Samsung recently filed patents with China’s National Intellectual Property Administration (CNIPA) office that shows off a few new designs in what appears to be two fairly similar PC VR headsets.
There’s little to go on besides the photos of both design patents, which were first uncovered by 91Mobiles, although we can hypothesize a bit from what we see below.
Unlike Samsung’s previous HMD Odyssey and Odyssey+ headsets, which sports two outward-facing camera sensors, it isn’t clear exactly what tracking standard the proposed headset(s) may use.
As seen in the renders and diagrams, a translucent cover houses a cage-like piece that has four prominent divots on the front; with such little information, these could be any number of things, including SteamVR sensors, outward-facing camera sensors, or simply attach points for the cover itself.
Otherwise, the render shows off a very similar design and strap system to the Samsung HMD Odyssey, which also features integrated audio. A cable trailing off on the left side of the headset betrays it as a tethered PC VR headset.
The second patent uncovered by 91Mobiles is a little less mysterious regarding its positional tracking standard. As if VR headsets didn’t look strange enough, this one shows off a prominent faceplate that seems to be drawing inspiration from the insect world. We weren’t unable to locate the above patent, but the insectioid design can be found officially listed on the CNIPA website.
Underneath the translucent faceplate appears to be four optical sensors, which appear to cover the front, and left and right flanks. The Odyssey line of Windows Mixed Reality headsets only has two forward-facing sensors, but in more or less the same locations as the front-facing ones seen below in the diagrams.
Note: both headset designs sport the same logo on the top of the headset and integrated into the strap system on the back, which could denote a line apart from the Odyssey Mixed Reality headset line (see update).
Samsung has yet to give any indication as to whether it intends to actually produce the headset, be in one form or the other. As it is, all products have patents, but not all patents become products, so only time will tell.
The above patent was published recently, however it was filed on January 3rd, 2019, so there’s no telling when/if the design will find its way to other main patent offices soon as the process may differ from country to country.
Update (1:20 PM ET): the logo seen in the design patents above incorporate the Odyssey logo, which is used on the company’s laptop line, but not their previous VR headset line as such. Thanks goes to ‘dk’ for pointing it out.
