side-grade and cost-down to the original Rift rather than a true successor. In 2019 Facebook showed some very impressive prototype VR headsets with major advances in optics and form-factor, but has yet to announce Rift 2.
The prototype tech seems like it will form the foundation of Rift 2, but there’s a bigger question on our mind: will Quest 2 and Rift 2 be the same headset? This would be an ambitious move, but there’s already some hints that it’s the direction Facebook is headed.
Along with cross-buy between many Quest and Rift apps, Facebook is trying to unify its VR userbase to make a broader audience for developers. If every customer that owned an Oculus headset could play both standalone Quest content and PC-powered Rift content, that’s a huge win for the ecosystem.
Alternatively, rather than combining Quest 2 and Rift 2, Oculus could keep Quest as its lower-end product line while positioning Rift 2 as a piercer but higher-fidelity headset to compete for against Valve’s Index in the VR enthusiast space.
All Eyes on Half-Life: Alyx
Image courtesy Valve
There’s no doubt that the Half-Life: Alyx, the upcoming made-for-VR game from legendary developer Valve, is the most anticipated VR title of 2020. And it will have ramifications beyond the existing VR market; many mainstream gaming and tech publications which rarely (or effectively never) cover VR will be picking up the requisite headsets and hardware to take a good close look at the game when it launches. Half-Life: Alyx will be the biggest opportunity to date for VR to show mainstream gamers why it’s worthy of their attention.
Big Oculus Games on the Horizon
Image courtesy Ready at Dawn
After a string of not-so-great titles from Oculus Studios, Facebook’s first-party VR publisher, between 2017 and mid-2019, Asgard’s Wrath and Stormland ended the year as wins for the Oculus content library.
Oculus Studios also has placed big bets on several highly anticipated games set to launch in 2020: Medal of Honor: Above and Beyond, Lone Echo II, and Phantom: Covert Ops. It remains to be seen whether these games will become key additions to the Oculus content lineup or go down in history as flops, but the outcome is important because Facebook is effectively the only company in town that’s funding big VR titles from third-party studios.
Beyond games, Facebook is also set to launch its brand new social VR platform, Facebook Horizon in 2020. Despite being one of the world’s leading social media companies, Facebook’s social VR strategy has been chaotic at best, but it looks like the company is finally trying to consolidate its efforts into a platform that’s more universally available across its biggest headsets in 2020.
Facebook Horizon | Image courtesy Facebook
Facebook Horizon will be the only first-party social VR application of its kind, and it has the potential to seriously shake up the social VR space which is currently dominated by third-party VR apps.
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What were your personal ‘most important moments’ in VR for 2019 and what are you looking forward to most in 2020? Drop us a line below!
Zero Latency provides systems for warehouse-scale, location-based VR experiences in cities across the world, letting you and up to seven others roam around a huge area with physical prop guns you can use in-game. It is kind of like a cooperative VR version of laser tag.
The idea is that you and your friends can move around freely in the warehouse, using a backpack PC to avoid tethered wires. Most of the experiences are co-op, but they also offer a fairly new PvP experience which we tried out in February. As a whole, we’ve had mixed results with Zero Latency in the past. The game design has been mixed in quality, and their original open-source-based VR headsets weren’t the greatest when used in conjunction with their proprietary tracking system.
Pictured: The original Zero Latency system, using OS VR and external tracking
Zero Latency, however, announced they were going to overhaul the system away from the OSVR headsets to a second generation that uses HP hardware as part of a deal they struck earlier in the year. After my last visit a few months ago, Zero Latency invited me back to their North Melbourne location – one of a few that adopted the new Gen 2 system already.
The upgrade includes new HP computer backpacks and headsets. In some cases, that means the headsets will be HP Reverbs. For five of the current Gen 2-ready locations, however, the older HP VR headsets were used running Microsoft’s Mixed Reality system. The North Melbourne location was one of those five. Zero Latency says future upgraded locations will use Reverb.
I asked Zero Latency CEO Tim Ruse why they chose to go with the Reverb, as opposed to other options.
“Probably the resolution and the quality,” he said. “It’s a really good headset and it’s pretty comfortable compared to other stuff that’s out there. And it goes really well with the HP backpack.”
Ruse noted each of the 38 Zero Latency locations is run by a licensed owner and it is up to each location to choose their upgrade path.
