
Oculus Rift is Shipping - SXX
https://www.oculus.com/en-us/blog/oculus-rift-is-shipping/
======
bronz
Well, in accordance with tradition I will now lay my thoughts down and be
down-voted into oblivion for it. _VR will flounder._ I was a VR evangelist
from 2012 to around 2014. I owned a DK2 -- I followed every shred of VR news
like a fanatic. And what I learned from being so involved with VR was that it
is not ready for mass adoption and probably never will be. People in the VR
community drastically underplay nausea and discomfort. The main flaw is that
if you move in the virtual world but not in the real world, your body does not
like it. Thanks to head tracking, you can move the camera wherever you can
move your head without sickness because the movement in the real world and
virtual world are the same. But if you want to move around in any greater
capacity than that without making 50% of people sick immediately, and perhaps
80% sick after just a few hours, then you have to do full body tracking. We
are talking about 3/4 of games, easily. Games where you are a character and
you run around in virtual space.

Even if you do full body tracking in your home, you are going to be extremely
limited. You'll be running into the boundaries of your play space constantly.
Those tricks of perception that allow you to walk along a curve instead of a
straight line and thus never hit a boundary require very large amounts of
space, especially if it is done in a way that is not detectable at all by the
user. "What about omni-directional treadmills?" At this point I think we are
getting crazy. Not only are you buying a hugely expensive VR headset, but you
are setting aside a huge space in your home and buying a fucking gigantic
omni-directional treadmill. Plus, the treadmill also does not provide the
bodily acceleration required to prevent sickness because you are stationary
relative to the earth while you use it.

And all of this is assuming that VR headsets reach a place where we have full
FOV, perfect resolution and extremely high refresh rates. And VR headsets that
have all of that will never be affordable unless they become popular. And they
probably won't because of the reasons that I have just explained to you.

The one thing that I think has the potential to make VR popular is monitor
replacement. Other than that, when I look at the future of this kind of
technology I see AR. Not VR. I am sorry Rift fans, it was painful for me too.

~~~
coldpie
> Well, in accordance with tradition I will now lay my thoughts down and be
> down-voted into oblivion for it.

I downvoted you because of your snooty "ugh, I'm going to be downvoted just
for posting my opinions" crap. Either post your comment and join the
discussion or don't. Don't beg for upvotes.

~~~
Bjartr
It's a small distinction but I think he's actually saying don't downvote if
you disagree, not asking for upvotes.

For another point of view, I personally appreciate the heads up that the
opinion being voiced is believed to be unpopular so I can be careful to ensure
conclusions I draw are informed ones since there are a variety of easy to make
fallacies associated with unintentional groupthink.

~~~
Mahn
I also read it that way, but _" What I'm about to say will be controversial,
but bear with me for a second..."_ is probably a better alternative.

~~~
blisse
I think nowadays all the different types of disclaimers are all the same, and
how receptive audiences are just depends on whether the audience read
something similar or not 10 pages ago. It's weird.

------
kensai
I am honestly thrilled about VR. But it makes me wonder, if people are excited
about the possibilities of VR, let's just wait for AR to mature and have
things like Meta 2 ([http://www.roadtovr.com/meta-2-development-kit-hands-on-
coul...](http://www.roadtovr.com/meta-2-development-kit-hands-on-could-do-for-
augmented-reality-what-oculus-rift-dk1-did-for-virtual-reality/)) or HoloLens
([http://research.microsoft.com/en-
us/projects/holoportation/](http://research.microsoft.com/en-
us/projects/holoportation/)) really working as advertised.

I feel that AR has even more applications than VR, although honestly when both
will be sufficiently advanced they will merge. VR will eventually be AR with
the external (world) "signal" turned off.

~~~
recursive
> AR with the external (world) "signal" turned off.

That's a big step. How are you going to avoid running into stuff?

~~~
milesokeefe
The Vive has already solved that problem with its chaperone system[1].

[1]: [http://www.engadget.com/2016/01/05/htc-vive-virtual-
reality-...](http://www.engadget.com/2016/01/05/htc-vive-virtual-reality-
chaperone/)

------
ArtDev
I would buy one just so I could have virtually unlimited monitors for work:
[http://store.steampowered.com/app/382110/](http://store.steampowered.com/app/382110/)

~~~
TillE
I thought about that, but if you do the math the resolution is far too low.
Maybe after a few generations it'll be a viable replacement for a multi-
monitor setup.

