Oculus has finally taken the wraps off of Rift S, its first PC VR headset release in three years. But there's a reason the company is calling this Rift S and not Rift 2; the changes are mostly for the better, but not improvements across the board. This week at GDC, during a special Oculus media event, we got our first look at the Rift S, the company's Rift-replacement that's clearly designed for ease of use and affordability; the Rift S will launch in Spring and be available for $400, and is of course fully compatible with the existing Rift library. For a detailed look at specifications and features, see our article about the Rift S announcement here. The high-level look is that Rift S moves to an inside-out tracking system (in lieu of the more cumbersome external sensors of its predecessor), gets a small increase in resolution, and an ergonomic redesign. But there's a few changes that don't feel like clear-cut improvements over the original Rift. Visuals [caption id="attachment_86673" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Photo by Road to VR[/caption] Resolution Of primary interest is what things look like through the Rift S. Here's the skinny: Rift S now uses a single display which amounts to 1,280 × 1,440 per-eye, a moderate increase (1.4 times the total pixels) over the original Rift's 1,080 × 1,200 per-eye resolution. But, the new display is LCD instead of OLED, which brings a handful of benefits like a better fill-factor (less unlit space between pixels) and less mura, but often lacks the rich colors and contrast of OLED. That said, Rift S's LCD display seems quite up to the task, despite running at 80Hz compared to the Rift's 90Hz. [irp posts="74991" name="Understanding the Difference Between 'Screen Door Effect', 'Mura', & 'Aliasing'"] Clarity and Field of View With the bump in resolution alone you get a bit better fidelity and a bit less screen door effect, but with the improved fill-factor of LCD, the screen door effect (unlit space between pixels) sees a pretty solid reduction which makes the Rift S clarity seem better than the moderate change in resolution would suggest. With a "slightly larger" field of view—according to Oculus, which wouldn't provide a specific FOV measurement—and minimal mura, what you see inside the headset looks a lot like the original Rift but with better clarity. The screen door effect is less distracting, and it's easier to get lost in the content. Refresh Rate & Lenses [caption id="attachment_86670" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Photo by Road to VR[/caption] On the 80Hz display, Oculus says that one reason for making it lower than the Rift's 90Hz display was to ensure they could maintain the same recommended PC specifications as the original headset (to avoid fragmentation). That said, I don't think I'd have any chance of seeing the difference between the Rift S at 80Hz and the Rift at 90Hz, though anyone who is highly sensitive to flicker might be able to feel the difference in excessively bright scenes. As for the new lenses in Rift S, it's too early for me to say with certainty to what extent they've changed things, but assuming they're similar to the improved lenses in Quest and Go (as Oculus says), then I'd expect a larger sweet spot. These are still Fresnel lenses though, so you can expect some god rays, though they have likely been reduced to a similar extent as Quest and Go. Ignore anyone telling you "there's no god rays" (which I hear all the time on headsets where this is not the case); god rays are most visible with high contrast scenes and you aren't likely to notice them otherwise. However, in my time with the Rift S so far, I didn't get to choose what content I was looking at, so I didn't get to pull up a good test for god rays. No Hardware IPD Adjustment Because Rift S is using a single display, it has no hardware IPD adjustment (unlike the original Rift) to change the distance between the lenses to match the distance between your eyes. A proper IPD setting is important for visual comfort (and makes it easier to achieve maximum panel utilization). While IPD on the Rift S can be adjusted, to an extent, in software, users on the outer limits of the IPD range might be left wanting. Oculus hasn't specified what they consider to be the headset's acceptable IPD range. Passthrough+ Oculus is talking up the new passthrough capability of the Rift S, which allows users to 'see through' their headset by piping the video feed from the on-board cameras into the displays. The company says they've paid special attention to make sure the feed is low latency, high framerate, and stereo-correct, which is why they've calling it 'Passthrough+'. Passthrough+ was unfortunately not ready for testing during my Rift S demo, but Oculus says that users will be able to set up their Guardian playspace boundaries by using passthrough+. Instead of tracing the boundary using a controller while looking at their computer monitor, users will see their environment directly via passthrough and 'trace' their boundary right onto the floor (a smart improvement over the prior method). - - — - - All things considered, for those who are used to Oculus' first PC VR headset, Rift S's visuals aren't going to feel like a step into next-gen, but they are an improvement. Head & Controller Tracking [caption id="attachment_86678" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Photo by Road to VR[/caption] Perhaps the single largest point of difference between Rift S and the original