Pictured: The new Zero Latency system in North Melbourne, featuring HP Mixed Reality headsets and a Windows controller mounted to the gun prop.
The original Zero Latency system used OSVR headsets with a gun peripheral and glowing balls mounted on the top of both. Tracking was done externally for each player via overhead mounted cameras tracking the glowing balls. There are also blue patterns on the floor used to help determine position.
The HP headsets feature two outward facing cameras that provide inside-out tracking similar to an Oculus Quest, Rift S, Cosmos and others. According to Zero Latency, the new HP headsets still use the existing blue patterns on the floor to help determine your position in the play area and relative to others but, crucially, all of this tracking is all done on the players’ headset alone and no longer uses the external cameras mounted overhead from the Gen 1 system. The headset’s inside-out tracking system also tracks a Windows controller mounted to the gun prop, instead of the old glowing balls.
“The gun is essentially [now] locally tracked,” he said. “Before, it was the positions travelling through the tracking system and back out. Whereas, your perception of the gun is [now] all local. It’s going all through the WMR tracking specifically, not out through an external tracking system. It feels way snappier.”
I could really feel the difference and it is one of the most noticeable improvements of the new system. The guns now feel snappy and sharp with low latency. Most important, they feel really fun to use. I felt in control of my aim the whole time and I didn’t get as frustrated with aiming as I did in the old system. The gun-play seemed much more skill-based and I was talking long range shots that didn’t seem possible with the original OSVR setup.
Inside Out Arena Scale Limitations
While I found the overall experience improved with the HP-based system compared with the first generation of Zero Latency, I also noted limitations. There were a few instances, for example, where a player’s gun would appear lodged in the ground, far away from where they were standing with the prop. The fix was to just look directly at the gun prop and move it around a bit.
My head movement also seemed susceptible to occasional frame drops and momentary freezes. Fast actions also resulted in my movements sometimes feeling like they were smoothed over, or “averaged out”, when translated back onto the screen – the finer detail and incremental movements of my head sometimes felt like they were lost in translation during a big sweeping motion. When I approached a physical wall, the positional tracking went haywire. Despite all this, I did find the overall experience to be quite a bit better than the first generation — a change likely attributable to the abandonment of OSVR hardware.
I would expect some casual VR players to come away impressed by the upgrade. The gun props feels much more responsive and the experience is notably more fun because of that. But there are still more improvements needed to iron out occasional tracking glitches in an inside-out-based system at this scale.
After a tumultuous initial rollout of the HP Reverb headset marred by stock shortages and display issues, the company says that the issues have been identified and fixed, and that new inventory is bringing the headset back in stock.
Speaking to Road to VR, HP says they’ve identified the issues which caused displays on some headsets to flicker, show stripes, or go completely blank in some cases. The root cause of blank screens was the headset’s breakaway cable connector which didn’t maintain a firm connection for some headsets, the company said. Meanwhile, flickering and other display issues were the fault of some internal components not behaving as expected. HP maintains that these issues were the result of manufacturing inconsistencies and a batch of components which had larger tolerances than expected.
The company pulled stock back from retailers while it identified the issues. HP tells Road to VR that all new Reverb inventory available through official retail channels from this point forward has been fully fixed.
Photo by Road to VR
While it didn’t go as far as issuing a recall for headsets already sold, the company said that any Reverb owners with issues should contact HP support, and further said that the support teams have been specifically briefed on the Reverb situation. Having run long-term tests on the problematic batch of headsets, HP tells Road to VR that it doesn’t expect currently functional headsets from the initial batch to develop any of the issues in the long run.
A spokesperson for HP’s VR team said the group is “fairly sorry” and “frankly a bit embarrassed” that the initial batch of headsets didn’t meet the quality bar that the company was aiming for. Having identified the issues, and with new procedures in place during manufacturing, the group says that it wants customers to feel confident they are buying a quality product from this point forward.
After several weeks of delays from the May 6th launch date, HP said that their new Reverb VR headset should be restocked at their official website and major retailers in July, though it seems only a small number of were made available before the headset returned to being ‘sold out’. The bumpy launch continues to be plagued by reports of display issues.
