Oculus Quest was the main attraction at Oculus Connect 5 this week. Following the high-end standalone headset’s reveal, attendees of the conference got to try several demos to experience the headset’s inside-out positional head & hand tracking, including in an ‘arena-scale’ setting. We also got a handful of interesting details about the headset’s specs and capabilities.

Oculus Quest (formerly Project Santa Cruz) is officially set to launch in Spring 2019, priced at $400. While that’s twice the cost of the company’s lower-end Go headset, it could certainly be worth it for the much more immersive class of games that comes with positional tracking (which the Go lacks). But that will only be true if the inside-out tracking tech, which Oculus calls ‘Insight’, can really deliver.

Quest ‘Insight’ Tracking

Photo by Road to VR

Insight seems to be shaping up to be the best inside-out head and hand-tracking that I’ve seen to date. I say “seems” because I haven’t had a chance to test the headset’s tracking in a non-demo environment. The tracking system relies on recognizing features of the surrounding environment to determine the headset’s position in space; if you played in an empty room with shiny, perfectly lit white walls, it probably wouldn’t work at all since there wouldn’t be sufficient feature density for Insight to know what’s going on. Demo environments are often set up as best-case scenarios, and for all I know something in my house (or anyone’s house) could really throw the system off.

Oculus claims they’re tuning the headset’s tracking to be robust in a wide range of scenarios, and as long as that remains consistently true, Insight will impress many. While other inside-out tracking systems either lack positional controller tracking entirely, or require some compromise on the size of the controller tracking volume, Quest’s four cameras, mounted on the corners of the headset, cover an impressively wide range that I effectively couldn’t defeat. A simple test I’ll often do with such systems is to move my outstretched arm as far outside of my own field of view as possible, then move it while (hoping to have lost the view of the tracking cameras), then bring it back into the tracking volume from some other angle. Generally I’m trying to see my hand ‘pop’ into existence at that new point of entry, as the cameras pick it up and realize it wasn’t where they saw it last.

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Despite my efforts, I couldn’t manage to make this happen. By the time my hand came anywhere near my own field of view, the hand was already re-acquired and placed properly (if it had even left the tracking volume at all). I would need to design a special test (using something like a positional audio source emitted from my virtual hand) to find out if I was even able to get my hand outside of the tracking volume, short of putting it directly behind my head or back.

So that means there’s vanishingly few situations where tracking is going to harm your gameplay, even in situations that would normally be cited as problematic for inside-out tracking systems, like throwing a frisbee or hip-firing a gun. Two specific scenarios that I haven’t had a chance to test just yet (but believe will be important to do so) is shooting a bow or aiming down sights with a two-handed weapon. In both scenarios, one of your hands typically ends up directly in front of, or next to your face/headset, which could be a challenging situation for the tracking system. I’ll certainly test those situations next time I have Quest on my head.

In any case, it feels like Oculus has done a very good job with Quest and its insight tracking system. Assuming Quest can achieve a consistently high level of robustness once as it finds itself across a huge variety of rooms and lighting situations, I think the vast majority of players wouldn’t be able to reliably tell the difference between Quest’s inside-out tracking and Rift’s outside-in tracking in a blind test.

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And that has big benefits beyond just getting rid of the external trackers. For one, it means the device has 360 roomscale tracking by default rather than this being dependent on how many sensors a Rift user chooses to buy and how they decide to set them up. Additionally, it means players can easily play in much larger spaces than what was previously possible with the Rift.

At Connect I played a few demos with Quest, one of which was Superhot VR. The game was demoed in a larger-than-roomscale space (about the size of a large two car garage) and I was free to walk wherever I wanted within that area. When it came to hand-tracking, I played the game exactly like I’ve played it on the Rift many times before, without noticing any issues. Being used to tethered headsets, it was also incredibly freeing to take a few steps in one direction and not see a Guardian/Chaperone boundary, then simply keep walking for many more steps before needing to think about the outside world.

Oculus took this to the extreme at Connect in an experiment they put together to show how Quest tech is capable of ‘arena-scale’ tracking. They created a large arena space, about the size of a tennis court, and put six players wearing Quests inside to play a special version of Dead and Buried. Physical cover (boxes of varying sizes and shapes) covered the area, and players could physically walk anywhere around the arena and use the cover while shooting at the other team.

A rendering of the arena set up at Oculus Connect for ‘Dead and Buried Arena’. I added a little red stick-person for scale. | Image courtesy Oculuis

Through my time in this demo I didn’t see any jumping in the positional head tracking, even while I walked 10 to 15 feet at a time from one piece of cover to the next.

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So, Quest is shaping up to deliver the same kind of quality positional tracking experience that most of us associate with high-end tethered headsets today, but now with more freedom and greater convenience. That’s a big deal at a $400 all-in price point.

Continue on Page 2: Oculus Quest Tech Details »

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Ben is the world's most senior professional analyst solely dedicated to the XR industry, having founded Road to VR in 2011—a year before the Oculus Kickstarter sparked a resurgence that led to the modern XR landscape. He has authored more than 3,000 articles chronicling the evolution of the XR industry over more than a decade. With that unique perspective, Ben has been consistently recognized as one of the most influential voices in XR, giving keynotes and joining panel and podcast discussions at key industry events. He is a self-described "journalist and analyst, not evangelist."
  • dk

    u don’t need a positional audio coming from the controller to test the tracking …..mirror in vr …or painting app

    • FireAndTheVoid

      You can also look at your shadow

      • Peter Hansen

        just hold the headset in your other hand, or let it sit loosely on your head. similar to the steamvr room setup you don’t need to see anything virtual for doing it. simple haptic feedback will do just fine

  • johnny

    “Quest’s tracking isn’t designed for outdoor use.” very disappointing… WMR works great outside, I hope Microsoft will make a move and make some wireless WMR that is much better then the oculus quest soon.

