Fool me, this is real good shit ! [the VR thread]

[Yak]

I have the nearly final software for the Gear VR now and it's looking pretty awesome. The cinema app is particularly nice, allowing you to watch films in 4 different "rooms", one like a big cinema, one like a rich person's private cinema, one on the moon and one just in void. It actually looks great and I can imagine I will want to actually sit and watch some films in VR.

There's a handful of games up on the closed beta (mine is one of them) and one thing that's apparent is that there is a definite advantage in developers being able to work to a known spec - all the games I've tried so far have perfect framerate and no lag, very nice. Also some of them seem to be made with the assumption that you'll be playing them on a spinny chair - as there are no trailing wires to get caught up in a spinny chair makes a surprisingly effective motion platform. There's a space battle one that's great fun as you spin round blowing crap up. I think because you are physically orienting yourself there's no nausea despite your turning round a lot during play.

The 3D video and panorama stuff looks like it'll be interesting too when more content arrives. I'm hoping that one day they'll put a VR cam up on the ISS. I'd love to be able one day to skin up, put on some Floyd and spend an hour or so looking down at Earth and around at space .

If I had a Note 4 I'd definitely think it was worth the investment to try the Gear VR going by what I've seen so far. Promising!

[gilesgoat]

@Dio : ask one of your Italian colleagues ( I think you have one ) about how it works in Italy about business and payments and/or if he has a vague idea about "how people pay - better to say NOT pay - for things in Italy" ..

Our chief architect for DX11 is Italian, we've had some conversations along those lines. I think he finds California relatively sane .

.. well .. yes .. compared to Italy probably ...

.. tell him never to come back, things are just getting worse and worse ..

[Soluzar]

If I had a Note 4 I'd definitely think it was worth the investment to try the Gear VR going by what I've seen so far. Promising!

I just changed my phone, definitely played with the idea of getting a Note 4 for this very reason. In the end I decided that the large increase in my monthly bill would not be worth it. I'll have to be happy with the Oculus.

[gilesgoat]

If I had a Note 4 I'd definitely think it was worth the investment to try the Gear VR going by what I've seen so far. Promising!

I just changed my phone, definitely played with the idea of getting a Note 4 for this very reason. In the end I decided that the large increase in my monthly bill would not be worth it. I'll have to be happy with the Oculus.

Samsung Gear is ok ( IMHO ) IF you already have a Note4 phone so "there is the perfect add on", if I'd have to buy a new phone I'd think "ok I get a Note 4 AND the Gear VR" of course.

BUT .. if you don't plan of buying a Note 4 and you want "a super VR experience" then I say "no, wait for the final version of the Oculus" ..

DK2 is really IMPRESSIVE .. but the new to come is told be even LOT more impressive and I can't wait for it.

I love the portability, I love the practicality of wireless and "all in one go" .. BUT .. if I have to be "super mega picky" .. well .. "there are still some minor defects" and "a phone is a phone" .. for
"mega VR experience" you can't beat yet the super beefed up PC with some mega GPU and the DK2.

If the Note 4 would cost really cheap then one could say "yeah no brainer" .. but .. it cost what it costs and if the question is "I want a really super VR experience" the answer is already "then get a DK..".

[Soluzar]

DK2 is really IMPRESSIVE .. but the new to come is told be even LOT more impressive and I can't wait for it.

I'm sure it looks very impressive, however I'm a little concerned about the barrier to entry. Even on DK2, there are games which require some of the best possible hardware to run adequately. I'm talking about a high-end i7 and a GTX 980, for example. The Crescent Bay prototype is reported to be very nice, but since it actually has even higher resolution than the DK2, that means it will need even more powerful of a PC. There are limits to how much I can spend pursuing the dream...

That said I'm still very much excited about both current and future Oculus Rift developments.

If the Note 4 would cost really cheap then one could say "yeah no brainer" .. but .. it cost what it costs and if the question is "I want a really super VR experience" the answer is already "then get a DK..".

It costs a lot, which is a shame because I do love a really big screen on my phone. If money were no object I would absolutely buy a Galaxy Note 4, because I think it is a lovely gadget. Instead I have got a much cheaper model and put the money towards a DK2. I know there's probably going to be a different version available to buy in the fullness of time, but I really want to experience and experiment with what it can do now.