Update (July 30th, 2019): HP had expected that new stock of the Pro and Consumer Edition Reverb headset would be available in July, though it appears that only a very limited number of headsets became available for sale. Users over at the WindowsVR subreddit spotted some stock at Best Buy earlier this month but said it was gone within 30 minutes. Presently the headset remains ‘sold out’ at HP.com, Amazon, and Best Buy, with no estimates for stock replenishment.
A spokesperson for HP tells Road to VR that the company is still working on the shortage, but doesn’t have a firm timeline at present. HP maintains that the near unavailability of the headset is due to “incredibly high demand,” but a surprising number of user reported display issues, and a purported HP insider, tell a different story.
Throughout July reports of display issues have continued, similar to those seen in June. A user on Reddit who claims to work for HP and be directly involved with Reverb said at the end of June that the company is actively testing returned headsets in an effort uncover the display issues.
At present we are capturing DOA units to get an handle on all the symptoms reported and we’re plowing through any stock we have here to see if we can repro what is being seen. (I’m testing units at my desk as we speak.)
Luckily, we found on[e] in the office that was having the dimmed LCD issue so we have a bit of a head start.
The fixes will be implemented as soon as we discover what is driving them. (The ‘cable issue’ is the easy one had has been fixed already.)
We hope to hear from HP when they have fully solved Reverb’s issues and the headset becomes readily available for purchase.
Update (June 12th, 2019): HP today told Road to VR that an initial supply of the Reverb headset was recently offered and quickly sold out at HP.com. The company says that more stock of both the Reverb Pro Edition and Reverb Consumer Edition is expected in July, and will be available from HP, Amazon, and Best Buy.
We’ve reached out to HP for comment on the display issues, which some suspect were related to the headset’s delayed launch.
Update (May 26th, 2019): We’ve checked in with HP for an update on Reverb availability at several points since the May 6th launch date, but the company has declined to offer an update on when they expect the headset to be available, or what has caused the delay. We’re told they’ll be in touch when more information is available.
Original Article (May 14th, 2019): HP’s new Reverb headset boasts high resolution displays and a new design. Though it’s primarily aimed toward enterprise customers, HP is also planning to sell direct to consumers.
In fact the $600 HP Reverb Consumer Edition can already be seen listed on Amazon and Best Buy in the US, but both stores list ‘Out of Stock’. The $650 Reverb Professional Edition is also listed as ‘Out of Stock’ on HP’s store.
“We’re waiting on an update for expected availability to purchase and will let you know as we have a new date confirmed,” an HP spokesperson told Road to VR on May 6th; we’ve reached out in the interim but still haven’t received an update on availability of the headset.
In our review of the HP Reverb we found it to be a meaningful upgrade from the original HP headset, but the headset is held back from its true potential by an issue impacting display clarity and the same controllers flaws shared by other Windows VR headsets.
Reverb is HP’s second VR headset, and this time around the company is aiming mainly at the enterprise market, but not shying away from selling individual units at a consumer price point. As the highest resolution headset presently available at that consumer price point, it has a unique selling point among all others, though the usual compromises of Windows Mixed Reality still apply.
As usual, we’ll start with an overview and summary of the headset to be followed with an in-depth review. Our in-depth write-up is still in progress and will be added to this article when complete.
HP Reverb Review Summary
Photo by Road to VR
To be up front, the HP Reverb headset itself is a solid improvement over its predecessor by most measures. The new design is comfortable and feels higher quality. The new displays and lenses offer a considerably better-looking image. And on-board audio is a huge plus. However, while its hardware has improved in many ways, it’s still a ‘Windows Mixed Reality’ headset, which means it shares the same irksome controllers as all Windows VR headsets.
Reverb’s headlining feature is its high-resolution LCD displays, which are significantly more pixel dense than any headset in its class. On paper, we’re talking about 2,160 × 2,160 per display, which is a big step up over the next highest resolution headsets in the same class—the Valve Index, showcasing a resolution of 1,440 × 1,600 per display (also LCD, which means full RGB sub-pixels), and HTC Vive Pro’s dual 1,440 × 1,600 AMOLEDs, which feature an RGBG PenTile pixel matrix. Among the three, Reverb has a little more than twice the total number of pixels.
Photo by Road to VR
There’s no doubt that Reverb’s displays are very sharp, and very pixel dense. It’s impossible to focus on a single pixel, and the screen door effect (unlit spaces between pixels) is on the verge of being difficult to see. It has the best resolving power of any headset in its class, which means textures, edges, and text are especially crisp.