    • cartweet

      WMR isn’t designed for outdoor use either but that won’t stop people from doing it.

      • Konchu

        For sure no one has tried this outside, it may not be optimal but may work non the less just may be less optimal.Its probably more having something to track and for sure sky and clouds are a poor reference point for 3d tracking but it does have 2 downward cameras too so may be able to squeak by and if you have alot of trees or other outside structures this may help as well. Sure wind could play hell here and maybe IR light is the main issue we will have to see.

    • OkinKun

      It will probably work fine.. Especially once they get it into more people’s hands, and update the tracking software as time goes.

    • I think it has to do with dependability and having enough unique patterns/object to continue reliable tracking (something I have done as well with a smaller 20×20 bare room, by adding patterns on the walls and floor). Every camera based stereo slam system I have used has worked pretty well outside and it is interesting that all the boxes in their large area demo had patterns. I also believe they used boxes to help break up the large area. I have tested WMR and Lenovo Mirage outdoors and both work great with grass, bushes and other items, but fail to track reliably on large asphalt surfaces, like a parking lot, unless you are close to a building.

  • polysix

    Don’t really like the idea of it being more front heavy than the rift (which is about fine), but as heavy as I’d like to go (again), after having the awful facebrick Vive first (also dk2 and PSVR). TBH while this is a cool VR gadget it does seem to have more drawbacks than positives for people already IN VR on PC with a rift. the small cases of needing/wanting to feel free are offset by the issues such as weight, lower powered software (PC vs snapdragon! no contest!), slightly worse controllers (love the touch controllers as is!).

    It’s a good first step to get people into VR who never will spend a grand+ on a PC and want more than the super nerfed ‘GO’ etc. And now that their ‘1st gen line up’ is complete, I can only hope they make Rift 2 an amazing update, even if it’s not until 2020 as is likely now. Wireless would be cool as standard/with optional tether too by then even though they say unlikely. What I don’t want is WORSE ergonomics, that’s the #1 thing that stops anyone from using VR properly, that chore like feeling of wearing it… fiddly fitting, weight etc. RIFT CV1 is the best of the ‘proper’ HMDs so far on that score so Rift 2 should nail it.

    • impurekind

      Yeah, I have a Rift currently, so I’m just waiting for a headset like the Quest that has around 4K+ resolution per eye, as close to 200 degrees field of view as possible, near current-gen PC graphics min, 90Hz+, and comes in at around the $400 at most. I’m pretty confident the Quest 2 will probably meet most of those requirements.

      • Krzysztof Kiersznicki

        oh sure……..2x4k plus 90hz plus current gen pc graphics…mhm…see you in 20 years….a pc with 2080ti cant run pimax 5K properly….

        • kontis

          Foveated rendering.

        • impurekind

          Considering all those things are available on various commercial VR headsets right now, I don’t see any reason they won’t be available in one headset in the next year or two for a reasonable price.

          • GunnyNinja

            Where are you going to put the 3lb battery?

          • impurekind

            Where ever other self contained headset if figuring out how and where to put the batter. And, much like how the tech today would have required a much bigger battery if it had been released a generation ago, I expect the tech I’m hoping for in the next headset won’t require quite as much power as it would if we were to try and put that in a headset right now.

          • GunnyNinja

            You are describing what we call, a pipe dream…

          • impurekind

            To be honest, I can’t be bothered arguing with you and going out of my way to prove something that is pretty self evident at this point. Neither of us will feel better at the end. You’ll just look bad, and I’ll feel bad for making you look bad. Believe whatever you like. Time will move on, new headsets will come out, and we’ll all see where VR is in literally a few years more time. But, whatever happens, me being right is the near future that would be better for all of us–so I’m rooting for it regardless of what anyone believes or thinks they know.

          • GunnyNinja

            We call that a CRACK pipe dream…

        • dsadas

          Krzysztof Kiersznicki, how about you don’t post something that you have no idea what you are talking about?

          Foveated rendering can lower the GPU processing power demands up to 10x without losing any image quality. That means even a 580ti can run pimax 5k properly.

      • Gonzalo Novoa

        Well, that will come, no doubt but certainly not Quest 2, more like the year 2030 at the very least.
        My current 1080Ti is almost as big and heavy as the Rift and then there’s heat dissipation, power, etc.

        • impurekind

          Nah, I fully expect to see the Quest 2 in maybe 2 or three years tops, with basically all the stuff I’ve mentioned.

          • Nelson Tutorials

            You are thinking way ahead of your time with your predictions.

          • impurekind

            I don’t really think so. Much like Michael Abrash himself said in the latest Oculus Connect presentation, the tech is actually moving faster the people like him predicted in some ways–and that guy knows this stuff better than almost anyone else in the world.

          • Denis Koroskin

            I believe they will announce one hardware per year. Go at OC4, Quest at OC5, Rift 2.0 at OC6, Go 2.0 at OC7, Quest 2.0 at OC8, Rift 3.0 at OC9 etc.

