6 ms·

Rivvr Brings Wireless VR to the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive

54 points by yurisagalov 10y ago

yurisagalov 10y ago
So I had the chance to try this at the YC Alumni Demo day at the computer history museum, and it was SUPER cool. Completely wireless and doesn't add any noticeable weight on top of the HTC Vive in general. The ability to walk around the room with a Vive without having that cable tether made the experience truly immersive.
- mustacheemperor 10y ago
  Is the 11ms latency really not bothersome? I'd be concerned about the input latency and the potential for frame rate drops from connection issues etc, especially over longer terms of use.
  - sixa 10y ago
    We have a guy in our office who was heavy VR user, he played for 6 hours, without any complaints. Gamer, with second time VR experience, played during one hour, without any problems. In our team personal record was during 9 hours, we just changed batteries without any problems. It was QA engineer with first in a life time VR experience, and a passion for drawing. Tilt Brush now one of his favorite applications.
  - yurisagalov 10y ago
    I haven't been able to notice it at all. I was standing up, lying down, looking upside down, and doing all sorts of things that would probably make me nauseous (as friends of mine can attest, I get queasy super easily) for ~30 minutes or so, and didn't notice any latency.
  - zackmorris 10y ago
    If the engineers did their homework then the headset should send a vsync signal back to the console so the software could use dead reckoning to predict where the headset will be. That way it would be relatively immune to longer transmission latencies. Maybe there's a way to do this with the lighthouse tracking, maybe sending the latency measurement between actual and delayed position back through the controllers or something.
    - cma 10y ago
      Oculus DK2 had a built in latency sensor that measured a coded pixel in the corner of the screen and then fed that back in to the prediction/forward-projection steps. I'm not sure about Vive and Rift CV1. I didn't see anything like it in the iFixit teardowns.
otoburb 10y ago
>>Unlike other devices, which are aiming to compress the entire raw HDMI signal over the air, Rivvr uses its proprietary tech to compress the much smaller video feed from the PC, sending just about 40-80 mbps of video signal over the air. This paragraph seems contradictory to me: other devices aim to compress the video signal over the air (i.e. wirelessly), but Rivvr somehow compresses "much smaller" video feeds from the PC "over the air" (i.e. wirelessly). This isn't my industry, so what key technical definition or fact am I missing from this picture? The two statements seem to be equivalent.
- Impossible 10y ago
  Maybe it means compression happens earlier in the chain? For example, everyone else is compressing HDMI output and Rivvr is compressing the post VR compositor render target before scan out happens? This would break an app that does front buffer rendering, but afaik there aren't any commercially available VR games that do that. No idea what the actual difference is and I'd like some clarification also.
- sixa 10y ago
  Techcrunch already fixed this error "Unlike other devices which are aiming to send the entire raw HDMI signal over the air, Rivvr uses its proprietary tech to compress the much smaller video feed from the PC, sending just about 40-80 mbps of video signal over the air." Other companies trying to transmit raw HDMI stream wirelessly using 60Ghz frequency. They trying to reinvent Wireless HDMI which is well known and have a lot of problems. We are using standard WiFi networks 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz.
  - Haldir 10y ago
    I wonder how that should work. Less than 11ms per Frame compression time, let's say 9ms (as we need to Account for the way back too for latency) for a 2160 x 1200 stream + audio. And you can't see any compression and we're talking Close up here. Not possible with h264/h265.
    - krzat 10y ago
boxcart 10y ago
A lot of gamers use wired mice to reduce latency and avoid the hassle of fiddling with batteries. I have trouble imaging this going over with hardcore gamers for the same reason. In fact, I feel like the latency could be a much bigger issue here.
rubicon33 10y ago
I'm really curious about how VR will solve the movement problem. See, a virtual environment is only part of the equation. Oculus peeled the onion back further, with touch (and Vive equivalent). How will they solve movement? Using a pad to move forward or backward is not nearly as immersive as walking...
- feelix 10y ago
  I've always wondered why they dont stick a camera on the front of it, then overlay the virtual world onto the physical world.
  - ullarah 10y ago
    Wouldn't that delve into the augmented type of reality rather than virtual?
  - chrischen 10y ago
    The Vive has this feature although its not used in games.
    - dogma1138 10y ago
      It is used for overlaying some info like the room borders and barriers. It is exposed to the devs but the quality of the camera doesn't really allow for AR experience so it's not really used.
  - diamondo25 10y ago
    You can enable this on the Vive through Steam VR, and has a couple options: - Show borders of things the camera sees on top of the 3d - Show camera view aside from your controller in the "menu/system" screen It requires more bandwidth through USB, though, so it might not work. (I know there is a third option, but i cannot recall what it does)
- ramshorns 10y ago
  There's a forum post from a few years ago [0] with a few links to projects; I don't know how active they are though. One of them [1] is an array of treadmills running in one dimension, mounted on a track that moves them in the perpendicular direction, and it tracks your movement to keep you near the centre of the platform. Another [2] holds you in place while you run with slippery shoes inside a saucer-shaped surface. [0] https://forums.oculus.com/community/discussion/388/2d-treadmill-list https://forums.oculus.com/community/discussion/388/2d-treadm... [1] http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/robotics-software/cyberwalk-giant-omnidirectional-treadmill-to-explore-virtual-worlds http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/robotics-softwar... [2] http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/01/the-virtuix-omni-vr-treadmill-made-us-all-hot-and-sweaty/ http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/01/the-virtuix-omni-vr-t...
kimburgess 10y ago
Really looking forward to watching the development of this. Ultra low latency, high quality signal compression and network based (which I assume this is based on other comments) distribution is hard. It has a lot of use cases outside of this scenario. I know there's some really interesting work being done in the broadcast space (e.g. BBC R&D with VC-2 [1]) and the various low-latency implementation of H.265 which seems to be driven by UAV use. Are you guys/girls expanding on something existing for the codecs used or going down a completely different route? [1] http://www.bbc.co.uk/rd/projects/vc-2 http://www.bbc.co.uk/rd/projects/vc-2
microcolonel 10y ago
Maybe they do a final motion adjustment on the receiver just at the video level. Seems slightly interesting. I doubt they've made any breakthroughs in compression. maybe eye tracking could reduce the bandwidth even further (though the latency in this case means it can't go as far as a wired installation).