[gilesgoat]

I think VR is going to "redefine" what "really high end graphics is" ( and maybe to an extent optimisation and such ).

You can't run a Ferrari pretending to spend like a Fiat.

I think "the dream" as a rough estimate assuming you have to buy a brand new PC/GPU to run it a conservative guess is lightly above a thousand pounds, but you can expect a good 5 years of dream out of it at the very least.

We managed to have Minorescue VR running 60 fps in low performance mode on a phone .. maybe when you'll see "Less Unity Engine around and more custom-made stuff" maybe things will go better as well *sarcasm*

Spare a tought for those that destroyed part of their brain, nerves, guts ( going into ulcer maybe ) and stuff like that "to make things work smooth" having to deal with too low specs GPUs ( and Android NDK, nuff said )

I am an "enemy of laptops" and "GPUs that are not really GPUs but low end low cost chips".

VR is going to set a new bar for "what is really power graphic" .. Samsung costs .. because it's not "a phone" .. is "a powerful computer with a phone attached", that's the way those devices should be seen, also that "lovely screen" probably ( my guess ) makes 1/2 of the cost of the whole phone if not more .. it's again "powerful tech" you know ..

Yes for "super slick VR" probably you'll have to start consider your computer as a "dedicated machine for it" .. which basically means "there's no end to the amount of money you could throw into a GPU", bit like Hi Fi or such

It's going to be .. interesting .. for a bit .. still .. the device itself it's very cost accessible .. but I can definitely see "PC upgrades" happening in the next years ..

[venusian]

I bet somebody somewhere inside Oculus is working out how much it would cost to put a GPU (or two) inside the Rift. Cost aside, it would surely fix most of the problems with variable framerates, detail levesl etc.

[Soluzar]

I think "the dream" as a rough estimate assuming you have to buy a brand new PC/GPU to run it a conservative guess is lightly above a thousand pounds, but you can expect a good 5 years of dream out of it at the very least.

I wonder if that estimate might be conservative! It is not that long since I built my current PC, and I'm not convinced it is sufficient. I didn't get much change from a thousand pounds that time!

My current build includes a 3.4GHz i5 and a GTX 770. I think I can just drop in a replacement GPU, at some point... if necessary. I don't know if I need to replace the CPU, and if so whether I'll need a new motherboard. I'll wait until the DK2 arrives and see what the performance is like on those things that are most important to me. I might get a pleasant surprise, the GTX 770 is not so bad. I can stand to dedicate some money to this, but not spending extra money on a super-fancy computer-masquerading-as-a-phone is part of the trade-off there.

You're probably right when you say that VR will redefine the definition of high-end graphics, and it's possible that as a result (if VR becomes popular) the tech might accelerate, becoming more affordable in the process.

I definitely want these experiences enough to make it a priority for me. I can cut back on other unnecessary spending for a while. I didn't think I was going to be interested in VR at first, but once I tried it I just developed a powerful craving for it. I can see this being the main thing I put my money into for a while.

I bet somebody somewhere inside Oculus is working out how much it would cost to put a GPU (or two) inside the Rift. Cost aside, it would surely fix most of the problems with variable framerates, detail levesl etc.

It is an interesting idea, but I don't really know how simple it would be. I'm not saying it can't be done, but it would be an engineering challenge. Take a look at the typical high-end GPU for a PC. It's pretty bulky, draws a lot of power and generates a lot of heat. I feel like if they could make the GPU smaller, they would. That means you need to add that much bulk to the Oculus. This might be OK if it was an additional pack that you wear on a belt, or something. I don't think it would be OK as part of the headset though.

Leaving aside the bulk, there's also the question of how the computer would talk to it. From the best information I can find, the PCIe x16 port is an 82-pin connector, and I don't know if there's any support in the architecture for that to be external to the computer's chassis. I can definitely see how including some processing power on the Rift itself could be helpful, but I think it would require a substantial rethink and possibly some creative engineering. At the moment the Rift just works as a monitor, from the computer's point of view. That makes it fairly simple to work with, in some ways. You can actually output an Oculus Rift demo to a normal monitor, and you get the two images (one per eye) displayed on screen.

I'm sure that they know more than I do, and a future version might do some onboard processing, but I'd be really curious to know how it would work because it would take a really different approach.

