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HTC unveils Vive Pre, its second-generation VR system

Bsigg12

Member
The original controllers didn't have that ring in the middle right? Is that in response to Oculus Touch's design?

Correct and no. They made the design both smaller and more aesthetically pleasing by getting rid of the platform and changing it into a ring of sensors.

htcvivelead%2Bcopy.jpg
 
The original controllers didn't have that ring in the middle right? Is that in response to Oculus Touch's design?

Oculus's design choices may be affecting HTC's (see the backs of each HMD strap), but the controllers are like that just for better tracking. They don't map out your fingers or anything. There's sensors inside and outside that ring on the new controllers for the lighthouses to see.
 

majik13

Member
Don't get the people who are underwhelmed by this. This just made room-scale VR a lot more realistic, how many people actually had a completely obstacle-free space planned out? Also, if devs can make it so that you can physically interact with real-world objects represented in VR, that's going to help with presence.



Wait what? Have you seriously only heard the term "generation" in regards to consoles? Your post literally doesn't make sense.


Edit:
But basic common sense tells us that it's the former.

eh, not always. I was in the VR eye track thread last night. And everyone is throwing around the term, "1st gen VR hardware wont have eye tracking", it will come in the "2nd gen hardware, in a few years". This was repeated over and over. Then you see the thread title here, and it says "HTC unveils Vive Pre, its second-generation VR system " and It throws you for a loop. New name, 2nd-gen. Obviously I knew something was up though, so I went back and read the article. But, I mean its not unheard of for devkits to be out a year or 2 in advance of the actual hardware release. And I could possible see an actual Vive 2 out within that time frame.
 

Sinistral

Member
Between the fantastic improved chaperone system with the camera, improved Mura correction, included controllers with the possibility to do seated, standing and room scale VR. The Vive is still my choice. Even if it's going to cost north of $500 US.

Rift only has some games (Valkyrie) that would be missed.
 
lol, that's their "big breakthrough"?

Had a feeling it was all BS.

The real breakthrough is what the camera can do, not necessarily the camera itself. The fruits of this new development have yet to come to light.
Between the fantastic improved chaperone system with the camera, improved Mura correction, included controllers with the possibility to do seated, standing and room scale VR. The Vive is still my choice. Even if it's going to cost north of $500 US.

Rift only has some games (Valkyrie) that would be missed.
Same. It's a shame the VIve will take a few extra months, but if they need that time to get it right, so be it. They'll still have their complete ecosystem on the market before Oculus gets around to releasing their controllers.

Room scale is not an option for me, it's a requirement.
 

Bookoo

Member
Between the fantastic improved chaperone system with the camera, improved Mura correction, included controllers with the possibility to do seated, standing and room scale VR. The Vive is still my choice. Even if it's going to cost north of $500 US.

Rift only has some games (Valkyrie) that would be missed.

Probably closer to $700 maybe $600 being the cheapest.
 

Alexlf

Member
All the people shouting about how the camera stuff isn't a big breakthrough are reeaaaaly underestimating how hard this type of image processing is. To be able to do it on the fly at real time speed and have it be efficient enough to run as a background process is nothing short of incredible.
 
All the people shouting about how the camera stuff isn't a big breakthrough are reeaaaaly underestimating how hard this type of image processing is. To be able to do it on the fly at real time speed and have it be efficient enough to run as a background process is nothing short of incredible.

It sounds like it''s basically doing what a Kinect does, with just the depth sensor. Doesn't seem that hard, definitely not this huge technological breakthrough that made Vive suddenly scrap their entire launch plans.
 
It sounds like it''s basically doing what a Kinect does, with just the depth sensor. Doesn't seem that hard, definitely not this huge technological breakthrough that made Vive suddenly scrap their entire launch plans.

Well that's PR BS. They were never going to be able to hit that launch window, breakthrough or no
 

Alexlf

Member
It sounds like it''s basically doing what a Kinect does, with just the depth sensor. Doesn't seem that hard, definitely not this huge technological breakthrough that made Vive suddenly scrap their entire launch plans.

Since I don't know the technology for sure I can't say with 100% certainty but I don't think that's a depth sensor at all. I think they are using photometry from a single camera point to calculate depth, like Valve had showed research on previously. It has a number of very useful applications if that's the case.
 
No 3D camera? I don't see this working well, unless I suppose it has some other way of measuring the distance to real-life objects.
Yep this. The Toms Hardware guy even said he had a problem with depth perception when approaching the chair.

Will be interesting to see how the sensor data can be used to enhance the 2d image with depth.
 
That's what I mean. Maybe they're piggy backing off each others discoveries and design decisions, especially since the Otouch is getting pushed back.