~~~
kbenson
That's what zoom in/out is for.

But really, per-monitor is too limiting. This really screams for a window
manager that is aware of the display medium, and allows stashing of windows in
a virtual desktop space. In a way, old Linux/BSD window managers like TWM and
FVWM with their ability to have unconstrained (or very large) desktop spaces
that you can move the viewport around is the paradigm we might want (with the
addition of zoom).

~~~
guelo
The point is that since the Rift's 2160 x 1200 screen is so close to your face
the pixels are further apart in your field of view. You're very far from
Retina levels of smoothness. Small details, such as small text, will always
look grainy.

~~~
azernik
Possibly the sheer real estate available could compensate. I wouldn't use it
for e.g. graphic design or the visual parts of web work, but grainy terminal
text or web content could be made more legible by just using more of the field
of view and blowing everything up by 2x or so.

~~~
guelo
If you make the text big then you'll always be moving your head around, which
is slower and more tiring than just moving your eyeballs. It's like sitting
too close at a movie theater.

------
hartator
Still no updates concerning the touch controllers.

VR is awesome to use and I've played a lot in it, but you need specific
controllers to take fully advantage of it. IMHO, VR paint is still the best
experience you can have, you need more than a xbox one controller to enjoy it
though.

~~~
mklim
Seconded. I've been lucky enough to try the Vive Pre with the Trials of
Tatooine demo, Rift Crescent Bay + Xbox controller on a seated experience, and
Rift + Touch on a standing experience. Vive was far and away the most
compelling for me. I don't know how to describe it other than being dropped
into a fictional world. Being able to walk around R2D2, kneel and examine the
landing strut of the Falcon, having to physically lunge forward a few feet to
deflect a blaster bolt with my lightsaber, actually gripping said lightsaber
hilt in my hand and being able to bring it up to my face and inspect it, it
really felt like I was there. My only major complaint is that I couldn't stop
grinning/laughing, and that pushed the headset up on my face enough to leak in
light. Just having a headset and a controller does not at all compare, even
with the limited walking space. It's the difference between looking through a
porthole and scuba diving.

~~~
coldpie
What did you find more compelling about the Vive than the Rift+Touch?

~~~
mklim
Disclaimer: I'm definitely onboard with motion controllers in general, and
would hesitate to definitively say that Vive > Rift+Touch without trying more
things for both of them (that being said, I cancelled my Rift preorder and do
have a Vive on hold right now). The subject matter of the Star Wars demo was
much more compelling than the Rift+Touch demo I tried, which I'm sure
influenced me subconsciously. But the main things that I consciously noted
during both experiences:

1\. Better tracking in the Vive. I dropped an arrow on the ground in the Touch
demo (a longbow shooting game) and the controllers lost track of my hands when
I crouched on the floor to grab it. It was really disorienting to be
"grabbing" it and have the game have no idea where my hands were, sort of like
when you're in a dream where your body just refuses to move how you tell it
to. I had to just give it up and stand, wait for my "hands" to adjust to the
right position, and then reach for another one at eye level. Similarly, I kept
having to reach a little farther than I was expecting to to actually pick
anything up despite being able to see my "hands" in the game. It was like all
the distances were just a little off from reality. I'm a lot shorter than the
average person (5'), I don't know if that contributed or what. In the Vive
demo the controllers always felt 100% 1:1, even when I was whipping the
lightsaber around, crouching on the ground examining R2, etc. Tracking did not
even surface as a concern at all to me there, felt exactly like my body.

2\. Freedom of movement in the Vive demo really made me feel like I was in the
world. I could easily walk around, kneel, stand, and was encouraged by the
experience to lunge and flail around, like I said. It felt like I was there in
the desert 100%, free to do whatever I wanted. I did trigger the transparent
Chaperone grid, and felt a little annoyed when it happened, but I trusted the
grid to save me from hitting a wall, and the demo's layout encouraged my
movement well enough that most of the time I forgot that I couldn't run off
into the sunset if I really wanted to. Most of the interesting things were
within six feet of me so in general I forgot about the limitation and just
felt like I was there. In the Rift demo I felt very constrained and was
concerned about hitting anything IRL. It was a longbow shooting game, with me
stuck between two parapets. IRL there was a TV displaying what I was doing for
the benefit of the people behind me in line. It was positioned in the space
between parapets in the game world, and I was super concerned about
headbutting it accidentally as I leaned forward to try and see over the wall.
No Chaperone, so even though I was trying to be careful I almost did hit it
and the woman giving the demo warned me to step back. In the game there was
also a bow rack right next to me, and I felt nervous about tipping it over,
too (this is silly, as it's not real--just goes to show how immersive the
experience was).