            This will give them ~3 year release cycle for each product, which I think is a sweet spot between too soon (2 years) and too late (4 years). Releasing more than one product during one calendar year is also unlikely in my opinion.

      • Icebeat

        far from current-gen PC graphics min

    • Rogue Transfer

      The latest estimate from Michael Abrash in the keynote is 2022, due to him having to put back his predictions for reliable eye-tracking a year from the earlier 2021. Can’t do significantly higher PPD/resolution without that for a Rift 2 – widespread GPUs won’t be sufficient by 2020. (He also mentions the Half Dome feature prototype had “similar resolution” to the Rift.)

      • Denis Koroskin

        That wasn’t a prediction when Rift 2 will be out, you got that wrong. 2022 is when the industry (not necessarily Oculus) will reach the milestones that he set (also not all in one device). In addition, many of the predictions were regarding software, not hardware. He actually mentioned that the hardware part (4k x 4k, eye tracking, varifocal displays etc) is easy and doable much sooner than that. So I believe Rift 2.0 is still on track for oc6 announcement and 2’2020 release. The software parts will follow.

    • Kraufthauser

      “it does seem to have more drawbacks than positives for people already IN VR on PC with a rift.” I do not agree. I think having a Rift (quest) that has 360 arena scale is a huge leap forward.

      • NextWorld VR

        Well no, as a Developer (or power user) I can see a LOT of people with a Rift (and especially people like me with Gear VR and a Samsung Odyssey too) will instead wait through the Quest to see what comes next for RIFT. They may say it will play Rift ‘Like’ games but I highly doubt it will handle my Photo-realistic-work and goals, OR my mega Modded Skyrim VR game! BUT it is a VERY good VR option for people looking for their first HMD for SURE! All the bases are well covered for any casual user. ;~)

    • VRgameDevGirl

      Sorry, did u say PSVR is front heavy? Just want to make sure

  • Darshan

    Ben please ask oculus did they made any provision to connect power bank to Quest in such a way where connecting to powerbank disconnect the inside battery and use powerbank as source of device power thus eliminating chances of creating issues in playing while charging? This allow Powerbank of 20,000Mah with waist clip to power go for 5/6 Hours.

    In my opinion this small functionality will serve much larger purpose. Think what is most criticized feature of Oculus Go? I would say fixed inside memory in a blink yet it was not it was short battery life.

    If they are saying Quest could only last long as GO its bad news as games which are as good as Rift with playtime short as Go in my opinion is bad combo. Its like you were IMAX to watch Jurassic park and theater declare they can only play movie 20 minutes at stretch …imagine your frustration.

    So its must feature.

    • Rogue Transfer

      Yeah, 2 to 2.5 hours is pretty disappointing, but not unexpected. It’s quite remarkable considering they’re doing all the tracking of the headset & controllers with four cameras to process.

    • Justos

      you will likely get the same answer as what they say for go.

      It works, its just not recommended due to the heat.

      • Darshan

        No read my post carefully.. currently when you attach power bank Oculus Go routes power to battery first .. in this scenario if you use device while charging the battery will be charged and discharged at same time creating heating issues.

        The method i suggested in my post needs internal mechanism, which reject power from battery and take directly supply from power bank bypassing battery all together to power to device from powerbank. In this case you can’t charge device battery from powerbank port. In other words same port can not be used for powerbank and battery charging both unless single physical button placed for routing the supply via T-junction

  • impurekind

    Sounds pretty solid all-round.

  • Gonzalo Novoa

    It looks like a great device but my problem with standalone headsets is always the same, the battery. I play for 5-6 hours straight most of the time and having to recharge is a pain in the ass so for now I still prefer a tethered solution.
    Can’t wait for the Rift 2, that’s going to be amazing.

    • kontis

      You can use a tethered, switchable battery pack for infinite play time. You already like tethers, so…

      • Firestorm185

        lol

      • Gonzalo Novoa

        That would be better than having to recharge after 2-3 hours but certainly more uncomfortable than simply taking off my tethered headset now so not really a solution, at least not a good one for me.

        Ideal thing for me would be a headset that includes both options, untethered for those who like room scale or don’t want any cables and tethered for those like me who couldn’t care less about it.

        • Peter Hansen

          Like a USB-C cable that aside from power also could deliver visual information. Wait, don’t we have that already? What was it called…. Virtual Link?!?

          Oculus, you really missed an opportunity here.

          • Jistuce

            Virtual Link actually requires the cable not be removable from the device, due to some stupid USB-C licensing rule.

    • daveinpublic

      You might be able to plug it in while playing.

    • namekuseijin

      you really play 5-6 hours in VR straight? no sweat, no fatigue? VR is much more physically demanding than button-mashing flatgaming…

      time to recharge is a good idea, both for the device and for you too Lol

      • Gonzalo Novoa

        Yep, I do, almost every weekday, depending on how hooked I am to the game I happen to be playing. Last friday that my girlfriend was away I played Subnautica for 10 hours. No fatigue or anything but it felt weird to take off the headset and realise I was in dry land and not surrounded by water XDD

        • Peter Hansen

          But that is probably a sitting experience, right?

          After 3-4 h of room scale I am usually dunzo.

