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Facebook Announces $199 Oculus Go Standalone VR Headset (variety.com)
Facebook is going to ship a standalone VR headset called Oculus Go next year. The headset, which won't require a PC or phone to run, will be available early next year for $199. From a report: Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg officially announced the new product during his keynote speech at Facebook's fourth Oculus Connect virtual reality (VR) developer conference in San Jose, Calif. Wednesday, where he framed the device as an important step towards bringing VR to the masses. "We want to get a billion people in virtual reality," Zuckerberg said. Facebook VP of VR Hugo Barra said that the company developed custom lenses for the headset, which allow for a wide field of view. The display is a fast-switch LCD screen with a resolution of 2560x1440 pixels, and it comes with integrated headphones. The company will be shipping first headsets to developers in November.
Lets see... a large part of the expense for the normal VR is the accurate position tracking. Since they are focusing entirely on a portable headset, presumably they are dropping the accurate tracking.
Which means, it will be a set of accelerometers with a screen and a display engine... does this sound like Google Cardboard or any of the hundreds of "smart phone" VR solutions to anyone else?
But how long will anything have a plug that you can use them with?
According to most tech companies lately a headphone jack apparently is obsolete, is known to cause cancer in the state of California, and most probably murders puppies for fun on the weekends.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
So it's virtual reality, but we'll need to log on with our real names?
Why would Zuckerberg ever want us to log out of Facebook to enter a 'virtual reality?'
It sounds a lot more like it would be 'Augmented Reality' with Facebook in charge of the augmenting. Which is kinda chilling, if you think about it very long.
And has support for HDMI-in, it is just a late knockoff of the chinese VR headsets that have been out for 6 months to a year now.
Unfortunately Zuck doesn't seem to understand what we want VR for, and what it was created for. We want to play our current games in VR. That's all. We don't want it to become a walled garden like the Occulus store. We don't want it for social media. We only want it as a display, nothing more. I don't see why all this money is being blown to make it into something people don't want.
I had my HTC Vive for a long time and a beefy PC to power it. It was garbage. I don't even wanna know what shitty experience a $200 integrated device (with the added "bonus" of total surveillance) is going to paint. VR is just as dead as computers are to me.
Is this what it's like getting old in the tech industry? I hope not, and at the same time, 3.5mm has been around for longer than anyone I know has been alive, so maybe it's more tech jackassery coming from the tech giants.
Who doesn't have a phone and wants to do this?
There, I've said it.
According to most tech companies lately a headphone jack apparently is obsolete
I don't think that Apple and Google count as "most tech companies".
And they're wrong, anyway. Something can't be obsolete until there is something else that replaces is and functions at least as well as the old thing. Right now, there isn't anything that does this with the headphone jack, so it's not obsolete.
What Google and Apple are doing is trying to kill it in the hopes that if there's no headphone jack, better tech will be invented that can replace it.
Until that happens, the headphone jack may no longer be supported -- but it's not obsolete.
They're not trying to kill it in hopes that better tech replaces it, but tech that is under their control.
Most people don't want to deal with trying to wear two separate sets of gear on their head. You might be okay with the hassel, but you aren't going to buy a billion headsets and the software to go with them, so you aren't the market.
If your goal is to look like a complete dork, do wear your VR goggles in public. Even better if you indulge in spastic movements of your hands, in your attempts to interact with the virtual world.
the problem is 3.5 mm headphones don't fail, we need products that have a designed end of use date...
Since Zuckerberg wants to be viewed as working for the betterment of mankind, how does this fit in:
"We want to get a billion people in virtual reality,"
I get that they'd want that in order to further their profits, but how would widespread adoption of OR make the world at large better?
I know, I was just going along with their public statements for the sake of argument.
Don't forget proprietary use.
Because having to put on a headset and headphones is a huge pain in the ass. It's one reason I haven't used my HTC Vive in nearly a year: the integrated headphones alone made me a convert to the Rift.
This is the same two pieces of gear, except now you can't take them apart. Also, I wonder how true that is. And the word is hassle, by the way.
You forgot the most important part. It's very hard to DRM a 3.5mm headphone output.
Luckily it also includes a headphone jack.
No positional tracking makes it just another way to watch 360 video.
