I finally got myself an Oculus Quest 2 last month and started researching its capabilities. I am impressed.
This wired product is the first VR rig I tested with the Qualcomm Snapdragon platform, and I was skeptical of how it would compare to the older Samsung rig that I plugged into my PC. To my surprise, it didn’t go that well, it went better.
The advantage of using a VR rig without a tether is enormous, because in a complex movement-oriented game you tend to get tangled up in the tether. So you need to stay close to your hardware that you come across and trip over, which makes standing up VR impressively dangerous.
Let’s talk about the Oculus Quest 2 this week and the announcement that this class of products will introduce 5G for the next generation. We conclude with my Product of the Week, a new Dell webcam that’s perfect for those of us who still work from home.
Unbound VR
We started with Tethered VR because there just wasn’t enough power and too much weight in an untethered solution to be helpful.
The smartphone-based VR products are inexpensive and can be fun, but they get old quickly, especially if you have a call coming in while you’re playing and you have to rip the headset apart to get to your phone before the call goes to voicemail.
With the Oculus Quest 2 you pick it up, put it on, grab the controller, define your scope so that you don’t trip over things, load the game and off you go. The Snapdragon solution is particularly impressive because not only was it able to run the game locally, but it was also better than the tethered Samsung headset I had used.
If you play physical games, the Beat Saber series where you use a lightsaber to the music is not only great fun to play but also increases your heart rate and is entertaining for anyone who is watching. I have to admit that listening to my wife laughing was a little distracting.
Let’s say you want to try a Fortnite game. In this case there is population one. If you want to experience Disney Star Wars Park without traveling or queuing (last time I was at Disneyworld I was there for eight hours and only made it to two rides due to the huge lines), try Star Wars: Tales from the Galaxy’s Edge game. There are also some old favorites like the Space Pirate Trainer which is incredibly addicting.
The headset has a feature that allows you to wirelessly connect to your desktop computer and play desktop VR games, but I haven’t had a chance to try it yet and as I am good with the games developed for the Oculus Quest 2 get along, it may be a while before i do.
Using this on an airplane is likely to run into someone, and using this in a car is likely to cause you to get motion sick. Although it is portable, you may want to use it while traveling if you want to kill time in the hotel room. But that’s a lot more fun than playing a top PC title on a laptop (I don’t like playing on a small screen that much).
The cost of a complete solution is pretty reasonable too. My tethered rig cost me around $ 350 when new, and this one only cost me $ 448 with the carrying case and 256GB of storage. For about $ 100 more, I have a more secure solution that involves using more than the tethered headset.
A practical feature is the headset’s built-in cameras, which turn on when you leave your defined safe space and keep you from stepping on heavy, painful dining tables.
Finally, the headset has built-in speakers and supports headphones (wired and wireless) if you don’t want to deal with a sour spouse who you woke up from a nap, woke up to the noise you made.
Future of VR, Mixed Reality
Qualcomm has announced that its Snapdragon mixed reality (VR) solution will receive 5G support for the next iteration.
This advancement means that at some point we should be able to play cloud-based games and do exciting things like VR massive multiplayer games played with cloud resources and even better games run in the cloud, provide. This allows the headset to focus on optimizing connectivity and game presentation.
5G opens the door to playing games wherever there is 5G coverage – such as outdoors. Indoors, the headset may have other uses when it is outside of Wi-Fi coverage, such as for business purposes. B. Training and Support.
This 5G update also means that even remotely with 5G coverage, you still need to put on the headset and start playing, as you don’t have to worry about local Wi-Fi services that can be infected with malware and an obstruction with excessive latency and unreliable performance.
Wrap up
During the pandemic, I was fed up with being locked in the house and like many of you, I played lots of video games and read an impressive number of books in an attempt to mentally escape my Covid prison.
I was hoping VR would help with this escape. Tripping over the rope or running into my desk grew old quickly, which led me to search for a loose solution. The original Oculus Quest didn’t work for me as it was subpar and the game selection wasn’t great at the time.
However, this new Qualcomm-based Oculus Quest 2 was a lot of fun and sets the stage for the next version which will likely work even better and connect to a 5G network for cloud gaming.
I look forward to playing my favorite PC VR game, Half-Life Alyx, when I get the chance to get it working on my gaming rig. But finally there is an unbound VR solution that I can love thanks to Qualcomm.
The Dell UltraSharp webcam
I’ve been using the Logitech Brio for several years now. While I loved this camera initially, the lack of Logitech support, especially with AMD hardware, made the camera less and less useful and more and more annoying. When Dell said they were entering this market and sent me their new Dell UltraSharp webcam for $ 199, I was thrilled that I could potentially have a desktop camera again to do the job.
I was more than impressed with the simplicity of setup, the clean design, and even the magnetic lens cover that sits behind the camera when it’s not in use. You can place the camera on the screen of your laptop or monitor, or use any camera mount of your choice, including a tripod.
The camera supports Microsoft Hello and does a great job with digital backgrounds as it can accurately measure depth.
One of the better features is auto-centering, which is where the 4K resolution comes into play. This feature allows for a wider potential field of view at high resolution, allowing the camera to digitally pan and zoom on your face regardless of your movement.
The Dell Ultrasharp webcam is the second camera I tested with this feature (the first was the Poly Studio 15), and it has become one of my favorite features.
We spend a lot of time looking good and it’s all free if your video camera sucks. A good webcam is crucial – especially in a meeting when you’re on screen with other attendees who might otherwise look better.
In the end, the Dell UltraSharp webcam enabled me to retire my Logitech Bio, which surpasses it and is therefore my product of the week.
The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the ECT News Network.
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