This is an example of a display with mura which shows varying brightness across the display; a perfect display would have perfectly consistent brightness from corner to corner.
Unfortunately, overall clarity is held back in a large way by plainly visible mura. At a glance, mura can look similar to the screen door effect (in the way that it’s ‘locked’ to your face and reduces clarity) but is actually a different artifact resulting from poor consistency in color and brightness across the display. It ends up looking like the display is somewhat cloudy.
As HP is mostly pushing Reverb for enterprise, they probably aren’t terribly concerned with this—after all, text legibility (a major selling point for enterprise customers) gets a big boost from the headset’s high resolution whether or not mura is present. For anyone interested in Reverb for visual immersion though, the mura unfortunately hampers where it might be otherwise.
There’s also a few other curious visual artifacts. There’s a considerable amount of chromatic aberration outside of the lenses’ sweet spot. There’s also subtle—but noticeable—pupil swim (varying distortion across the lens that appears as motion as your eye moves across the lens). In most headsets, these are both significantly reduced via software corrections, and I’m somewhat hopeful that they could be improved with better lens correction profiles for Reverb in the future. While I couldn’t spot any obvious ghosting or black smear, interestingly Reverb shows red smear, which is something I’ve never seen before. It’s the same thing you’d expect with black smear (where dark/black colors can bleed into brighter colors when you move your head, especially white), but in Reverb it manifests most when red (or any color substantially composed of red, including white) shares a boundary with a dark/black color. In my testing this hasn’t led to any significant annoyance but, as ever, it could be bothersome in some specific content.
From a field of view standpoint, HP claims 114 degrees diagonally for Reverb, which is higher than what’s typically quoted for headsets like the Rift (~100) and Vive (~110). Nobody in the industry really seems to agree what amounts to a valid field of view measurement though, and to my eyes, Reverb’s field of view falls somewhere between the two. So whether you call it 105 or 114, Reverb is in the same field of view class as most other PC VR headsets. These are Fresnel lenses, which means they are susceptible to god rays, which are about as apparent on Reverb as with recent headsets like the Rift S, and a bit less prevalent than the original Rift and Vive.
Photo by Road to VR
Reverb’s other big feature is its major ergonomic redesign. HP has ditched the halo headstrap approach seen on every other Windows VR headset and instead opted for a much more (original) Rift-like design, including on-ear headphones. At least to my head, Reverb’s ergonomics feel like a big improvement over HP’s original Windows VR headset.
I found it quite easy to use for an hour or more while maintaining comfort. As with all headsets of this design, the trick is knowing how to fit it right (which isn’t usually intuitive). New users are always tempted to tighten the side straps and clamp the headset onto their face like a vice, but the key is to find the spot where the rear ring can grip the crown of your head, then tighten the top strap to ‘lift’ the visor so that it’s held up by ‘hanging’ from the top strap rather than by sheer friction against your face. The side straps should be as loose as possible while still maintaining stability.
Photo by Road to VR
I was able to get Reverb to feel very comfortable, but I’m a little worried that the headset won’t easily accommodate larger heads or noses. Personally speaking, I don’t fall on either ends of the spectrum for head or nose size, so I’m guessing I’m fairly average in that department. Even so, I had Reverb’s side straps as loose as they would possibly go in order to get it to fit well. If I had a bigger head, the straps themselves wouldn’t have more room to accommodate; all the extra space would be made up by further stretching the springs in the side struts, which would put more pressure on my face than is ideal.
I also felt like I was pushing the limits of the headphones and the nose gap. The best fit for the headphones is to have them all the way in their bottom position; if there were a greater distance between the top of my head and my ears, or if I preferred the top strap adjustment more tightly, the headphones wouldn’t be able to extend far enough down to be centered on my ears.
With the nose gap, I was feeling a bit of pressure on the bridge of my nose, and actually opted to remove the nose gasket entirely (the piece of rubber that blocks light), which gave me just enough room to not feel like the headset was in constant contact with the bridge of my nose. If you have a larger nose or a greater distance between the center of your eye and your nose’s bridge, you might find the nose gap on Reverb annoyingly small.
Photo by Road to VR
As with most other Windows VR headsets, Reverb lacks a hardware IPD adjustment, which means only those near to the headset’s fixed IPD setting will have ideal alignment between their eyes and the optical center of the lenses. We’ve reached out to HP to confirm the headset’s fixed IPD measurement, though I expect it to fall very close to 64mm. If you are far from the headset’s fixed figure, you’ll unfortunately lose out on some clarity.
