Having been delayed until April 2016, the HTC Vive consumer headset is still under wraps. But these images, supposedly sourced from an accidental leak, may give us a clue as to what we can expect from the forthcoming 2nd Vive developer kits, recently announced to be on their way.
A pair of observant Redditors discovered new images of the HTC Vive headset and controllers on Thursday night. The images appear to have been found in a commented-out portion of code (since removed) from the HTC Vive developer site.
The headset image shows the familiar pockmarked enclosure but with a single camera lens in lower-front portion of the device. While it is difficult to tell for sure from the head-on perspective of the leaked image, the head strap also seems to have gotten an upgrade from the current dev kit.
See Also: Here’s the Entire Oculus Rift “Placeholder Concept” Leak
The controllers also appear to have gotten a redesign in the leaked images. The tracking portion now uses a hollow ring design, similar to what we’ve seen on Oculus’ half-moon prototype, and the thumb pads have been raised from the body of the controller. Interestingly, the bottom of the controller now shows a series of four dots of unknown purpose, perhaps for charging or grip detection.
We’ve seen early product images leaked before, most notably from Oculus, only to have them dismissed as unrepresentative of the final product, so there is no guarantee that this is what will end up shipping early next year.
As ever, we must emphasize that these are not confirmed as genuine in any way, the chances of an elaborate hoax is of course ever present.
Thanks to Michael Glombicki who deserves full reporting credit for this piece.