          • Gonzalo Novoa

            Yeah, that was sitting but I play InDeath for hours while standing too, not 10 but 5 or 6 hours straight lots of times.
            It’s true what you say, though, VR is more demanding from a physical point of view, no doubt about it.

          • Peter Hansen

            Most issues I have is with my knees after 3-4 h in slower titles. ;)

          • Kenny

            I do stand for hours sometimes, thanks to Skyrim. I played around 6 hours without a break (playing an archer), and WOW I got sore, lol. I try to take breaks now and then, but my legs get used to it. I am used to a tether (Rfit DK2 first, Vive original, then Vive Pro), but I really want wireless. Even after 2+ years, that cable gets in my way. The issue with Vive, is they want $360 for the wireless adapter (cost for Vive Pro…), and I believe it lasts around 4 hours. If I had a battery for 8 hours with an extra one to swap, I would be good. I may get the Oculus Quest as a good mobile system I can take to work, friends house, etc – but will keep something like the Vive as my primary VR system.

    • Downvote King

      Hot-swappable batteries always seemed like the best solution to me, although that would impact form factor some.

  • Trenix

    I really don’t think this is 2nd generation. It like the Samsung Odyssey without the need of a PC, and that’s not that great. There is no eye tracking. Steam is not supported. No camera behind headset for 360 tracking. Only 64 GB of storage. The lightening in the room will mess up tracking, similar to the Samsung Odyssey. The controllers are also similar to the odyssey instead of the rift, which actually feels awkward. Also now the headset has a battery life, yeah not for gamers.

    Man people gotta stop with the hype. Getting me all hype up over nothing.

    • paratay

      Agree 100% , unfortunately this does not even scratch the surface

    • kontis

      They said multiple times at the Keynote that this is their final 1st generation device.

      • Trenix

        How many 1st generation devices can they make? VR is dead for another year. I feel sorry for the customers who are buying basically the same technology that we had 4 years ago.

  • paratay

    The entire VR industry is being raped by these sort of products and forced on to the gullible consumer as the ‘ future ‘ of VR. It is ‘ Virtual Reality ‘ people, NOT ‘ Virtual cartooney ‘ graphics. They are going backwards to say the least.

    We WANT 170+ FOV
    We WANT GOOD Lenses, for the love of god, DO F–ing Custom NON-Fresnel Lenses you have the cash Facebook
    We WANT TO USE OUR LATEST HARDWARE such as 2080Ti for Best possible CG

    STOP manipulating people facebook and do some real progress.
    On top of all that $400 is an insult and way too expensive.

    Zuckerberg only wants a mediocre HMD for the ‘general ‘ public so he can have the ability to shove facebook type SM up your you know what… even on the keynote he mentions howmany people in VR and quoting ‘ 1 billion ‘ then mentions only 1%, what a tool. It is SO obvious what they are trying to do are you majority f-ing blind.

    They are killing VR by trying to takeover and pollute the general consumers perception of what it should be so they have the final say, Who the F made Mark fukkerberg an expert in VR

    • Ombra Alberto

      you are in total confusion .. you want to use a viewer with a 2080Ti and then you complain about the price of 399 dollars.

      Make peace with your brain.

      • paratay

        Hey Kid, read my comments a few hundred times and it should sink in, you clearly miss my point.

    • kontis

      The reason fresnels are the current standard of VR industry has NOTHING to do with cost. It’s all about trade offs. Lenses that have ale pros of fresnels but eliminate some of its shortcomings only exist in real prototype forms in the labs, but are NOT available in any consumer device for ANY price.

      Read this post from Valve about fresnels: https://www.reddit.com/r/Vive/comments/8ea207/psa_alan_yates_on_the_gearvr_lens_mod/dxzkm5o/

      • paratay

        Seriously FU, you wannabe, again judgement by proclamation i.e. no research have a look at this https://vrgineers.com/xtal/ custom lenses at 5K, just a small example of what is possible at even 1 /100000 the funds available to oculus. You also missed my point, dickhead.

        • paratay

          piss off kuntis, I wish there was actual voice chat in these forums I would love to hear how dumb you sound. You are a LOST cause unfortunately like most

          • daveinpublic

            You must be fun at parties.

        • Wow, have you thought about seeing a therapist? Is there any reason to be this volatile and hostile? Again, it is easy to read about all these great HMDs coming to market, but have you tried to order one? First they cost 4900 Euros, not dollars ($5706) and you can’t. You fill out an inquiry form and they will get back with you. On top of that you still need a premium PC to run it and there is no built in positional tracking.

      • Icebeat

        again the Alan yates claiming that they did a great work with the shit of lenses.

    • R3ST4RT

      Lowering the bar to entry is a completely separate goal from what you are saying should be the priority. A number of people don’t have the money for a 1070-2080Ti, gaming PC, and supporting hardware. With the quest, people are able to have solid VR experiences for the price of a gaming console which will help further push the VR industry to become mainstream.

      Oculus/Facebook has shown us that they are developing new headsets like the half dome so they clearly haven’t given up on producing better headsets that are on the cutting edge of technology.

      If I am able to convince my family, friends, or work buddies to buy a headset like a Go or Quest, it may just convince them that VR is amazing enough to invest in a gaming rig / rift / vive down the road, thus, furthering the VR industry by increasing sales.

      Step back and take a look at the bigger picture.

