Facebook killed Oculus Rift, long live the Quest...


Alongside today's Quest 2 news, however, Facebook has confirmed it will no longer be continuing development of its PC-only Rift headsets, instead focussing on its popular range of all-in-one models such as Quest. As a result, the company will be ending the sale of Rift S in 2021, but does say its Rift platform of PC software "isn't going anywhere", and that it will continue to support PC VR via Quest and Oculus Link.

You had a good run, Oculus Rift. Rest in peace(s).
 
Yeah they going Quest line only and will also be working on some AR glasses. Bah good riddance I say, I mean do we really want a VR device that's going to bombard us with damn facebook ads, send facebook telemetry on our every move within out VR safe havens/getways from reality?
 

Craith

Volunteer Moderator
It is a pity to see oculus destroyed by facebook, but it does not come as a surprise, unfortunately. The original oculus brought VR back to the public and on the road to a more mainstream acceptance (not that it is there, yet ...), for that they deserve praise. Facebook left that vision behind, not only with the discontinuation of a dedicated headset but also with their current mandatory facebook account for using their hardware.
 
While I am sad to see the Rift go it comes as no surprise. Having owned the DKII i will never forget those early Rift experiences.

Tethered VR is not the future. The evolution of the Oculus HMD with Abrash and Carmack at the helm is still a very exciting prospect.
 
It is a pity to see oculus destroyed by facebook, but it does not come as a surprise, unfortunately. The original oculus brought VR back to the public and on the road to a more mainstream acceptance (not that it is there, yet ...), for that they deserve praise. Facebook left that vision behind, not only with the discontinuation of a dedicated headset but also with their current mandatory facebook account for using their hardware.


It is a shame, Oculus indeed are the one's that brought VR back and helped make it more than just a passing fad like previous attempts at VR and they should be remembered for this.

It's really sad that the peeps whispering words of doom for Oculus when they got bought out by facebook are being proven right by the direction facebook is going. Oddly enough it reminds me a little of Ready Player One but wherein the good guys lost....
 
While I am sad to see the Rift go it comes as no surprise. Having owned the DKII i will never forget those early Rift experiences.

Tethered VR is not the future. The evolution of the Oculus HMD with Abrash and Carmack at the helm is still a very exciting prospect.
If you want the best visual experience, it's going to be few more years until we get away from tethered VR. Unless they find a way to cram an RTX 3090 into a headset soon. ;)
 
If you want the best visual experience, it's going to be few more years until we get away from tethered VR. Unless they find a way to cram an RTX 3090 into a headset soon. ;)
I suspect the eventual solution there will be to leave the graphics generation on the PC, and use something like WiGig to ship uncompressed frames to the headset. The question is whether self-contained headset graphics will get "good enough" that PC-dependent solutions are relegated to niche status.

Ideally the industry would evolve towards standards that would let you buy one headset that works as a standalone device OR connects to your PC, gaming console, etc. But that's a generation or two away still, if it happens at all.
 
I suspect the eventual solution there will be to leave the graphics generation on the PC, and use something like WiGig to ship uncompressed frames to the headset. The question is whether self-contained headset graphics will get "good enough" that PC-dependent solutions are relegated to niche status.

Ideally the industry would evolve towards standards that would let you buy one headset that works as a standalone device OR connects to your PC, gaming console, etc. But that's a generation or two away still, if it happens at all.
I think it will happen in a few years. Headsets will get smaller and lighter, displays will get better, streaming technology will improve. Only a few years ago it was low res and clunky.
Now we are getting almost 4k screens. Exciting times. :)
 
If you want the best visual experience, it's going to be few more years until we get away from tethered VR. Unless they find a way to cram an RTX 3090 into a headset soon. ;)

Yeah for sure 100% agree.

I will be buying a Reverb G2 and a 3090 to replace my current 2080Ti/G1 combo for that exact reason.

Tethered VR and brute force rasterisation power is still where its at for hardcore VR sim rig enthusiasts given the lack of adoption for VRWorks in legacy render engines like Elite (and pretty much all sims).

But the goal is no doubt making a set of untethered patch in anywhere goggles with the same level of adoption as the personal computer/mobile phone.

In Carmack we trust.
 
While I am sad to see the Rift go it comes as no surprise. Having owned the DKII i will never forget those early Rift experiences.

Tethered VR is not the future. The evolution of the Oculus HMD with Abrash and Carmack at the helm is still a very exciting prospect.
But Carmack left like a year ago? He's now doing some data science projects... Which given his brilliant mind is probably better for humankind.
 
I will be buying a Reverb G2 and a 3090 to replace my current 2080Ti/G1 combo for that exact reason.
Unless money is no object, you'd want to wait for 3090 benchmarks because it might be a terrible "price-increase-to-performance-increase" ratio. In other words, +15% performance for +100% price. We already know that at lower resolutions 3080 rasterisation prowess is "not that impressive". And if you have a 2080Ti, the increase looks to be about 25% more with a 3080.
 
Read that btw. - it's strange, generally the first reviews were quite positive... Hmmm "sponsored articles" anyone?

Could be an "The Emperor's New Clothes" moment, when someone actually just realises it's a crap HMD.

As for the facebook account thing - that (I think) will ruin it for quite a few people. Then there is the apparent awful comfort of the 299 version.
 
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