So, if it fits, Reverb from a hardware standpoint is a pretty solid headset, and the singular choice for anyone prioritizing resolution over anything else. However, Reverb can’t escape the caveats that come with all Windows VR headsets.
Mostly that’s the controllers and their tracking. Reverb uses the same Windows VR controllers as every other Windows VR headset except for Samsung (which has slightly different controllers). Yes, they work, but they are the worst 6DOF controllers on the market. They’re flimsy, bulky, and not very ergonomic. They actually track quite well from a performance standpoint, but their tracking coverage hardly extends outside of your field of view, which means they lose tracking any time your hands linger outside of the sensor’s reach, even if that means just letting them hang naturally down by your sides.
Photo by Road to VR
The tracking coverage issue is primarily driven by the tracking system used in every Windows VR headset: a two-camera inside-out system. HP says Reverb’s tracking is identical to the first generation headsets, and as such, Reverb’s two cameras lose controller tracking as often as its Windows VR contemporaries. Luckily, the headtracking itself is pretty darn good (on par with Rift S in my experience so far), and so is controller tracking performance when near the headset’s field of view. For content where your hands are almost always in your field of view (or only leave it briefly), Windows VR controller tracking can work just fine. In fact, Reverb holds up very well when playing Beat Saber on its highest difficulty because your hands don’t spend much time outside of the field of view before entering it again (to slice a block). But there’s tons of content where you hands won’t be consistently held in the headset’s field of view, and that’s when things can get annoying.
Photo by Road to VR
For all of its downsides, the Windows VR tracking system also means that Reverb gets room-scale 360 tracking out of the box and doesn’t rely on any external sensors. That’s great because it means relatively easy setup, and support for large tracking volumes.
The compromises on the controller design and tracking were easy to swallow considering how inexpensively you could find a Windows VR headset ($250 new in box is not uncommon). But Reverb has introduced itself as the new premium option among Windows VR headsets at $600, which shines a much brighter light on the baggage that comes with every Windows VR headset to date.
While Windows Mixed Reality—which is built into Windows and comes with its very own VR spatial desktop—is the native platform for Reverb and all other Windows VR headsets, there’s an official plugin that makes it compatible with most SteamVR content, which vastly expands the range of content available on the headset.
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And that’s it for the top-down summary. The write-up of our in-depth review is still in progress and will be added to this article when complete, so check back soon.
Disclosure: HP provided Road to VR with a Reverb headset.
In wenige Tagen will HP eine neue VR-Brille veröffentlichen, dessen Spezifikation und Preis definitiv spannend klingen. Mit der HP Reverb wird das Unternehmen damit bereits seine zweite Windows-Mixed-Reality-Brille auf den Markt bringen.
HP Reverb erscheint am 6. Mai
Die HP Reverb wird mit zwei LCD-Panels ausgestattet, welche jeweils eine Auflösung von 2160×2160 Pixel bei einer Bildwiederholrate von 90Hz liefern. Im Vergleich: Die Oculus Rift und die HTC Vive kommen nur auf 1080×1200 Pixel pro Auge. Beim Tracking setzt das Unternehmen weiterhin auf das Inside-Out-Tracking von Microsoft und die Windows-Mixed-Reality-Schnittstelle.
Die Reverb-Brille wird zudem über ein Field of View von 114 Grad verfügen und einen Regler für den Abstand der Linsen mitbringen, welcher den Abstand zwischen 55mm und 71mm anpassen lässt.
Beim Design scheint sich das Unternehmen an der Oculus Rift orientiert zu haben und dementsprechend sollte die Brille einen guten Tragekomfort bieten. Die integrierten Kopfhörer können optional entfernt werden und für eigene Kopfhörer ist ein Klinke-Anschluss vorhanden. Um die VR-Brille mit dem PC zu verbinden, benötigt ihr einen freien DisplayPort 1.3-Anschluss und einen freien USB 3.0-Port. Ein zusätzlicher Bluetooth-Adapter ist für die Verbindung der trackbaren Controller nicht mehr nötig, da HP diesen innerhalb der Brille verbaut hat.
