HTC was supposed to launch their virtual reality headset Vive earlier this year, but now the OEM has officially announced that they will not be releasing the device not until April 2016. But the good news is that the reason for this is that they were able to make “a very, very big technological breakthrough” and so decided to delay it and remake the device rather than release a first version then sell an updated one months later.
HTC CEO Cher Wang herself revealed this during the Vive Unbound developers forum, but unfortunately, she did not reveal what exactly this breakthrough is and what the upgrade will be about. She also didn’t reveal anything about how much the VR headset will cost, but based on what they’ve shown so far and this new “breakthrough” as well, we can expect that it will not be as cheap as some of the other ones in the market.
This headset was created in conjunction with Valve, who has made a name for themselves with games like Portal and Half-Life. So the Vive is actually powered by Valve’s SteamVR so all the games available there will also be supported in Vive. The VR headset has a 1200 x 1080 pixel screen and has a refresh rate of 90 frames per second. It also has an audio jack on the side which is compatible with any of your favorite headphones. The game controllers are ergonomic, and it has a gyro sensor, accelerometer, and laser position sensor.
Now we have to wait a few more weeks until they unveil even more details about this breakthrough at the CES in January. By that time, they also might have been able to rethink their pricing for the Vive, in light of competitors like the Oculus.
VIA: Engadget