------
jhspaybar
"If you pre-ordered, you’ll get an email when your order is being prepped (1-3
weeks prior to shipping) and then another one when your payment method has
been charged and your Rift is on its way."

I ordered mine about 5 minutes after the order form opened on the first day of
availability but haven't yet received this email, nor has my card been
charged. At the time of order my ship date was still March...is this slipping
now?

~~~
berberous
Check your spam folder or promotions tab. If you ordered within 5 minutes you
almost certainly got the "1-3 weeks" email. Based on recent tweets from
Palmer, the first pre-orders are targeted to start shipping Wednesday, so I
assume cards will start getting charged by Tuesday or Wednesday.

~~~
jhspaybar
I went through their forums, I have an order number of 26xxxxx, apparently
some people in this range have received the emails, but most haven't from the
looks of it. Oh well, I guess I'll get it in a couple weeks :(

~~~
Cyph0n
Are the order numbers serial? They can't have received 2.6 mil orders, right?
:O

~~~
Terribledactyl
Some interesting reading on this sort of thing

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_tank_problem](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/German_tank_problem)

------
rm999
My biased opinion: VR is going to be huge, but it won't look that way for at
least a few years while things mature (especially when 90% of the content is
just improving games that could have existed on a 2D monitor).

Just off the top of my head, it has the potential to disrupt:

* Television and movies. Imagine an Imax theater in your house. VR is really the obvious solution here IMO. We just need to give it a few years while the screen resolution ramps up.

* The office. Obvious one - virtual desktops. Less obvious - remote working. This hasn't worked as promised yet, I suspect because remote interactions aren't immersive and interactive enough. Skype calls are ok, but I'd love to just stand up and "draw" something on a virtual board with other people. I can see VR making this much more possible.

~~~
greggman
The iMax theater in my house isn't a draw for me. Things I do currently
watching a movie that I can't do in VR

* Grab my snacks on the table in front of me (can't see them in VR)

* Take a drink (headset gets in the way of putting a half full class to your lips and drinking)

* Interact with friends and family also watching at the same time

~~~
flashman
> Interact with friends and family also watching at the same time

A virtual cinema will let you do this with them, wherever they are. Once
Netflix launches a VR app, they'll take care of the movie delivery and
syncing, so you'll just pop on a headset and be sitting next to your Dad who's
on the opposite coast. Hell, I can see that being a killer app for ESPN.

~~~
greggman
Not unless they add cameras looking at your lips and eyes. Just being able to
see a body with a head in VR is not the same as sitting next to my dad who's
facial expression I can see.

------
foobarbecue
I work with pointclouds using active shutter glasses on an ASUS pg278q, which
is gorgeous 3D at 2560x1440. I tried one of these and I found it a
disappointing experience. I could see all of the pixels, and I didn't like
having a thing on my head. VirtualBoy all over again.

~~~
josephpmay
Was this DK1, DK2, CV1, or one of the internal prototypes. Because the
experience of using the later ones vastly exceeds DK1 & 2\. Also, you have to
be doing the right experience. Many things suck in VR, but the right one (like
TiltBrush or The Walk) is mindblowing

~~~
robterrell
I've tried the final hardware and thought the pixels were fine, but the
engineer next to me (15 years my junior, with eyesight to match) thought the
pixels were unacceptable. I think it'll be another hardware generation before
everyone agrees the pixel size issue has been put to rest.

~~~
foobarbecue
Yes.. I can generally read smaller and further print than others around me. I
can also see the pixels on that 2560 x 1440 monitor, but for me the difference
with the Rift was that I felt like I could see the dark spaces between the
pixels... felt like looking through a window screen. I did just get my first
4K monitor though and it's the first time I don't see pixels when I'm working.
It's lovely.

~~~
gfodor
If you were using a DK1 or a DK2 that's not really comparable to the consumer
Rift. One of the downsides of Oculus mass producing dev kits is many people
assume the dev kits were "the Oculus Rift", but the Oculus Rift actually just
came out today and is a totally different beast.

------
krick
It was a hot topic a couple of years ago, when Oculus just started, but now
when VR devices are everywhere (starting with simple cardboard and on to
something more sophisticated) it's not really the time to be "selling a
dream", is it? The real question is how exactly is it different from the
competing products, and I'm not sure I've heard the answer. To be more exact,
what exactly justifies a huge gap in prices between Oculus and something more,
uh, Chinese.