    • NooYawker

      I think people’s expectations are not inline with reality. VR was commercially released only a couple of years ago. People’s expectations and price points are no inline with reality.

      • paratay

        Agreed, most people don’t know what the hell they want, they just go with the ‘vibe’ and these fuc-rs are trying to take control. Don’t forget it’s not always right to ‘progressively’ improve a product and this is not the way most legendary things happened. Good things take time, best thing happen instantly

        • daveinpublic

          ‘Good things take time, best thing happen instantly.’

          Nice.

        • Really? Give me an example of anything that was not built upon previous knowledge or experience?

    • Ian Shook

      I think you belong more in the Youtube comment section. -Sincerely Everybody.

      • paratay

        hahahaha very funny and informative, well done. Your mindless automatic responses simply doesn’t cut it anymore. Grow a brain

    • daveinpublic

      Hmm, are you highly medicated?

    • There are other choices now besides Oculus. If you want wide FOV, and custom lenses, go with pimax. If you want 8K resolution and 90 frames per second, go with… oh wait you can’t. This sadly is why Oculus did not release the Rift 2, and the Vive Pro was only an incremental upgrade.

      But hey you appear to be very smart. The hardware and software is out there to build your own and maybe if your lucky, there won’t be someone like you out there complaining why didn’t add X or Y, why you are late to market and if after all that, if you are really lucky, maybe Facebook will buy your solution as the next Rift.

    • Downvote King

      Oculus is still working on a high-end next-gen solution. Quest is only meant as an entry level mainstream device. Most people are not willing to spend thousands of dollars on VR.

    • Jistuce

      We WANT you to shut up.

    • kjohn034

      Dude, you might want to de stress a little because after your stroke you won’t be able to enjoy all those WANTS…

  • fuyou2

    There is nothing I mean nothing new with this crappy device. It’s only 75 Hz, what ever happened to 90 hz. Low FOV, same old god ray loving lenses. Yeah sure, can it compete with 2080ti..Oculus are snake oil sales man.

    • Hindsight2020

      “No wireless. Less space than a nomad. Lame.”

      -CmdrTaco (2001)

      • fuyou2

        I hope you see the flaw in your comment…Make me laugh..So, No wireless so it’s wired..you retard, calm down get your words straight, Oculus Quest, what a pathetic name. Shitty Fresnel Lenses, Shitty FOV, Shitty OutDated Processor.. So, who has a football field size room for tracking..Again, completely stupid claim, completely stupid marketing ploy.

    • daveinpublic

      There’s a few new things, namely, inside out tracked controls and headset without a PC. Never been done before. One of the best things about VR is 6DOF controllers. You couldn’t have that unless you owned or bought a PC before this spring.

      • Peter Hansen

        The graphics is also “without a PC”. Meaning low-fi.

    • OkinKun

      Actually, as someone who owns and uses both the Rift and Go, I can tell you first hand that 72hz is perfectly fine. There is no perceivable difference between 72hz and 90hz, when done properly in VR, with features like Low Persistence.
      Also, the lenses in the Go have almost zero god-rays, and Quest uses similar lenses.
      People trying the Quest at OC5 say the FOV is really pretty good, so it’s odd for you to call that low..
      No one is claiming it will compete with a high-end VR gaming PC.. no one ever said that.. They’re saying it can provide similar experiences. Obviously the graphics won’t be as good as PC, but it’s good enough for most people.

      • Peter Hansen

        Hyped people (who are attending OC5) are calling the FOV “pretty good”.

        Meaning its the same as Oculus Rift and Go.

      • Djehuti Hotep

        Hello, I was one of the reps giving demos in the “Face Your Fears 2” area (indicated by the background in the photo above of the authoe) and for the most part people didn’t get sick from the 72 refresh rate of the Oculus Quest. But over the 2 day period I had to take 2 people out of the experience because they started to get dizzy . I think that the VR industry is saying that they can guarantee that people won’t get sick at 90 fps refresh rate and that if it is below that then there is a possibility of motion sickness.

    • Kenny

      What is new, is pretty simple here – giving us a mobile system with room scale freedom and hand tracking. They never said it would compete with a PC driven VR headset, of course it can’t handle the same graphics, which is why the PC HMD’s are still top of the line. But many people will want this because it’s mobile, roomscale VR that can be brought anywhere, easily. And $400 is pretty cheap, since the wireless adapter ALONE for a Vive is $300-360 depending on Vive Pro or not. I will likely toss $400 at it just to have a mobile system to bring with me, that has roomscale abilities (I have no interest in the Go, as it is not roomscale).

  • MW

    As a consumer, and VR enthusiast, I’m totally not interested with this product.

    • paratay

      dumb ass, wow we have an enthusiast here like no others give a shit

      • MW

        And you sir, are shame for human race.

        • paratay

          Sorry I miss read your initial comment, I agree 100%

          • MW

            That’s no matter. We should be civilized no matter what we like or dislike.

    • HomeAudio

      Me too, mee too :(
      Ech….

  • fuyou2

    WHERE THE FUCK DID THE OC5 KEYNOTE VIDEO DISSAPEAR TO????

  • HomeAudio

    I was saying it so many times… and I feel I need to repeat it one more time:

    THEY SHOULD WORK WITH NVIDIA/AMD ON HARDWARE IMPLEMENTATION OF FOVETAL RENDERING!!!!!