"We want to get a billion people in virtual reality,"
Zuckerberg says that and I get a bit nervous.
Brought to you by Carl's Junior.
It has integrated headphones, AND a headphone jack. The integrated version is fine for many, and adds almost nothing to the weight. Best of both worlds.
I don't get it. What can a VR headset do without a computer or phone to power it? It needs to get its input from *somewhere*, right? Or are they going to stream the data to the device over the internet like video? I think one would need a truly exceptional connection for that to be remotely usable. Or is this device going to have its own CPU and actually run software on the device itself?
Yes they do. Have you really only bought one pair?
you've never owned a Beats headset (since the Apple takeover) the cables on them fail even faster than an iphone headphone adaptor...
[The Universe] has gone offline.
What would be the software availability?
My Steam library has around 200 games, out of which exactly three have VR support.
I am not interested in VR tech demos (like those 5 minute "spiders everywhere" games) nor VR porn (can't for the life of me get used to looking down and seeing a differently colored dick).
...gis sdrawkcab (usually not responding to ACs; don't bother posting as AC)
"We want to get a billion people in virtual reality because we love vomit" remarked Zuckerberg while casually pulling off his headset and wiping his mouth.
You realise you could have bought the Vive headset addon for a lot less than a new VR system giving you "integrated" headphones? Of course as a Rift shill I guess you never really bought a Vive to begin with....
[The Universe] has gone offline.
However, it won’t have any positional tracking, which means that high-end VR apps available on the Oculus Rift headset won’t run on the device.
Is this different than head tracking? If not, what's the point of VR without head tracking?
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
True, but that just shows how stupid these tech companies are. It's been 20+ years since I copied a song through a 3.5mm audio jack.
CD Extractor and L3Enc for DOS made analog copying pointless.
I built a gaming rig specifically so I could get the Oculus Rift this year. I love it. Almost everyone who tries it is amazed and loves it (my mom seemed somehow completely unimpressed). Since I purchased it, any new games are specifically for it. My poor consoles are languishing for any love at all. I don't see this headset competing against a Rift setup, which more or less people have already reported it will be equivalent to a smart phone, however I can see that once people get a taste of it, they may scale up to want more.
I can also see the parallels between hardcore and casual gamers. Before tablets and smartphones, most of the casual gamers would have done no gaming at all. But give them a simple, cheap device, and suddenly VR is more ubiquitous and devs will move to that. Having used the Rift to try and work with my desktop, I don't foresee this being a device people are wearing for hours, however it could draw people into more VR content.
I will shred my adversaries. Pull their eyes out just enough to turn them towards their mewing, mutilated faces. Illyria
They're probably iris scanners or something creepy like that. Don't forget to turn your microphone off.
Facebook. Now stealing your data right from your FACE!
That resolution sucks. Things wonâ(TM)t be stunning. People will hate VR. They have just set VR back 25 years or more.
This is all rather rich after the preaching from Oculus people about quality and deepest fears of proliferation of cheap knockoffs that suck and get everyone sick poisoning the well of public opinion.
After all that here Oculus is directly releasing VR gear lacking positional tracking where any head movement translates into the wearer instantly feeling like shit.
I happen to really get a kick out of VR. I'll spend hours on coaster simulators, playing descent, flying spaceships and doing crazy stunts that would sure as heck make me loose my lunch in real life. The one thing I simply will never do is put a VR display on my head lacking positional tracking. It makes me sick just thinking about it.
Zuck and his little data piñata for Russian intelligence ought to be run the fuck out of town.
This shitty headset will be a veritable signals collection platform for whoever's next attempt to assfuck democracy.
The Vive "deluxe audio strap" came out on June 6 2017, 4 months ago. GP mentions "nearly a year", he probably got the Rift well before the Vive option was even announced.
I was going to write the same thing, but I was too slow. Damn, I should have husseled.
So this one must REALLY spy on you and record your voice and show ads and track you via GPS and probably process your entire DNA profile and sell it to your health insurance company. I don't trust Facebook. Nobody trusts Facebook. At this point the damn thing will probably have paid loot boxes and microtransactions.
Nobody trusts Facebook.
Facebook has more than 2 billion active users. So it appears that 2 billion people trust them.
Here's a better idea:
All you need to do is.. not buy one.