~~~
nilkn
I don't think Cardboard even really counts as a competitor. Its head tracking
is extremely primitive and basically non-functional with severe drift, frame
rates are bad, games are overwhelmingly simplistic, etc.

~~~
pen2l
Just curious, how does a Gear VR setup (with galaxy 7) compare with Cardboard?
Does /that/ count as a competitor?

~~~
nilkn
I suspect the Gear VR is a lot more comparable to the current Rift without
Touch controls. After all, I believe many of the Rift launch titles are
actually Gear VR ports (but of course not the high profile ones like Lucky's
Tale, Eve: Valkyrie, Chronos, etc.).

That said, there are still major differences. The Rift for instance has _much_
better tracking thanks to its external camera. The camera allows drift to be
corrected constantly and also allows positional tracking of the headset
throughout a room. There's little reason to take advantage of that latter
ability right now without the Touch controllers, though.

Thanks to modern smartphone displays, the Rift will not actually be higher
resolution. However, I expect it'd have less pronounced screen-door-effect
(SDE). And of course, being powered by a high-end PC, it will be able to play
games like those I mentioned above that a smartphone just can't power.

The bottom line is that I think right now the most compelling VR experiences
by far involve motion controllers, and those are only available on the Vive. I
think the Rift will become a much more interesting device later this year when
it gets its own set of controllers.

------
baby
I want it (an HTC vive actually but it doesn't change the point of my
comment), but my big problem is the price.

The thing is almost $1k (we still don't know the price for Oculus Touch), then
you need to add the desktop that can run games on it, so let's say $2k now.
Then since I had laptops for years now I need to buy a monitor, a keyboard, a
mouse, etc... That adds up.

I wonder how much I need to pour into the setup to be able to run VR.

~~~
meemoo
PS4 VR full setup looks like ~$850.

If it were an open dev platform I'd be considering it.

~~~
djhworld
The advantage the PS4VR headset has is you don't have to buy or upgrade
anything if you already own a PS4, you just need the headset, camera and
(optional) move controllers.

------
balls187
Congrats to the Rift team. Shipping is a huge milestone!

~~~
simplemath
This really is a big day.

Consumer VR interface?

Man, it's cool living in the future.

------
ChuckMcM
Farlands looks a bit like "Spore for Rift" :-) I am glad to see they are
shipping. And it definitely provides an example of a project I didn't think
they would be able to ship from Kickstarter being shipped. Congrats to the
Rift team!

------
fsloth
I think VR would be marvelous in bringing classical entertainment - opera,
theatre - available to all.

Call me silly but for me the most effective uses of 3D in movies have been
single actor static shots where the 3D has emphasized their performance to
lifelike qualities.

~~~
wrsh07
VR could be a great new way to enjoy a whole bunch more than "high brow"
entertainment, too.

Everyone could see what it's like having "front row" seats at a basketball
game. Or hovering above the action.

Player perspectives and other "moving camera" tricks might not work, but
that's not how we currently enjoy a lot of live experiences anyway.

I'm also unbelievably excited to see what the geniuses at Disney / other major
entertainment studios can accomplish. [NB I don't just think Disney will excel
here, but if you don't find Disney World magical...]

~~~
flashman
> Everyone could see what it's like having "front row" seats at a basketball
> game.

More realistically, you'll get nosebleed seats on a basic subscription, and
courtside if you pay a premium. I don't see why businesses wouldn't apply
typical pricing arrangements to VR, even if there's no scarcity involved.

~~~
wrsh07
While there's always an enticing option to make more money, I don't think it
makes sense in this scenario: your cynicism seems unwarranted.

For one, that doesn't match up with current media [you don't generally pay for
better camera angles, you just pay to see the game].

For two, it's most likely going to be somewhat expensive [in space and
technology] to set up a VR recording rig [see g.co/jump for a baseline].

Finally, media always capitalizes on advertising. "Sitting" in the front row
seats doesn't mean you won't have ads during breaks, and they'll be even more
convincing/all-consuming in VR land. [as a post from a16z says, in VR, your
default state is belief.]