Wir werden zeitnah die HP Reverb für euch testen und anschließend findet ihr das Review auf unserer Seite. Alle weiteren Informationen findet ihr auf der Webseite von HP. Aktuell gibt HP für die Reverb einen Preis ab 600 US-Dollar für das komplette System an.
HP has released a number of virtual reality (VR) solutions for both home consumers and enterprise alike. From its Windows Mixed Reality (WMR) headset to the backpack PC’s which are great for free-roaming experiences in VR arcades. HP latest WMR headset is the Reverb which was due to arrive last month, now the company has given an official launch date; next Monday 6th May.
HP has updated the listing for the Pro Edition on its US website with the new date, but there’s no listing for the consumer version, retailing for $649.00 USD and $599.00 respectively. Likewise, the UK site doesn’t have details for either headset, so this could be a US-only launch, to begin with.
When it comes to the differences between the two models the actual headsets are exactly the same. They both feature an improved resolution over HP’s original WMR headset, from 1440 x 1440 to 2160 x 2160 per eye. Plus the field of view (FoV) is also slightly wider at 114-degrees. Adjustable and removable headphones with built-in spatial audio are now part of the package and dual-mics aid communication. There are the usual adjustable straps on the sides and top with a large circular padded section at the back for comfort. Returning is the inside-out tracking which makes setting up the device a lot easier than those using external sensors.
The HP Reverb Pro Edition also comes with a leather faceplate which can be easily removed and cleaned when in use by multiple people, a .6m headset cable for HP Z VR Backpack wearable VR PC (sold separately) and a 1-year limited commercial warranty.
With all the announcements this week regarding VR hardware the HP Reverb has certainly put itself right in the middle of the pack. When looking at its direct, tethered headset competitors, there’s the Oculus Rift S due for release this month at $399 which also features inside-out tracking, of at the top of the pile is Valve Index which retails for $999/£919 for the full kit.
There’s certainly no shortage of choice when it comes to VR headsets in 2019. VRFocus will continue its coverage of HP Reverb, reporting back with any further updates.
If you’ve been paying attention to the VR space at all in 2019, you’ve likely noticed the increasing buzz, no doubt thanks to four major VR headsets set to launch over the course of the next few months. Here’s the quick breakdown of what we know.
Oculus Quest
Image courtesy Oculus
What is it?
Quest is Oculus’ first standalone VR headset that includes 6DOF tracking on the headset and controllers. That means the movements of your head and hands are tracked in all directions, just like you’d expect on a high-end VR headset, except Quest doesn’t rely on an external PC or trackers—everything is built right in.
This is similar to Oculus Go, except that Go only tracks rotation of the head and hands, which means it can only offer static, seated VR experiences. With full 6DOF tracking, Quest will run some of VR’s best games, like Beat Saber, Superhot VR, Job Simulator, Moss, Robo Recall, and more.
Because it have the power of a beefy PC, you can expect graphics to have a decidedly ‘mobile’ feel, but nevertheless it’s very possible to get lost in VR on Quest, even if the graphics are far from what you’d see on a PC VR headset.
Who is it For?
Quest is made for gaming, and most apt for the VR user who isn’t willing to invest in a gaming PC that has enough power to run a PC VR headset. Quest can only run Quest-specific content available on Oculus store (Oculus Rift and Oculus Go also have their own separate content libraries).
Given that it is totally standalone, it’s also portable which makes it a great choice for someone who wants the ability to take it from place to place and share the fun with friends.
It’s also likely to be the lowest point of entry for anyone who just wants to be able to play Beat Saber (which has been confirmed as a launch title) for fun or exercise, and it is very likely to be great for that purpose.
When is it Coming Out and How Much?
Oculus says Quest will launch this Spring, but hasn’t offered a more specific release date. With Facebook’s annual developer conference coming up at the end of the month, we’re expecting to see the company either launch the headset at the event outright, or provide a final launch date.
Rift S is Oculus’ second PC VR headset, and the company is positioning it as an easier to use version of Rift, with a few upgrades. The biggest change is that the headset now uses an on-board tracking system which means the external cameras required by the original Rift are not longer necessary. That change will reduce the complexity of setup and the friction of use compared to the original Rift.