Sure, but I don't that's the case in reference to the controllers. Seems like a natural evolution from their first revisions.
 
I am beginning to think that most VR headsets are smoke, mirrors, and non-existent marketing. Really? reveal it like this HTC / Valve?

Have you seen good hardware reveals in the past? How they're done?

The whole thing from Oculus to this is such a joke. I hope someone actually has some software for these things somewhere...that's where the winners will be decided.
 
I am beginning to think that most VR headsets are smoke, mirrors, and non-existent marketing. Really? reveal it like this HTC / Valve?

Have you seen good hardware reveals in the past? How they're done?
Not saying they have been doing a good job but demonstrating a product like this to consumers is a new and probably quite difficult challenge.
 
I hope they tell more details about hardware specs(resolution, FOV, display type, etc).

I still see the Vive as the premium choice for this first generation of VR devices, with best tracking, room-scale positioning, passthrough camera, etc.

But we need more info and price.

Especially the room tracking brought Vive a good way ahead of oculus. But oculus seems to have better software support.

But it depends in the price. With all the extra stuff and superior hardware Vive should be much more expensive than oculus.
 

viveks86

Member
I read five in another site.


What's the normal duration of a wireless controller, btw? I don't have one.

Even the ds4 lasts about 8 hours, and that's terrible by most standards. I guess you won't play in VR for sessions lasting that long, but this will mean it's permanently on the charger.


To quote HTC - "under heavy usage". Even then, this is a developer kit, so it doesn't matter as much. For retail I'd want a bit more than that.

Let's hope it's more

You can swap one controller out for 8 hours of play if your other hand is occupied.

Lol
 

jax

Banned
Honestly though, why would anyone choose Oculus over this? This has the controllers, 3D Room Tracking, front facing camera all day one for probably? The same price as Oculus. Seems like Facebook may have rushed Oculus out the door to compete with Vive before it was ready. That's not a good sign for Oculus.

still preordering both
 

Bsigg12

Member
Honestly though, why would anyone choose Oculus over this? This has the controllers, 3D Room Tracking, front facing camera all day one for probably? The same price as Oculus. Seems like Facebook may have rushed Oculus out the door to compete with Vive before it was ready. That's not a good sign for Oculus.

still preordering both

First, the Vive is going to be more expensive than the Rift. There are no 2 ways around that.

Right now? I was getting a Rift (regardless that I'm getting one free) over the Vive to begin with because I wasn't going to bite the bullet on a more expensive set whose features I wouldn't use. I don't have the room or the need to want to play with room scale so I'm not going to pay the premium for those features.
 
Topic subject could really use an edit to clarify it's the second-generation DevKit, not that they're talking about the sequel product to the consumer model.
 
Honestly though, why would anyone choose Oculus over this? This has the controllers, 3D Room Tracking, front facing camera all day one for probably? The same price as Oculus.

Do you have any info about that? Or just saying baseless stuff?

Hint: precisely if it includes so much more, the price will be more expensive.
 

Alx

Member
All the people shouting about how the camera stuff isn't a big breakthrough are reeaaaaly underestimating how hard this type of image processing is. To be able to do it on the fly at real time speed and have it be efficient enough to run as a background process is nothing short of incredible.

The way it is described in the hands-on, it doesn't sound like it's doing much image processing. If it was doing a real 3D mapping of the environment in real time, then yes it would be impressive, but it seems to only replace the 3D grid they were using before by the video feed from the camera, with some stylized rendering to hide its lower quality.
Since the point of view of the camera is very close to what the user would see without the headset, it doesn't need additional geometry analysis. It would work just like the passthrough of the GearVR.
 
Honestly though, why would anyone choose Oculus over this? This has the controllers, 3D Room Tracking, front facing camera all day one for probably? The same price as Oculus. Seems like Facebook may have rushed Oculus out the door to compete with Vive before it was ready. That's not a good sign for Oculus.

still preordering both

I think you're going to be disappointed if you think the price is going to be the same. I'll likely get the Rift because it will probably be a couple hundred cheaper and that rumored/likely price is on the edge of what I can afford at the moment. Especially for Gen 1 hardware that will likely get replaced in a year or two.
 

ArtHands

Thinks buying more servers can fix a bad patch
eh, not always. I was in the VR eye track thread last night. And everyone is throwing around the term, "1st gen VR hardware wont have eye tracking", it will come in the "2nd gen hardware, in a few years". This was repeated over and over. Then you see the thread title here, and it says "HTC unveils Vive Pre, its second-generation VR system " and It throws you for a loop. New name, 2nd-gen. Obviously I knew something was up though, so I went back and read the article. But, I mean its not unheard of for devkits to be out a year or 2 in advance of the actual hardware release. And I could possible see an actual Vive 2 out within that time frame.