    It is all what I am expecting from them right now. Only this one thing they should figure out properly right now (IN COOPERATION WITH NVIDIA/AMD!!!!).

    • Konchu

      The Oculus Go already does some Fovetal rendering on the Oculus go so bet they will here too. But this is Fixed so its just blurring things in the peripheral all the time. I agree tie this to good eye-tracking and resolution and FOV may become super manageable even at the extremes..

      • HomeAudio

        Fixed Fovetal Rendering is a joke from users of this headsets. Fixed Fovetal should not exists. And what more – if graphic cards will not have hardware implementation that will support eye tracking and fovetal rendering – than this technology doesn’t have sense.

        • benz145

          A good, properly implemented fixed foveated rendering solution is actually a pretty good idea, and already functioning very well on Oculus Go.

          • Darshan

            Fixed foveated render assumes that point of interest is always in center thus this method gives more detailed texture in center where as little fuzz around the corners.Details decreases incrementally when you are moving from center towards edges.

            since in VR HMD the IMU is always on and whenever you look for point of interest elsewhere than center your head movement creates new center at point of your interest where you moved your head. thus there is always good picture quality at center of your gaze. This method beneficial for apps which put point of interest scattered in visual pan where you need head movement to see them. Example Shooter, Racing etc

            What if the app keep point of intrest linear across the horizontal pan where you really not need head movement much. Ex. Puzzle games or Recreational apps, in such scenario visual quality keep on decreasing where your gaze move from center to both ends without moving your head.

            So its good and bad both liking and not liking is subjective to your use case.

          • Peter Hansen

            I am a little sad, but I have to agree. Outside the sweet spot/area, your view already is blurred. Why not reduce rendering quality there? You wouldn’t even notice. And on devices like the Quest, you just have to. It has an extremely high resolution for the little rendering power that smart phone technology can offer.

            Also, eye tracking would make the device even more expensive. It is already as expensive as the Oculus Rift, which is a problem for a device with less fidelity.

      • Others have complained about fixed foveat, and some provided great responses about the peripheral of the Fresnel lens already creating problems on the edges (mainly chromatic, and glad hear they are correcting this in their shader).

        But another point to keep in mind is you have limited FOV anyway in these headsets, and even in the real world, just moving your eyes to focus on another object in your peripheral is not ideal. We naturally move our heads to center the object in our vision.

        I do agree with you about NVIDIA’s work in foveated processes, including dynamic focus, but sadly their TX2 SOC is priced much higher than the Snapdragon variants, and is not as power thrifty. And frankly Magic Leaps use of its capability in their demos have been disappointing to say the least. If you are talking desktop, than yes, by all means, but in my dealings with NVIDIA, they can be very shady in who and how they work with developers, as learned first hand in approaching them about securing the TX2 in volume.

  • fuyou2

    “Who the F made Mark fukkerberg an expert in VR” lol, paratay good comment.

    • daveinpublic

      You can reply to people’s comments by hitting the reply button.

  • FireAndTheVoid

    No Steam integration. So, those hundreds of dollars of VR games I purchased can’t be used on this device. This is a fatal flaw for me.

    • Firestorm185

      It’s unfortunate that they didn’t add VirtualLink connection, but it was never meant to be a SteamVR device. It’s a mobile Oculus device for heaven’s sake, that’s about as far as you can get from Steam.

      • FireAndTheVoid

        The Rift is an Oculus device that also can play games on Steam. The concept isn’t unheard of.

        More than half of all people who own VR devices (Vive and Windows MR) will have the vast majority of their games purchased on Steam – maybe only a few on the Oculus store if they use Revive. If they want to attract us as customers of the Quest, then they should allow us to play our Steam games. Do we need to pay again for the same games that we already own? That would need to be factored into the cost of this device.

        • PD J

          It’s a mobile device. You’re not going to run Steam games on a mobile ARM SOC.

          • FireAndTheVoid

            Some Oculus Quest titles will be downgraded versions of the full Rift games. I realize that they will not be the full Steam games. I’m talking about the rights to play the games that have already been purchased.

            In fact, this isn’t just an issue with Steam. From what I can tell, Rift game purchases are not transferable to Oculus Go when the title is on both platforms. Go owners need to re-buy games. If this is the case with Quest, then EVERY current VR owner will need to re-buy their VR game library. That is costly and will be a non-starter for many, including me.

          • sethsez

            Just because the same games are available on the Rift and Go (and later Quest) doesn’t mean they’re actually the same product. They’re similar for the end user, but a lot of work has to go into porting between different architectures and optimizing for vastly different hardware capabilities, and that work isn’t free.

            Outside of EXTREME rare circumstances, buying a game on Steam doesn’t give you access to the iOS version, or the Switch version, or the Playstation 4 version. Games purchased on Steam work with both the Rift and the Vive because those are both peripherals for a broader platform, not platforms in and of themselves. The Quest is a completely separate thing.

            With that said, developers have the option of making cross-buy possible. As far as I know, only Anshar Wars 2 and End Space allow it, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see at least some games offer full cross-buy, or at least discounts for people who already own the Rift version, and I’m fairly certain they’ve actually discussed this possibility already.

      • Peter Hansen

        It is sad that this device cannot also be tethered or used via TPCast compatible technology.

    • daveinpublic

      Think of it like a Nintendo Switch. It’s a new form factor, new product line. Moving forward, games and apps will be backward compatible.