------
STRML
Just got mine in the mail from the kickstarter promotion. Really cool thing
that they sent this to all the DK1 buyers.

First impressions are that it's certainly far more professional-looking and
refined than the DK1, but that goes without saying. Clearly the QA guys have
done well, the Oculus setup app is really nice and it appears they're trying
to build a Steam clone of sorts.

A bit delayed finding the latest NV drivers - "Geforce Experience" is a dog
that takes 10 minutes to do anything (seriously, how did this pass QA?), and
the main nvidia.com site just forwards to a broken akamai link on download.
Ended up having to grab it from a guru3d link.

~~~
haldean
Do all DK1 owners get them? I have a DK1 but haven't heard anything about
getting one from this release.

~~~
MrRadar
Only if you backed the Kickstarter. If you bought it after the Kickstarter
ended you don't get a free Rift.

------
shmerl
Any ETA on Linux support?

~~~
exelius
Given that Linux gaming is perpetually 3-5 years behind Windows/console
gaming, I'd say 3-5 years is probably a good bet for it running in any sort of
usable capacity (i.e. more than a tech demo someone reverse engineered to
prove it's possible).

Before you down vote; I'm really not being snarky here -- games on Windows
typically run 30-40% faster on the same hardware than they do on Linux [1]
because there just isn't the market there to make it worth doing the
optimization.

[1] [http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2015/11/ars-benchmarks-show-
si...](http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2015/11/ars-benchmarks-show-significant-
performance-hit-for-steamos-gaming/)

~~~
shmerl
_> games on Windows typically run 30-40% faster on the same hardware than they
do on Linux_

Typically many game developers have no clue about Linux programming either. So
poor performance doesn't surprise me. When developers know what they are
doing, performance is good (example:
[http://knockoutgames.co](http://knockoutgames.co)).

Also, OpenGL is a major mess for several reasons (barely compatible
implementations not complying to the standard and so on).

Now there is Vulkan however, so VR developers should have easier time with it.

~~~
exelius
> Typically many game developers have no clue about Linux programming either.
> So poor performance doesn't surprise me.

But ultimately, this is a weakness of the Linux platform.

Most games today are cross-platform, so there is a core set of assets and code
that has to remain the same across every platform to ensure the game plays the
same way. This means that (for right now, anyway - Vulkan was designed to help
with this situation) most hardware-specific workarounds/optimizations have to
be done in the drivers -- and there are LOTS of them. Game-specific things
like "run this shader code, but this model of card has graphical bugs when
features x, y and z are active together so stealth disable feature x" or "this
card supports this transform algorithm but its output is inconsistent with the
version we developed it with, so disable it for this hardware" happen at the
driver level. Same thing happens on consoles, but they usually have more
direct control over the hardware so console developers have gotten used to
this type of driver optimization.

This optimization doesn't happen on Linux (or Mac for that matter), so any
games that get ported are just unoptimized.

~~~
geofft
Wouldn't that happen if you're running the proprietary drivers? I thought in
general the proprietary drivers are built from the same core codebase across
multiple platforms -- once you've gotten past the WGL, GLX, etc. bindings, and
you have some system call for getting data to and from the card, the rest of
the driver should be basically the same across platforms.

And similarly the games themselves are the same across platforms, apart from
their end of the WGL or GLX or whatever bindings. So anything in the driver
that says `if (!strcmp(name, "Portal 2"))` is going to be equally applicable
regardless of whether it's a Portal 2 compiled for Windows, Mac, or Linux.

It's certainly a weakness of the all-free-software subset of the Linux
platform (at least on Nvidia or AMD), but that's not the only option.

~~~
SXX
Overall i'm not agree with statement, but what he was talking about is that
Windows drivers have tons of hacks to optimize certain D3D code paths that
used by most games and sometimes even fully replace whole shaders with GPU
vendor one.

~~~
geofft
Why wouldn't those hacks happen on Linux? I guess the reason is that they're
specific to Direct3D and not OpenGL, but for those games that do OpenGL on
Windows (which I think is somewhat common), wouldn't the same hacks be present
in the Linux OpenGL drivers as the Windows OpenGL ones?

~~~
warkid
They present on Windows because gpu (driver) vendors choose spend tons of
their money to make them happen. And they spend their money exactly why?
Because they see their profit in Windows pc market.