Thread title seriously fucked up here (and also the original article title). Its just an updated version of the dk for developers, not vive 2 at all. A mod should seriously change the title.
 

Maximo

Member
Some of these responses are fairly embarrassing its like their not coming with a voice of reason or logic but blind hate on HTC for some sort of reason.
The Vive is delayed however in that delay time their shipping out new Devkits that are much improved and their going to replace the models that were going to release..don't see the issue.
Edit: Or is the new product NOT releasing when the consumer version comes?
 

Alexlf

Member
The way it is described in the hands-on, it doesn't sound like it's doing much image processing. If it was doing a real 3D mapping of the environment in real time, then yes it would be impressive, but it seems to only replace the 3D grid they were using before by the video feed from the camera, with some stylized rendering to hide its lower quality.
Since the point of view of the camera is very close to what the user would see without the headset, it doesn't need additional geometry analysis. It would work just like the passthrough of the GearVR.

That's the thing though, you can't GET depth from a single camera WITHOUT doing it, and they are very clearly using depth to enable the selective viewing as they are. There something very neat going on here, mark my words.

EDIT: I should clarify so that it doesn't seem like blind fanboyism. It's neat as a comp. sci. guy. Might be less neat to the general populace but there seems to be something cool going on here software wise.
 

PolishQ

Member
Some of these responses are fairly embarrassing its like their not coming with a voice of reason or logic but blind hate on HTC for some sort of reason.
The Vive is delayed however in that delay time their shipping out new Devkits that are much improved and their going to replace the models that were going to release..don't see the issue.
Edit: Or is the new product NOT releasing when the consumer version comes?

The consumer version will be a slightly updated version of this new devkit.
 

tuxfool

Banned
Any more insights on what "Mura corrections" are all about?

Mura corrections is when you compensate for imperfections in OLED manufacturing. What happens is that for whatever reason some leds (or regions) may not get enough voltage or current thus it creates a slight splotchiness to the colour.

Thus this correction should enable uniform luminosity across the entire panel.
 

viveks86

Member
Mura corrections is when you compensate for imperfections in OLED manufacturing. What happens is that for whatever reason some leds (or regions) may not get enough voltage or current thus it creates a slight splotchiness to the colour.

Thus this correction should enable uniform luminosity across the entire panel.

Isn't this an issue with any oled display then? So have they solved something that applies to the display segment at large?
 

tuxfool

Banned
Isn't this an issue with any oled display then? So have they solved something that applies to the display segment at large?

Two ways of dealing with it, use highly binned panels or use more complex display drivers so that you can use more panels. These corrections and the need for them are fairly well documented, but I presume the requirements of VR require the solution to be more stringent.

e: in case you're wondering what an uncompensated panel looks like:

hOrQ2G3.png
 

Alx

Member
That's the thing though, you can't GET depth from a single camera WITHOUT doing it, and they are very clearly using depth to enable the selective viewing as they are. There something very neat going on here, mark my words.

EDIT: I should clarify so that it doesn't seem like blind fanboyism. It's neat as a comp. sci. guy. Might be less neat to the general populace but there seems to be something cool going on here software wise.

The selective part doesn't need computer vision. Because the headset knows exactly where it is thanks to the lighthouse, it can select when to display video information, and when not to. Like I said the way they describe the feature, they only replaced the 3D grid they were using by the video feed.
Of course I'd need to see the output of their system to be more positive about it, but there's no need for 3D reconstruction of the environment for the task they're describing.
I did see the claim that "third parties could do 3D recodntruction and do AR stuff" in one of the interviews, but I'd be cautious about such claims, while structure from motion is indeed possible, it's not entirely reliable for precise models.
 
how cool would vr be with some glove controllers, that add pressure/vibration to a certain area of your hand/fingers, depending what your holding. or pressing, etc

On Topic, is it me or does it look like the headset has the infection from TLOU
 
The way it is described in the hands-on, it doesn't sound like it's doing much image processing. If it was doing a real 3D mapping of the environment in real time, then yes it would be impressive, but it seems to only replace the 3D grid they were using before by the video feed from the camera, with some stylized rendering to hide its lower quality.
Since the point of view of the camera is very close to what the user would see without the headset, it doesn't need additional geometry analysis. It would work just like the passthrough of the GearVR.

The hands-on I read sounded like it shows 3D models of things in front of the user, not a video feed at all. Like, you only see the chair in front of you, not the whole room, unless you enter the full-room mode which disables the VR feed. And you don't see features on people or keyboard keys, but you see the shape of the keyboard. It's definitely not a passthrough, if it was it wouldn't make everything look like Tron.
 
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