[Dio]

I bet somebody somewhere inside Oculus is working out how much it would cost to put a GPU (or two) inside the Rift. Cost aside, it would surely fix most of the problems with variable framerates, detail levesl etc.

What's the practical power dissipation limit though, when weight is a key factor? It's not 300W, which is what you need to run a pair of decent GPUs. Probably not even a tenth of that.

[Dio]

You're probably right when you say that VR will redefine the definition of high-end graphics, and it's possible that as a result (if VR becomes popular) the tech might accelerate, becoming more affordable in the process.

Increased popularity of high-end GPUs does change the economics of them slightly; they can come down in price a bit, the R&D budget for the silicon can go up, and larger chips become viable.

But there's not a lot of space for the tech to accelerate; given the nature of competition between AMD, nvidia and Intel, if there was a cheaper / faster / lower power way of doing things it would already be in the pipeline, as the economic incentives for doing it are gigantic - even 10% more performance at the same price can be $100m or much more.

[Absolute_Zero]

2.5/3D die stacking?

[gilesgoat]

I bet somebody somewhere inside Oculus is working out how much it would cost to put a GPU (or two) inside the Rift. Cost aside, it would surely fix most of the problems with variable framerates, detail levesl etc.

What's the practical power dissipation limit though, when weight is a key factor? It's not 300W, which is what you need to run a pair of decent GPUs. Probably not even a tenth of that.

In a way I hope they don't .. that would limit I think quite a lot what you can do with VR.

If it's "tethered" "it does not matter" at that point you can put all the grunt you want inside the PC.

Yes we got our latest "work PCs" with reasonably GPU power and all for LESS than 1 thousand quids, well just below it, around 900 and something a while ago and they do the job.

You could have saved some hundred quids by NOT getting the SSD, check Overclockers UK, they have good stuff there.

[venusian]

ISTM it depends on what Oculus consider to be the sweet spot between the predictable behaviour and low latency you'd get with a fixed-spec GPU embedded in the Rift and the increased graphic fidelity you get from using a higher spec GPU inside a PC.

It's no good having an uber-immersive VR experience if 85% of your customers see a juddery mess because their PC wasnt up to 4K resolution at 90Hz. My experience of the Rift is that apps don't degrade gracefully; they either work properly or they're utterly broken. That's going to be a huge problem for the PC gaming audience, one Sony won't have with Morpeus (assuming it's a PS4-only peripheral).

The Samsung device shows that you can do something with a (relatively) low power mobile GPU and an Arm. Surely Carmack &co will have had a pop at something notionally similar? How many Mali or PowerVR cores could you put on a die and still feed it power and data and cool it in something the size of a NUC? An asymetric Crossfire type arrangement would be "interesting".

FWIW, I don't believe Oculus will do this for CV1 as they're repeatedly said that it's doing to be DK2 on steroids. Moving the GPU out of the PC would break that muchly.

[venusian]

Yes we got our latest "work PCs" with reasonably GPU power and all for LESS than 1 thousand quids, well just below it, around 900 and something a while ago and they do the job.

I paid about £650 for mine a couple of months ago, including a Win8 license, and I've yet to find a DK2 demo which it can't run at full speed.

[gilesgoat]

Yes we got our latest "work PCs" with reasonably GPU power and all for LESS than 1 thousand quids, well just below it, around 900 and something a while ago and they do the job.

I paid about £650 for mine a couple of months ago, including a Win8 license, and I've yet to find a DK2 demo which it can't run at full speed.

What's the GPU you have ?

[edit] - I am kinda sniggering all the way around about things like those AND ALL THOSE PEOPLE USING UNITY ENGINE ...

"Let's use Unity Engine, it's cool .. " .. yes ... do you have a <insert too mega pc> to run this thing smoothly ?

Besides you do have a DK2 then ? "Stay tuned on this channel", news to come in the next week.

[edit2] - and also NOT using "DIRECT VIDEO MODE" with auto detection of you have the DK2 connected or not DK2 connected I can let you choose if you also want screen duplication or NOT screen duplication to go even faster and/or automatically drop into "normal video mode no oculus" (*) if no Oculus is attached.

(*) feature in work/debug.

Man I spent considerably amount of time studying/debugging/asking/modifying/grumbling around the OR SDK ... especially the Android version of it too.

Also "we tune for performance".

Must be said anyway 650 quids seems a bit 'cheap' for VR ...