    • Denis Koroskin

      How many of those games run on Android? Note that you can stream your stramvr games to Go *today* so I’m sure you will also be able to play them on Quest, too.

      • Peter Hansen

        That is probably ultra-low latency. lol

    • Kenny

      We’ll see if it can do anything from Steam, but Oculus has always wanted people to use their own platform, not Steam. It’s one of the several reasons I went with Vive this generation, despite Vive’s higher price point.

  • JesuSaveSouls

    This is really going to put vr on the map and catapult oculus into the public eye of the consumer.Huge leaps ahead of all the competition.Praise Jesus !

  • FireAndTheVoid

    Ben Lang, can you give us your impressions on the graphical quality of the games? Were they all low-poly and low-quality textures?

    • benz145

      Pulling in a comment response of mine from elsewhere as it addresses some of your question:

      Expect ‘good mobile graphics’. Everything being shown at Connect is using very simple textures and lighting models so they’re able to pull off good anti-aliasing, but you can still see that the visual fidelity isn’t taking advantage of the pixels on the screen in the same way that PC-connected headsets are able to.

      As we’ve seen with Go, there is likely to be a wide range of content quality. Some stuff on Go looks like crap, and other stuff looks surprisingly good. It comes down to how good the developer is at optimizing their title and working within the limitations set by the hardware.

      Superhot VR on Quest looks surprisingly comparable to its desktop counterpart, but it was never a graphically rich game in the first place. Something like Robo Recall will be a litmus test of what can be done when porting from PC to mobile; there you can expect more aliasing, less sharp textures, and flatter textures (due to heavily simplified lightning).

      The real test will come from the games built specifically for Quest from the ground up, as they’ll have been designed for its limitations in the first place, instead of trying to squish something built for a GTX 970/1060 into a mobile compute envelope. It seems very likely that ILMxLAB will likely set the bar here with Vader Immortal.

      Just remember, Quest is smartphone hardware, and its CPU and GPU is something like 50-100x smaller than just the GPU in a VR Ready PC; it’s never going to be able to push the same level of graphics. Even with heavy optimizations, generally those optimizations could be carried to the PC versions too, freeing up more power for even higher graphics.

      • Darshan

        Vader Immortal is real time rendered game experience like “Henry on PC” or its pre backed video like ” Henry on Gear VR” or its 4k cubic 360 Video like “Henry on Oculus Go” is biggest question??

      • Yes sadly I can’t agree more as a developer. With that being said, there a number of techniques either already out or coming out that improve the mobile pipeline like Goole Seurat and I would not be surprised if it was used ILMxLAB app, since they also showed off a pretty cool demo at last years Google IO and the SDK and plug-in for Unreal and Unity are opensource & available for download, along with the source code. Also, both engines have made great strides in other areas as well to reduce texture calls, along mesh reductions and baking.

        My only complaint is they chose the Snapdragon 835 instead of the 845 XR. With that being said, we shouldn’t forget that Qualcomm has had their new mobile VR reference platform that also does many of the items the Quest does, including hand motion detection. However, if the pricing on the Vive Focus (based on 2017 Qualcomm reference design) is indication of pricing, it will be twice as much as the Quest.

        https://www.qualcomm.com/news/onq/2018/01/18/snapdragon-845-immersing-you-brave-new-world-xr

        • Darshan

          Google Suerat is way to go, i think all mobile vr developer should learn and impement it in their apps, As per qualcomm snapdragon XR is having processing power some where between SD821 and SD835 so its little low grade. Better quest would have brought SD845

        • I also want to add that I have worked personally with Seurat on both Unity and Unreal, and the one who forked the Unreal plugin-source and compiled it for Unreal 4.20 if you want to try it out quickly.

          In my own experience it does work pretty effectively, but you really have to work at combining other assets with it, since relies heavily on transparency or transparency cutoff. It is also not a cure-all since it has very limited range of motion before the illusion is broken. Think of the Seurat process, as that of hundreds of texture baked disjointed facets facing the camera. Looks great until you move a few steps forward and look to your sides, at which you can see desperate facets clearly. However, if you use the process for background objects or large flat surfaces with attached detail, e.g. buildings (like those seen in the Bladerunner Daydream app) it works really well.

  • Lucidfeuer

    Don’t know what to think yet, but I think it’ll be a solid failure.

    • Justos

      shocker, lucidfeuer not interested in oculus products but posting negatively about them.

      • FireAndTheVoid

        Actually, I thought this was a pretty up-beat Lucidfeuer comment

      • Lucidfeuer

        Since we have 7 of them at the office and usually choose them for client or event showcase (outside of China), instead I’d rather see them release products that are successful, or rather and before that even happens, products that are worth it and practical.

  • Frank Taylor

    “Continue on Page 2…” link is broken.

    • benz145

      Sorry Frank, should be fixed now.

  • Diego Cesaretti

    I see nobody is asking a big question here… What OS is this thing running? Because if it’s running Android we could have a pretty good wireless pc hmd here…

    • jj

      …ouch man do some research.

      Nobodys asking that cause its been answered for ever.

    • Justos

      Oculus’ OS is a fork of android.

    • benz145

      As others mentioned, it’s Oculus’ own OS which is based on Android.

  • Devlin Darkside

    What I want to know is will I have to rebuy all my games that I currently own on the Rift if they are ported to the Quest

  • To test the tracking FOV just find a game that has a long object like a bow, hold it behind you but also so that you can still see the tip of it in your peripheral and see if the bow jumps about.

