PC VR News & Reviews

Vrgineers Secures $6M to Accelerate Wide-FOV VR for Enterprise

November 29, 2023 From roadtovr

Vrgineers, the US-Czech company known for its wide-FOV PC VR headsets for enterprise, announced it’s secured a $6 million Series A investment.

The funding round was led by Taiwania Capital, a venture capital firm based in Taipei, Taiwan. Returning investors include Czechia-based Nation 1, which has increased its share by $500,000 since the previous investment round.

Founded in 2017 and based in Delaware, United States and Prague, Czechia, Vrgineers is slated to use the funds to accelerate growth in addition to releasing a new version of its XTAL headset later this year.

Priced in the thousands of dollars, the XTAL platform is designed to appeal to enterprise, with the team putting a large emphasis on flight simulation. It offers both a ‘pure’ VR XTAL headset as well as mixed reality XTAL headsets for applications where users need to read real-world instrumentation.

“This investment is not just about the necessary funds to boost our activities and products, but it also brings a great deal of overlap,” Vrgineers CEO Marek Polcak said. “This strategic investment has connected us with the leaders in the electronics development and manufacturing industry. With this connection, we can now improve our technology to the highest level possible.”

The firm also offers a number of pilot training platforms in addition to its suite of wide-FOV XR headsets, ranging from portable, suitcase-style rigs up to custom-made trainers featuring integrated motion platforms.

HTC Launches Inside-out ‘Vive Ultimate Tracker’ for $200

November 29, 2023 From roadtovr

First revealed at GDC 2023 earlier this year, HTC has now launched its long-awaited inside-out tracking accessory, which is now dubbed the Vive Ultimate Tracker.

Unlike previous Vive Trackers, Vive Ultimate Tracker makes use of inside-out optical tracking instead of SteamVR base stations, making it useful for users of HTC standalones Vive XR Elite and Vive Focus 3. The company says support is also eventually coming to OpenXR/SteamVR based PC VR setups in the near future.

Vive Ultimate Tracker does this by imbedding two wide-FOV cameras to track its own location in 3D space. It also allows users to link up to five trackers per headset for multi-point full-body tracking by attaching two trackers to the elbows, two to the feet, and one to the user’s hips.

Vive Ultimate Tracker also uses a standard 1/4″-20 UNC mount and has a pogo pin interface, allowing it to attach to a variety of objects, the company says, adding that it’s also slated to release developer documentation and the 3D CAD file publicly so that people can design their own bespoke mounts.

Post-launch, HTC says Vive Ultimate Tracker will work entirely independently with SteamVR, without any headset present, so it can be used to track the movement of people or objects, making it useful for industrial things like equipment and prop-tracking. That’s slated to arrive as a beta in the coming weeks.

HTC’s latest standalone, Vive XR Elite, will also see the launch of a native VRChat app in December which supports Vive Ultimate Tracker.

Priced at $200, users looking for basic full-body tracking don’t need to spend the full $1,000 though for five trackers however, as HTC is also pitching a three-tracker bundle for $600, which includes the required Vive Wireless Dongle ($39 MSRP). With that setup, you’d attach a tracker to each foot (with supplied straps) and one to your hips.

HTC is offering a few bundles as special deals from now until December 31st. Owners of Vive XR Elite who purchase the $600 Ultimate Tracker 3+1 Kit + TrackStraps Special can get a $100 discount after registering a valid Vive XR Elite serial number, bringing the price to $500. This also includes a Dance Dash download key.

HTC is also bundling Vive XR Elite and Vive Ultimate Tracker for $1,500, which includes VIVE XR Elite headset ($1,000 MSRP), 3 Vive Ultimate Trackers, 1 Wireless Dongle, a Dance Dash download key, and TrackStraps. You can find the deals over at vive.com.

Check out the specs below:

In-box items – VIVE Ultimate Tracker, 1/4″-20 UNC screw-in mount (use is optional), 120 cm USB-C to USB-C cable, Documentation (user guide QR code / safety guide / warranty card)
Tracking – 6DoF inside-out tracking – Wide-FOV tracking cameras x 2
Dimensions – 77 x 58.6 x 27.3 mm
Weight – 94 g
Battery life – Up to 7 hours
Charging time – 2.2 hours on average with Qualcomm Quick Charge 3.0, 3.2 hours on average with 5V/1A power supply
Charging mechanism – USB Type-C, Pogo pins
Inputs – Pogo pins x 6, USB Type-C port
Connectivity – Proprietary 2.4 GHz, 5 GHz Wi-Fi
Compatible devices – Requires VIVE Wireless Dongle to connect to: VIVE XR Elite, VIVE Focus 3 (LBE). Support for other standalone and PC VR headsets is planned

Valve is “still working on VR and still pushing forward on it”

November 13, 2023 From roadtovr

Valve unveiled its Steam Deck OLED late last week, offering up a hardware refresh for the first time since the company launched the handheld gaming device last year. While the company has been full steam ahead on handhelds and developing Steam OS, Valve says it’s “still pushing forward” on VR.

Valve ostensibly has a standalone VR headset in the works, and although there wasn’t any big announcement (or acknowledgement) of what the company has in store just yet. Talking to Norman Chan of Tested though, it was revealed the company is still working on VR.

In an interview, Valve designer Lawrence Yang spoke about the overlap between Steam Deck’s design relative to its VR efforts:

“There’s a lot of things [informing hardware decisions]. Working with an APU, working with miniaturization of computers. We don’t have anything to announce today in terms of a VR other than we are still working on VR, and we’re still pushing forward on it. Just like Steam Deck is learning a bunch of stuff from controllers and VR, future products will continue to learn from everything we’ve done with Steam Deck.”

Following up, Valve hardware engineer Yazan Aldehayyat said this:

“Obviously there’s a lot of overlap, from technology pieces that we can use; wireless streaming is very applicable to VR. That benefitted Steam Deck as well in improving the wireless experience. But also from just establishing relationships with part suppliers, hardware partners, and that kind of stuff. The SteamVR team and the Steam Deck team work together. There’s a lot of inoculation of ideas, parts and technologies.”

At Steam Deck’s initial launch in February 2022, Valve chief Gabe Newell told Edge Magazine that Steam Deck represented a “steppingstone” to portable VR for the company thanks to its battery-capable, high-performance horsepower.

More recently, the company released its long-awaited SteamVR 2.0 which drastically upgraded the platform’s VR interface. Whether this is in preparation for an upcoming VR standalone headset remains to be seen; it’s certainly a knock-on effect of improvements made specifically for Steam Deck’s UI.

You can check out the full breakdown of Steam Deck OLED in the Tested video below: