Vive Wireless Adapter Now Available, Starting at $300

tpcast uses an additional router that everyone complains about so …

Sure, there’s probably also a transmitter in there, but it’s very unlikely to be a 60GHz transmitter, since data from the headset isn’t nearly as bandwidth intensive. Staying away from 60GHz for outbound data should help avoid potential interference with the video signal, as well as avoid the Line Of Sight issues that 60GHz is prone to. In the case of the TPCast, data being sent to the computer is done over 5GHz instead of the 60GHz used to send video to the headset.

People have generally been concerned about the use of 60GHz in particular, which is why I only focused on that aspect. But as long as we’re talking about transmitters in general, everyone who uses a Rift or Vive has held transmitters in their hands and strapped transmitters to their face the entire time they’ve used one. After all, the motion controllers have to communicate with something, and that something is the radio built into the headset.

It just drives me crazy to hear people worry about the mere possibility of a 60GHz receiver on top of their heads, when they’ve been perfectly fine wearing an actual transmitter right in front of their eyes the whole time–especially when the transmitter they’re ok with actually is capable of generating signals that can penetrate into the human brain. It’s the selective fear of RF radiation combined with worrying about the wrong part that manages to get under my skin. And really, it’s getting the source of the radiation wrong that bothers me most. If someone is worried about a wall-mounted transmitter filling a room with 60GHz radiation, I can respect that concern even if I personally believe there’s no danger. But when many people reflexively worry about an object in close proximity to their head that is literally no more dangerous than the other object that they’re already strapping to their head, I find it increasingly hard to be polite.

Given the invisible dangers of radiation like UV light, x-rays, and gamma rays, I can understand why people might worry about RF radiation, but I do expect such people to have some understanding of where the radiation is actually coming from. A spectator who happens to be standing near the transmitter will get a stronger dose of 60GHz radiation than the person actually using the wireless VR headset. If someone fears 60GHz, they need to worry about the transmitter on the wall. And if someone fears 2.4/5GHz, they need to worry about cellphones, their VR headsets, and their home wireless network, not just an add-on wireless kit.

On the TPCast at least, that’s done with a 5GHz transmitter, not a 60GHz one. Also in the case of the TPCast, that transmitter isn’t even head-mounted, though admittedly it probably will be on the Vive wireless adapter. Anyway, there’s already a transmitter in the wired Vive headset (the controllers need something to talk to), so people have already been staring at a wireless transmitter mere centimeters in front of their eyes. And unlike 60GHz, the lower frequency signals commonly used by wireless adapters can penetrate far enough to reach the brain. After all, they’re capable of broadcasting through walls.

Even if the Vive wireless adapter ends up using 60GHz to send data back to the computer instead of a more commonly used frequency, any energy beamed into the head is wasted, so it’s in their best interest to reflect such energy away from the head. Considering the transmitter has a 150-degree FOV, it seems that they’re already trying to focus energy where it’s most useful. It seems reasonable that they would do the same with the head-mounted part of the adapter, if they put a 60GHz transmitter in there too.

The Vive wireless adapter almost certainly has a transmitter in it due to the absence of an external module, but it seems unlikely that the transmitter will use 60GHz, since the TPCast chose not to. In fact, in the case of the TPCast, they decided to add a 5GHz-capable network router to their kit rather than make their 60GHz transmitter into a transceiver. Maybe HTC will rely on 60GHz for transmitting from the headset, but given the pretty severe limitations of 60GHz, there’s little reason to use it if the bandwidth isn’t being put to good use.

Here’s a study called “Effects of Long-Term Exposure to 60 GHz Millimeter-Wavelength Radiation on the Genotoxicity and Heat Shock Protein (Hsp) Expression of Cells Derived from Human Eye” that found no adverse effects to 60GHz radiation exposure, and among other things they were looking for single-strand breaks in DNA, so they were looking quite closely for damage.

Mind you, that’s with the cells being directly exposed to the 60GHz radiation. The human brain benefits from a protective barrier of skin and bone.

Ultimately, the way I see it, the HTC wireless adapter can’t do anything that a VR user isn’t already happily subjecting themselves to simply by wearing a wired headset in the first place. 60GHz can’t reach the brain, and even if it could there’s no evidence of detectable damage.These days people are exposing themselves to 2.4GHz and 5GHz almost constantly which can reach the brain, regardless of whether or not they use VR at all.