Rift is the tracking system. Rift 'Constellation' Tracking (outside-in) [caption id="attachment_45858" align="aligncenter" width="500"] Rift's IR LEDs visualized[/caption] The original Rift uses an 'outside-in' tracking system (called Constellation) that relies on external cameras which look at glowing lights on the headset and controllers (made invisible by using infrared light) to determine the position of the devices. This has shown to be a highly performant approach, but adds complexity to the setup because the external sensors need to connect to the host PC and carefully placed. And unless users are willing to run a USB cable across their room for a 'room-scale' setup, the default Rift tracking setup restricts users to 'forward facing' gameplay. Rift S Insight Tracking (inside-out) [caption id="attachment_86746" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Image courtesy Oculus[/caption] Rift S, on the other hand, uses an 'inside-out' tracking system (called Insight) which places five cameras onto the headset itself. The cameras look at the world around the user, and computer vision algorithms use the information to determine the position of the headset. The on-board cameras also look for glowing lights on the controllers (also invisible via infrared) to determine their location relative to the headset. An inside-out system like this is vastly more complex than the outside-in system of the Rift, and it's taken companies like Oculus several years to achieve the robustness and performance needed to make it work for a VR headset. Room-scale Out of the Box The result, however, means that Rift S is much easier to set up, and now has room-scale tracking out of the box, which means players can be more immersed in some games by walking around larger spaces and turning around naturally instead of relying on stick-based turning. Depending upon the game, having full 360 room-scale tracking can really enhance immersion levels (Lone Echo comes to mind for me). The actual camera layout on Rift S is similar to Quest but has five cameras instead of four, and uses a different configuration. Instead of cameras mounted at the corners of the headset's front panel, there's two cameras toward the bottom of the front panel which face forward, one camera on the left and right of the headset which aim slightly downward, and one camera on top of the headset which faces the ceiling. Latency & Accuracy From my hands-on time so far, Rift S tracking feels nearly identical to Rift in latency and accuracy, though it might have a bit more jitter. In my time with the headset I saw zero unexpected/sudden head movements, and latency on both my head movements and hands felt very tight. However, when moving my hands especially close to the headset (like when bringing my controller close to my face to look at the buttons) they would sometimes get a little bit wonky, which makes me think that there's something of a dead zone for the controllers if they get too close to any one camera. Controller Caveats [caption id="attachment_86737" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Image courtesy Oculus[/caption] This might not often be a practical issue, but you can imagine that it could pose a problem in certain game interactions like, for instance, a bow game where your string hand naturally pulls near to one side of your head before releasing, or a game where you bring objects near your face (like putting on a hat, eating a piece of food, or putting on glasses). Developers who still want to use these interactions may need to make case-by-case adjustments to make sure they work well. Outside of the 'very near the headset' bubble, controller tracking seems to work very well for a broad range of interactions, and tracking coverage for the controllers feels massively improved over the inside-out tracking on Windows VR headsets. Of course this comes with the caveat that it's possible to move the controllers outside of the field of view of the cameras. If you turn your head one way and hold your arm out the other way, you might end up breaking line of sight between the cameras and the controller with your body. The system recovers easily if this happens momentarily because positional estimation is still ongoing via an IMU, but if it happens for extend periods (like when a member of the press intentionally puts their hands behind their back to test the controllers) the controllers eventually freeze in place and stay there until their position is reacquired by the cameras. Oculus readily admits that some poses won't work, and that will impact some content over others, but they say they've designed the system to offer "maximum compatibility" for existing content. Over time it's likely that developers will gain a keen sense of problematic poses and interactions, and either design fixes that make tracking occlusion invisible to the play, or avoid those poses outright. - - — - - Overall, Insight feels like a clear win for the Rift S in terms of ease of use and the addition of room-scale tracking by default—and is notably better in terms of controller tracking coverage than Windows VR—but doesn't come without a few caveats. So far the problematic edge cases for controller tracking seem fairly innocuous, but this will be deeply content-specific. Continue Reading on Page 2: Ergonomics » Ergonomics [caption id="attachment_86676" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Photo by Road to VR[/caption] The Rift S looks like a totally new headset