~~~
shmerl
Intel, AMD and Nvidia work on Linux Vulkan support as well. They aren't tied
to Windows.

~~~
exelius
I would argue that Linux Vulkan support from Intel/AMD/NVidia is likely aimed
more at Android than traditional Linux desktop distros.

Also, the whole point of Vulkan is to move these card-specific optimizations
outside of the core driver while still letting games use kernel space to
interface directly with the hardware (and doubtless platform vendors will put
an abstraction layer on top of that like Metal on iOS). So the whole situation
I'm describing has been a huge pain for a long time, but things are starting
to get better.

------
jmandzik
Kickstarter back here; according to UPS, it should be delivered today.

------
willholloway
I'm really excited for VR, but I think what we need is a larger field of view
to feel truly immersed. I'm anticipating StarVR and other higher FOV systems.

When those drop, I predict VR will really take off, and people will start
spending large amounts of time in virtual reality.

[http://www.roadtovr.com/wp-
content/uploads/2015/06/techspec-...](http://www.roadtovr.com/wp-
content/uploads/2015/06/techspec-slider2alt-672x500.png)

------
kleer001
I think it will be great for education and remote work. And that's about it.

Education, scholarly or vocational. You could see the lines of force or the
right kind of widget.

If there's some good actuators and video stream thick bandwidth then you can
get experts to work out in the sticks bringing medicine or education (see
above). Imagine working on simulated patients that react far better than a
donated corpse.

Heck, it might even be good for treating PTSD or other psychological
treatments.

------
chrisacky
It says they ship to 20 countries. Any ideas what that list is?

"This item does not ship to XXXXXX, United Kingdom. Please check other sellers
who may ship internationally. "

~~~
emilssolmanis
UK is definitely one of them, and there's a support page listing them.
Preordered mine within some 20 mins of it opening and no problem shipping to a
London address.

------
toephu2
Interesting that there is no mention of the weight of the headset. Has anyone
used the Rift for more than an hour straight? Is there head/neck fatigue?

~~~
ssewell
I've used my DK2 for hours on end (perhaps to the tune of three hours or so?
You lose track of time playing in VR.) will no noticeable neck fatigue. Some
of the best times I've had is driving around Europe in Euro Truck Sim with my
force feedback steering wheel.

~~~
flashman
One of my least favourite parts of Euro Truck Sim 2 is the difficulty of
glancing left and right at a T-intersection. Far too often the game spawns a
vehicle in the direction you just checked, and then you have a collision once
you pull out. Quick head checks in goggles sounds like a big improvement, as
well as the feeling of being inside an actual cabin.

------
mark_l_watson
Haptics makes VR real. In the 1990s I did VR systems for SAIC and later one
also for Disney. At SAIC we had effective force feedback (haptics) and the
effect was awesome.

------
kensai
We even have an Angry Joe review... :D

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87IJU1AtcAw](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=87IJU1AtcAw)

------
middleclick
> shipping to more than 20 countries and regions!

It would have been good had they listed the countries they ship to. I can't
seem to find the information anywhere.

~~~
MrRadar
The best I can find is this support ticket[0] (Google Cache[1] since it's
current redirecting me to a login page) linked from the initial pre-order
announcement[2]. The countries are:

* Austria (available as of February 2016) * Australia * Belgium * Canada * Denmark * Finland * France * Germany * Iceland * Ireland * Italy * Japan * Netherlands * New Zealand * Norway * Poland * Spain * Sweden * Switzerland (available as of February 2016) * Taiwan * United Kingdom * United States

[0]: [https://support.oculus.com/hc/en-
us/articles/216091397-Initi...](https://support.oculus.com/hc/en-
us/articles/216091397-Initial-Launch-Countries)

[1]:
[https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:Igifjz...](https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:IgifjzdwezcJ:https://support.oculus.com/hc/en-
us/articles/216091397-Initial-Launch-Countries-and-
Regions+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us)

[2]: [https://www.oculus.com/en-us/blog/oculus-rift-pre-orders-
now...](https://www.oculus.com/en-us/blog/oculus-rift-pre-orders-now-open-
first-shipments-march-28/)

------
albasha
I wonder how this device affects the eyes health. We have been taught to to
stay to close to electronics and this is... right in the face!