54 points by yurisagalov 10y ago

So I had the chance to try this at the YC Alumni Demo day at the computer history museum, and it was SUPER cool. Completely wireless and doesn't add any noticeable weight on top of the HTC Vive in general. The ability to walk around the room with a Vive without having that cable tether made the experience truly immersive.

mustacheemperor 10y ago
Is the 11ms latency really not bothersome? I'd be concerned about the input latency and the potential for frame rate drops from connection issues etc, especially over longer terms of use.
- sixa 10y ago
  We have a guy in our office who was heavy VR user, he played for 6 hours, without any complaints. Gamer, with second time VR experience, played during one hour, without any problems. In our team personal record was during 9 hours, we just changed batteries without any problems. It was QA engineer with first in a life time VR experience, and a passion for drawing. Tilt Brush now one of his favorite applications.
- yurisagalov 10y ago
  I haven't been able to notice it at all. I was standing up, lying down, looking upside down, and doing all sorts of things that would probably make me nauseous (as friends of mine can attest, I get queasy super easily) for ~30 minutes or so, and didn't notice any latency.
- zackmorris 10y ago
  If the engineers did their homework then the headset should send a vsync signal back to the console so the software could use dead reckoning to predict where the headset will be. That way it would be relatively immune to longer transmission latencies. Maybe there's a way to do this with the lighthouse tracking, maybe sending the latency measurement between actual and delayed position back through the controllers or something.
  - cma 10y ago
    Oculus DK2 had a built in latency sensor that measured a coded pixel in the corner of the screen and then fed that back in to the prediction/forward-projection steps. I'm not sure about Vive and Rift CV1. I didn't see anything like it in the iFixit teardowns.

otoburb 10y ago

>>Unlike other devices, which are aiming to compress the entire raw HDMI signal over the air, Rivvr uses its proprietary tech to compress the much smaller video feed from the PC, sending just about 40-80 mbps of video signal over the air. This paragraph seems contradictory to me: other devices aim to compress the video signal over the air (i.e. wirelessly), but Rivvr somehow compresses "much smaller" video feeds from the PC "over the air" (i.e. wirelessly). This isn't my industry, so what key technical definition or fact am I missing from this picture? The two statements seem to be equivalent.