from the outside, and actually a bit bulkier and uglier than its predecessor in my opinion. Granted, I've always said that it doesn't matter how a headset looks like on the outside as long as it offers a good experience inside, so I'm not going to complain much about looks. An Unlikely Ally [caption id="attachment_86681" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Oculus Rift S is branded with Lenovo's logo to signify the company's involvement. | Photo by Road to VR[/caption] What does matter though is how it fits and feels. Oculus says they partnered with Lenovo to collaborate on the design and manufacture of the Rift, and that's led to an ergonomic approach which looks a lot like Lenovo's prior VR headsets. Rift S now uses a halo style headband but retains the overhead strap of the original Rift. The combination feels very, very comfortable on my head, but the comfort of halo head mounts seems anecdotally to be hit or miss depending on the shape of the user's head. The top strap ought to help accommodate a wider range of heads though, because it offers a reasonable way to distribute some additional weight and adjust the height of the lenses as they hang in front of the user's eyes. Lenovo's Daydream headset, which is somewhat similar in design to Rift S, lacks an overhead strap and suffers ergonomically because of it. [caption id="attachment_86671" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Photo by Road to VR[/caption] The new approach has a two points of adjustment (a knob on the back of the band for adjusting tightness and the velcro strap on top) rather than the three of the original Rift, which makes it quick and easy to adjust. There's also a way now to adjust the headset's eye-to-lens distance which can help maximize field of view and make the headset easier to use with glasses. To adjust, just press the button on the bottom of the visor and slide the entire assembly forward and back (very similar to PSVR and Vive Pro). I'll need longer sessions in Rift S to suss out any potential ergonomic pain points, but (in 30 minute sessions at least) the headset feels comfortable, better balanced than its predecessor, and highly adjustable. Hidden Audio Missing from the Rift S is the headphones of the original Rift, but on-board audio hasn't been removed it's just been hidden. Similar to Go and Quest, Oculus has hidden openings in the Rift S headband near the user's ears from which audio emanates. This arguably makes the headset easier to put on (by getting the headphones out of the way and removing the need to adjust their position), but comes at the expense of some audio fidelity and noise isolation that prevents real world noise from distracting from virtual noise. Granted, the Rift S has a 3.5mm jack on the side, so you can use your own headphones if you want, but I didn't personally feel like the original Rift's headphones were problematic and quite liked the quality and noise isolation they provided without needing to manage a separate pair of headphones which weren't designed to fit around the head straps. Indeed, even the headphones Oculus provided during my Rift S demo had a cumbersome fit around the headset's straps. In-ear earbuds then could be a good way to go, but add even more friction than the original Rift's integrated headphones. As for audio quality and positionality, the demo environment was far too loud to get a good sense from the hidden audio in Rift S, so I'll need to look into this more carefully in another session. A Touch Different [caption id="attachment_86677" align="aligncenter" width="640"] Photo by Road to VR[/caption] Rift S uses controllers which are similar to the original Rift's excellent Touch controllers, but not exactly the same (they're identical to those used on Quest). The most obvious difference is that the tracking rings now go over the hand instead of under (which better positions them to be seen by the cameras on the headset). The less obvious differences are a slightly different feel to the sticks and buttons, and subtle change to the controller's shape. That subtle change doesn't look like much when you see the controllers side-by-side, but it feels—to my hands at least—like a step back from 'perfect'. While the original Touch controllers fit beautifully in my hands, the Rift S controllers just don't feel quite as good. This is likely to vary from person to person, but the slightly straighter feeling controller doesn't cup the form of my hand as well. It's not a drastic change mind you, but it's notable considering how damn good the original Touch controllers feel. [irp] While the buttons feel a bit different from the original controller, they are fine overall. The sticks on the other hand feel ever so slightly smaller or less robust, including the 'down click' function which doesn't offer as much feedback. These are still engineering samples however, so hopefully there's a bit more tuning to come to the stick feel. - - — - - All-in-all, Rift S is shaping up to be a better offering at a similar price as what came before it, but it doesn't feel indicative of three years and ostensibly millions of dollars of R&D since the launch of the first Rift. Backed by Oculus' impressive content library, it's likely to be a strong offering for new users, but early adopters of the Rift might miss some features of the original. There's a lot to talk about with Rift S and we surely haven't covered everything with this hands-on. 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