~~~
alexbock
The lenses project the image plane such that your eyes focus as if they were
looking at an object about a meter away. It doesn't cause the kind of eye
strain you would get from trying to focus on something an inch in front of
your face; most people's eyes can't focus that closely to begin with.

~~~
xigency
It does cause the kind of strain that looking into a light bulb might cause,
not considering the focal point. But this is probably similar to using a
desktop monitor.

------
atarian
I got a chance to try out the Gear VR last week, and I was pretty sold on the
whole VR thing. But I was really disappointed to find out the Rift required a
$1000+ dedicated gaming rig to support it. IMO if Oculus Rift wants to really
take off they need to figure out how to become a standalone piece of hardware.

------
EugeneOZ
Is it MS only or can be used with PS4?

~~~
TranquilMarmot
Windows only, PS4 will eventually have its own proprietary virtual reality
setup.

------
mattjwarren
Vr will founder, but i think it will be due to augmented reality stepping into
its shoes and taking over before vr really got a chance. AR can do everything
vr can, and more.

------
throwanem
*(in June)

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fnazeeri
This makes sense as I installed Booking.com's app about the same time as I
upgraded and now I have a brick-phone...

------
jeremy7600
I still have a VFX1 from the 90s. It's now rotting in my basement. This will
go the same route.

(Forte Technologies VFX1, for those playing along at home.)

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chenster
VR makes me sick and nausea.

------
sillysaurus3
Never mind.

~~~
spicyj
What does Project Update #83 say?

And based on
[https://forums.oculus.com/community/discussion/comment/34760...](https://forums.oculus.com/community/discussion/comment/347607/#Comment_347607),
you're out of luck. :(

------
dzaragozar
Hooray! now 6 more months until the "VR flopped" articles and then no more
about this nonsense.

------
xfactor973
Windows 7 and above only? Ugh..

~~~
freeone3000
Windows 7 introduced the DX11 rendering pipeline, which the Rift uses. It's
essentially required for no-delay rendering. (Which is even easier with DX12 -
be glad it's not Windows 10 and up!)

~~~
thearn4
Is OpenGL really that far behind the curve now? I remember a long time ago it
performed much better for me on some games (I'm talking Half Life 1 days
here), but in the 15 or so years since then its pretty much fallen off of my
radar.

~~~
SXX
> Is OpenGL really that far behind the curve now?

Not at all, but it's not what was popular last 10 years for many reasons and
with Vulkan it's already legacy API.

~~~
cookiecaper
My understanding is that Vulkan does NOT deprecate OpenGL, at least not for
most use cases. Vulkan is a lower-level API that OpenGL can be implemented on
top of, much like Gallium3D. As such, much development will continue in OGL,
and only lower-level tuning will require the use of Vulkan.

Here's a lengthier discussion about it:
[https://forums.khronos.org/showthread.php/9717-Will-
Vulkan-e...](https://forums.khronos.org/showthread.php/9717-Will-Vulkan-
effectively-quot-replace-quot-OpenGL-or-not)

~~~
TillE
> Vulkan is a lower-level API that OpenGL can be implemented on top of

Well you _could_ do that, but the higher-level graphics APIs use fundamentally
different abstractions which need to be awkwardly translated into a format
that the GPU expects.

If you put an OpenGL wrapper on top of Vulkan, you lose most of the
performance benefits.

------
praveenhm
I never wore one, don't you get a headache, after wearing it couple of hours
and also the gadget is heavy.

~~~
whatever_dude
The gadget is not that heavy, and the little weight that it has is well
distributed.

You don't get a headache, but depending on what kind of content you're
playing, you can get nausea due to conflicting sensations in your body (your
eye thinks you're moving, your body doesn't feel it, etc). Some people get it
more than others. It's similar to being in a boat.

But you can get used to it fast, and again, it depends on content.

------
fallingfrog
I love the technology behind it. But it's going to bomb.

Here's why: Look at any picture of a person using the Oculus Rift. How does it
make you feel? To me, the feeling I get is one of creeping anxiety and future
shock. It looks like that person is withdrawn, isolated, sucked into a private
world that we cannot access. And vulnerable too; unaware of their
surroundings. If you want people to part with their money you have to make
them feel engaged, optimistic and so forth. It's gonna bomb.

~~~
SXX
> It looks like that person is withdrawn, isolated, sucked into a private
> world that we cannot access.

If only there was global network where we can participate isolated communities
while most of people around us don't understand why we sucked into that so
much... oh...

~~~
flashman
tbh that's what most people look like when using their phones

