Oculus Reveals 'Crescent Bay' Prototype of the Oculus Rift

VRFocus - Oculus VR has revealed a new prototype version of its upcoming virtual reality (VR) head-mounted display (HMD), the Oculus Rift, which it says is ‘on the path to consumer VR’ and a ‘massive leap’ from DK2. The announcement was made by CEO Brendan Iribe at the Oculus Connect conference in Hollywood, California.

[OOMagnum]

I bet without Facebook they wouldnt have the capital to add these new features. Wait this is N4g so any acquisition is bad.

[sinspirit]

Based on what? The heavy amount of investing in Oculus before the acquisition? The money made on very good sales for their developer units?

I think they had plenty of resources to do all of this before. But, they MIGHT not have had as good of connections. But, I'm pretty sure with how huge Oculus exploded onto the market that everyone was coming to them.

[Gamer1982]

Just wish they would release a public version already rather than keep changing it. By the time the tech comes out everybody will have lost interest as they will have got sick of waiting..

[DougLord]

No to on ear headphones. Please work with Klipsch to put in ear into this. 1080p to each eye! 60 fps+. The this is a good product.

[fr0sty]

In ear headphones suck. Even the best ones have very limited bass response.

[sinspirit]

Proper in ear headphones produce amazing bass. The ear properly isolates the sound and uses your canal as a chamber with in ear headphones. Obviously, bass isn't going to be as powerful as huge headphones that have bigger speakers, or sound systems, but it will sound just as good with proper in ear headphones and a proper MP3 player that doesn't screw with the sound signature.

You must buy headphones that raise the bass on the drivers to pretend to wannabe music enthusiasts that it delivers better bass just like how Bose misleads people to thinking that their speakers are worth even half the price when all they do is produce speakers with emphasized bass and acoustic sound. To any music producer or sound engineer these kinds of speakers are highly ignored because they're crap. If you want a speaker to deliver that kind of noise then use a good source that lets you change the signature to find the right one for you.

[fr0sty]

You cannot get as good of a frequency response with such a tiny driver vs. larger over-ear headphones. That's like trying to say you'll get as good graphics out of a wii as you will a PS4. Over-ear headphones create a larger chamber around your ear for sound to resonate in, accommodate a larger speaker system which can produce a wider range of frequencies, and can produce better dynamic range... though you guys probably are used to listening to modern mp3s that have been mastered to have most of their dynamic range squashed out so that they still sound good on those crappy earbuds.

I work in a recording studio... you will NEVER find someone behind the mixer board using a set of earbuds (in the few cases where they use headphones at all, rather than the studio monitors). Not anyone who takes their job seriously.

[sinspirit]

@fr0sty

Who is arguing that bigger drivers aren't better?

I'm not sure how you don't know of any good ear buds. And, what frequencies are you talking about? Any decent ear bud can play all frequencies that a human ear can discern. Most just deliver it with less quality.

The main reason to get headphones for recording is because they broadcast the sound with as much isolation on just about anyones head. Earbuds don't fit everyones ears well enough to isolate properly and get the same experience in both ears. It's not because of no good ear buds. It's because of what I just told you, and not just that but for long periods of listening in a studio they are easier on the ears and more comfortable a lot of the time. There are many great ear buds that have accurate and clear sound. Not all are trash.

[porkChop]

I would rather just use my own headphones which are miles better than whatever crap built-in headphones they plan on adding.

[The Great Melon]

The headphones on this prototype are there for testing more than likely. Oculus is working on implementing 3 dimensional sound, so for demonstration the prototype has a pair of built-in headphones. I bet the consumer one will likely NOT have built in headphones; rather, I expect them to have an audio out built into the headset. This would help tame the kraken that the oculus currently is with its many cords dangling everywhere while allowing the consumer to choose their audio solution and not adding cost to the headset.

I just can't foresee OculusVR compromising their vision of the Rift with average headphones after their driven pursuit of perfection for VR. Good headphones aren't cheap. There is no need for OculusVR mess with headphones when there are plenty of companies that do that well already. They just want ensure that audio is addressed well in VR along with the visuals.

[Mrtemper]

2k-4k per eye and 144 FPS and I will buy one.
But I do like the idea of in ear head phones.

[Gamer1982]

1080p to each eye is not needed considering its on your eye. 720p is enough at least for a starter version. 1080p will no doubt be a lot more expensive considering size.

[Pandamobile]

Reports from people that have tried out this prototype say that it's a huge step up from the DK2.

Screen-door effect is virtually non-existent at this stage, positional tracking is near-perfect, and the resolution has been given a significant bump. It's speculated to be 1440p right now, so it's not much of a stretch to expect the consumer version to be 1800p or higher. And just so you guys can get a better idea of how large these resolutions are, 1440p is 4x 1280x720; 1800p is 4x 1600x900p and 2160p (4K) is 4x 1920x1080.

Next step for people eagerly awaiting the VR revolution is to save up for a Maxwell GPU. I can't friggin' wait.

[starchild]

Yep, it's definitely going to take some powerful hardware to drive high end games at those resolutions and framerates. Of course, people with weaker rigs can still enjoy the simpler games in VR. But those that want the best that VR has to offer will definitely want to get a high end PC with the Oculus Rift.

I can't wait for the consumer model either. I've used the DK1 but not the DK2 version.