Impossible 10y ago
Maybe it means compression happens earlier in the chain? For example, everyone else is compressing HDMI output and Rivvr is compressing the post VR compositor render target before scan out happens? This would break an app that does front buffer rendering, but afaik there aren't any commercially available VR games that do that. No idea what the actual difference is and I'd like some clarification also.
sixa 10y ago
Techcrunch already fixed this error "Unlike other devices which are aiming to send the entire raw HDMI signal over the air, Rivvr uses its proprietary tech to compress the much smaller video feed from the PC, sending just about 40-80 mbps of video signal over the air." Other companies trying to transmit raw HDMI stream wirelessly using 60Ghz frequency. They trying to reinvent Wireless HDMI which is well known and have a lot of problems. We are using standard WiFi networks 2.4Ghz and 5Ghz.
- Haldir 10y ago
  I wonder how that should work. Less than 11ms per Frame compression time, let's say 9ms (as we need to Account for the way back too for latency) for a 2160 x 1200 stream + audio. And you can't see any compression and we're talking Close up here. Not possible with h264/h265.
  - krzat 10y ago

boxcart 10y ago

A lot of gamers use wired mice to reduce latency and avoid the hassle of fiddling with batteries. I have trouble imaging this going over with hardcore gamers for the same reason. In fact, I feel like the latency could be a much bigger issue here.

rubicon33 10y ago

I'm really curious about how VR will solve the movement problem. See, a virtual environment is only part of the equation. Oculus peeled the onion back further, with touch (and Vive equivalent). How will they solve movement? Using a pad to move forward or backward is not nearly as immersive as walking...

feelix 10y ago
I've always wondered why they dont stick a camera on the front of it, then overlay the virtual world onto the physical world.
- ullarah 10y ago
  Wouldn't that delve into the augmented type of reality rather than virtual?
- chrischen 10y ago
  The Vive has this feature although its not used in games.
  - dogma1138 10y ago
    It is used for overlaying some info like the room borders and barriers. It is exposed to the devs but the quality of the camera doesn't really allow for AR experience so it's not really used.
- diamondo25 10y ago
  You can enable this on the Vive through Steam VR, and has a couple options: - Show borders of things the camera sees on top of the 3d - Show camera view aside from your controller in the "menu/system" screen It requires more bandwidth through USB, though, so it might not work. (I know there is a third option, but i cannot recall what it does)
ramshorns 10y ago
There's a forum post from a few years ago [0] with a few links to projects; I don't know how active they are though. One of them [1] is an array of treadmills running in one dimension, mounted on a track that moves them in the perpendicular direction, and it tracks your movement to keep you near the centre of the platform. Another [2] holds you in place while you run with slippery shoes inside a saucer-shaped surface. [0] https://forums.oculus.com/community/discussion/388/2d-treadmill-list https://forums.oculus.com/community/discussion/388/2d-treadm... [1] http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/robotics-software/cyberwalk-giant-omnidirectional-treadmill-to-explore-virtual-worlds http://spectrum.ieee.org/automaton/robotics/robotics-softwar... [2] http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/01/the-virtuix-omni-vr-treadmill-made-us-all-hot-and-sweaty/ http://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2015/01/the-virtuix-omni-vr-t...

kimburgess 10y ago

Really looking forward to watching the development of this. Ultra low latency, high quality signal compression and network based (which I assume this is based on other comments) distribution is hard. It has a lot of use cases outside of this scenario. I know there's some really interesting work being done in the broadcast space (e.g. BBC R&D with VC-2 [1]) and the various low-latency implementation of H.265 which seems to be driven by UAV use. Are you guys/girls expanding on something existing for the codecs used or going down a completely different route? [1] http://www.bbc.co.uk/rd/projects/vc-2 http://www.bbc.co.uk/rd/projects/vc-2

microcolonel 10y ago

Maybe they do a final motion adjustment on the receiver just at the video level. Seems slightly interesting. I doubt they've made any breakthroughs in compression. maybe eye tracking could reduce the bandwidth even further (though the latency in this case means it can't go as far as a wired installation).