    • benz145

      Good idea, now I just need a game with a bow!

  • Adderstone VR

    Article full of errors…To name but two…resolution listed wrong, it should be 1600 x 1440 (not 1400)
    Author states OLED screen will cause ghosting, while OLED is specifically preferred for VR because they eliminate ghosting.
    Author thinks you’d be able to pick up loss of tracking with 3D spatial audio…how about just using shadows, very simple and will actually work, audio won’t.

    • Bob

      “Author states OLED screen will cause ghosting, while OLED is specifically preferred for VR because they eliminate ghosting. ”

      Yeah I thought this was a bit strange as well and didn’t make sense.

      • Downvote King

        The author literally answered this question right above your comment.

        • Bob

          My comment came before his response so take it easy buddy.

          • Downvote King

            Lol no hostility intended fella

    • benz145

      My mistake, will fix the 1.400 issue.

      OLED allows for low persistence which eliminates persistence blurring. This can also be achieved pretty well with newer fast-switching LCDs.

      Ghosting (AKA smearing) is when specific colors or scene elements appear to ghost/smear over other parts of the scene, which is a different artifact from persistence blurring.

      Ghost is especially noticeable blacks against bright colors. Put a black box on a white background and then move your head quickly left and right. While the black box should stay perfectly static against the white background, you can see a ‘ghost’ image of the box that bleeds into the white around it as you move your head. This has to do with how long it takes OLED displays to go from completely black (where pixels are technically unlit) to any other color (where pixels are lit).

      Mentioning @disqus_4e2PIma4qr:disqus for this explanation too.

      If you spot any other issues please let me know!

  • Foreign Devil

    Well I think we really want to know your impression of the games? Motion sickness? smooth? graphically dumbed down a lot?? Or was the lower graphics standard not too noticeable? Fun? Thanks!

  • And not a word about FOV ??? I’m very disappointed, Ben! As if this were a minor detail!

    • Peter Hansen

      That will be roughly the same as for the Oculus Go. Same lenses. If it was substantially wider or smaller, you would already know.

  • VRgameDevGirl

    It’s not for outdoor use???? Im confused. Arena scale tracking but NOT Outside?? Can someone clarify?

    • Downvote King

      In the arena-scale demo there are still plenty of objects, and everything has white tape markers on it to provide reference points for tracking – something you can’t necessarily count on in a natural outdoor environment. I think it’s the same as WMR headsets in this regard. It’s not designed for outdoor but it may work well nonetheless.

  • Great review Ben. Did you find out how soon developers will be able to get one?

    I had hoped as in the rumors last year, that they were going to use the TX2, but at a $399 price point, I now know why they didn’t. I am little disappointed they went with the Snapdragon 835, instead of the VR variant of the 845. It would be interesting to know if they also worked with the Qualcomm stereo SLAM custom processor, or if they have created their own custom chip? I hope so, since inside/out tracking can be pretty CPU intensive. Also, does anyone know at what rate the inside/out tracking works at?

  • Peter Hansen

    Does Oculus Quest really need a flamenco dancing violet hipster with yaw issues for advertisement? (this is a rhetorical question)

  • Peter Hansen

    So… did I overlook the section about visual fidelity or what?

  • Peter Hansen

    Honestly, I would like to buy it and toy with it for a while. But I am seriously afraid that I will need my Facebook login for using it and that all my VR related data will get associated with my FB account. I am not having that.

    • Greylock3491

      Imo, Facebook needs to change their policy and allow people to have multiple accounts. Our personal, professional, and hobby live’s are typically filled with different sets of friends and connections with different interests.

  • Greylock3491

    Great article Ben. I actually had no interest in the Quest until I got to the very large room scale part – sounds like fun and good for VR arcades too.

  • jc

    does it have usb otg support? can I use a keyboard with it?

  • Woah, you guys really doesn’t understand the market, It’s more complicated than just make the best product you can do and hope for the best fot the company.

  • Andrew Jakobs

    Now, if they just added a virtuallink connector, so you can also use it as a thetered headset to a PC, than you would have your Rift 2.. Even if it would add another $50 to the price of the headset, I think it would be worth the extra.

  • 82 Pythons

    How about the f*cking FOV man!? It’s one of the most important (if not most) features that needs to be upgrade in these VR headsets!? The s*itty FOV makes everything look like it’s being viewed through an old school Mattel Viewmaster. The Fresnel lenses have got to go as well, the rings around the lenses are way too noticeable while in VR. The rings are too distracting and increase the screen door effect, at-least they’re allowing lens adjustment finally (a feature dips*it Zuckerberg left off the GO).

  • Leo Richard Comerford

    Sorry if I missed this somewhere in the article or in other coverage: does the Insight tracking system support multi-user/multi-HMD? In other words, is the kind of head-to-head multiplayer from the Quest ‘arena’ demo something that will work in other real-world environments and with other Quest games and experiences (once the devs for that particular game support two or more users), or does it rely on special software or hardware measures? If it’s the former then that’s big news, one of the most important Quest advances.

  • Jason Lovegren

    They should have had the battery be wearable on your belt strap. They could have made it a bigger battery (Longer game times) as well as making the headset significantly less weight. Sigh, I get that they want to make it cool but a wearable battery is definitely the way to go.