News: Qualcomm wants to show Samsung and HTC how VR should be done

New VR820 headset promises new experiences
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By GARETH BEAVIS

When Qualcomm announces a reference design, it's not usually the most exciting thing in the world – but with the Snapdragon VR820, the brand has created a rather exciting virtual reality headset.

Sadly, it won't be able for mere mortals to buy, but is designed (in association with manufacturer Goertek) to show just how capable the Snapdragon 820 chipset is at powering a VR headset.

The exciting parts come in the form of eye tracking (with two separate cameras for monitoring both eyeballs) and dual front-facing cameras, so you'll be able to combine the virtual and real worlds for easy augmented reality.

Touchy-feely

It'll also support gesture based input, Anthony Murray, senior vice president and general manager of IoT at Qualcomm, told TechRadar. This means you'll be able to interact with the virtual world using your hands as well, rather than needing to use a controller.

The VR820 uses two separate OLED displays to show the content in front of your eyes, with the 1440 x 1440 resolution panels being among the sharpest on the market right now – in short, this should all amount to a stunning virtual reality experience, as it offers a blindingly quick 18ms latency.
That means, in layman's terms, that when you move your head there's very little delay, taking the motion sickness most associate with VR down a further notch.

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By putting all this on the headset means the processing can be done locally – so you can theoretically stream VR content over to the device and have the heavy lifting done internally… untethered virtual reality.

Murray told us this headset had been put together as something that Qualcomm 'had to have' in order to show off the Snapdragon 820 chipset's abilities to power a dedicated headset – which is why this reference design was produced.

The whole point of the exercise is to highlight the power of the chipset, and the software development kit, to developers – it could be used on any virtual reality platform.

A waking Daydream

This means headsets for the forthcoming Google Daydream VR platform for Android, for example, could be created specifically using this platform – not using a phone, but with dedicated head mounted displays for virtual reality.

Murray added that it was the speed that the chipset could work – allowing faster time between sensors working together and allowing manufacturers to 'shave off time to market' - so we'll get better headsets faster, as developers can get their hands on the VR820 from Q4 this year.

But if someone can just take this reference design and make it right now based on Google Daydream (or whichever platform is best with lots of great virtual reality titles) we'd be happy indeed.

Source: Qualcomm wants to show Samsung and HTC how VR should be done | TechRadar

With all the development for so different companies and the huge market ahead, am I the only one who think there should be an organization to define standards in order to create the rules so most of the companies may growth in the right direction and make a useful, compatible, cheap, high end VR/AR/MR hardware and software?

This is amazing but these days I see a lot of companies doing more or less the same but incompatible with each other.

There's a headset that answers pretty much all of the questions and problems people have with Gear VR and Cardboard. Too bad it's not available for mere mortals.

And yes, I agree that a standard would be nice; I'm sure the dust will settle soon and there will be one or two clear winners in each level of VR hardware, but until then, there is a lot of incompatibility.

Posted via the VRHeads App for Android

I just found out about this on Gizmofresh and was going to post it as an article, as usual I did a quick search to see if it was already posted and lo and behold I found this, I think this is quite a development , Ok I will ad just few details here, "The VR820 is said to be completely wireless with built in Bluetooth 4.2 and WiFi 802.11 ac support. Other features include eye-tracking, dual front cameras that take care of positional tracking and hand gestures. Full support for binaural audio and four microphones help filter out noise." "Qualcomm plans to release the headset to commercial partners in Q4 this year, with re-branded versions showing up shortly after." I want to stress this is the first of it's kind VR to not be tethered to a PC that , in fact it requires no PC, and it's not smart phone dependent like the Gear VR how it will compare to a Rift or Vive remains to be seen , my guess, no contest for the VR Headsets, how it will compare to the Gear VR , might just give it a run for it's money. I look forward to seeing and hearing more about this one, you can find the article I'm quoting from at Qualcomm Debuts VR Headset that Requires no PC - Gizmo Fresh

Originally Posted by Chemy JMHT

With all the development for so different companies and the huge market ahead, am I the only one who think there should be an organization to define standards in order to create the rules so most of the companies may growth in the right direction and make a useful, compatible, cheap, high end VR/AR/MR hardware and software?

This is amazing but these days I see a lot of companies doing more or less the same but incompatible with each other.

I think that's exactly what we'll see from Google's Daydream platform: A standard for mobile VR that can be used by any OEM. I agree with you, VR hardware by a random company can be the most technically advanced on the market, but without dedicated content, it's dead in the water. Daydream will create a platform for developers to work on that will be available to countless Android users. As a Gear VR user and enthusiast, I'm not sure what that will mean for the future of the Gear VR platform, but I really would love to see Samsung make their next flagship compatible with both. I'm not sure they'll be able to compete in the VR space otherwise, if their customer base falls behind Daydream, because it won't make sense for developers to stay with Gear VR over Daydream.

It's like what VisusVR was doing, they did something to stream from computer to the smartphone (I think I will post the info sooner or later about their system), but so far they haven't released the product to the market, even for those who pre ordered it.

Originally Posted by Chemy JMHT

It's like what VisusVR was doing, they did something to stream from computer to the smartphone (I think I will post the info sooner or later about their system), but so far they haven't released the product to the market, even for those who pre ordered it.

I'm not aware of VisusVR, but you should check out vridge! The future is now, haha.

https://riftcat.com/vridge