Another upgrade over the original Rift S is a new display with a higher resolution which will make graphics sharper and reduce the ‘screen door effect’ (the unlit spaces between pixels), which will make for a step up in clarity. The change in display does come with two downsides though: the move to an LCD display means that darker scenes will look more washed out than with the original Rift, and the headset loses the ability to adjust the distance between lenses (also known as IPD), which reduces the range of users who will fit within its suggested eye-range; you can read more about the supported Rift S IPD range here.
Who is it For?
Rift S is a gaming focused headset that’s best for someone who has or is willing to invest in a gaming PC to get access to the great looking (and playing) content in VR. Rift S can play games from the Oculus Store and SteamVR, which gives players a wide range of options. And, being powered by a PC, graphics are going to be a big step up from any non-PC powered headsets out there like Quest or PSVR. With on-board tracking, it’ll also be easier to setup than headsets which rely on external tracking.
When is it Coming Out and How Much?
Just like Quest, Oculus is only being as specific as “Spring” for the Rift S release date, be we expect that the headset could launch at Facebook’s upcoming developer conference at the end of the month, or at a minimum that we’ll get a specific launch date for Rift S.
HP’s Reverb headset is the company’s second PC VR headset which runs Microsoft’s ‘Windows Mixed Reality’ platform, and can also play SteamVR content through an official plugin. Like Rift S, Reverb uses on-board tracking and doesn’t rely on external sensors for tracking.
The biggest upgrades that Reverb bring to the table are an all new design which offers over-ear headphones, as well as new displays which offer a big jump in resolution compared to pretty much any other headset on the horizon.
Who is it for?
HP is positioning Reverb as a professional and enterprise focused headset, but will also sell directly to consumers. Reverb can play VR content from the Windows Mixed Reality store and SteamVR.
With a leading resolution, Reverb seems like it could be a great choice for sim enthusiasts who already have a gaming PC and are looking for maximum clarity. However, because Reverb uses an LCD display, those looking to play space simulators like Elite Dangerous might not like the washed out dark colors compared to a headset with OLED displays.
Because Reverb’s on-board tracking uses just two cameras, its controller tracking coverage isn’t as reliable as Quest or Rift S, which means it might not work as well for certain games which demand maximum reliability, but most content will work just fine.
When is it Coming Out and How Much?
HP says that the Reverb release date is late April, but hasn’t offered a more specific launch date just yet. Considering it’s already the 22nd, we expect to be hearing more very soon!
HP has confirmed that Reverb will cost $600 for the consumer edition and $650 for a professional edition for enterprise use.
Although Valve contributed significant R&D to the HTC Vive, the company’s upcoming Index will be the first PC VR headset made and sold by Valve. Though only limited information is available so far, it seems that Valve is positioning Index as a flagship headset for SteamVR, and it’s thought that the company could announce a least one first-party game to launch with the headset, but we’ll have to wait and see. The headset will launch with the ‘Knuckles’ controllers which Valve has had in the works for many years now (though they plan to call them ‘Valve Index controllers’ moving forward).
Much is still unknown about Index—even the basics like resolution, field of view, and price. While it’s almost certain that Index will use SteamVR Tracking (the same external tracking tech used by the HTC Vive), it’s possible that the headset could offer some form of on-board tracking (considering the cameras seen on the headset), but that’s still entirely up in the air.
Who is it for?
Because there’s still a lot of question marks surrounding Index, it’s hard to know who it will be best for just yet. Our best guess is that Index will be positioned toward existing PC VR enthusiasts, and those looking for a high-end VR experience who are willing to put up with mounting external trackers in their VR space. We’ll be able to refine our expectations soon enough as pre-orders for the headset will be open soon and by then much more ought to be revealed.
Valve Index can play content from SteamVR. For those not worried about using an unofficial workaround, it will also likely play content from the Oculus Store (via Revive), albeit with some caveats.
When is it Coming Out and How Much?
Valve has confirmed that Index pre-orders will begin May 1st, and by the time that happens we expect to get some essential details about the headset. The actual Index release date is set for sometime in June, though a specific date has not been confirmed. The price of Index is still unknown.
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Got more questions? We’ve got more answers. Drop us a line in the comments below!
Another exhibitor that has grown its investment into VR since our 2018 coverage was Redbox VR – providing a versatile and robust solution for schools to be able to field VR for education. Redbox VR has also partnered with the leading providers of VR based educational content. Fielding not only its own mobileVR powered headset but also working with the latest developments including from Pico.
