Oculus founder finds cables an obstacle to VR breakthrough

According to Oculus founder Palmer Luckey, virtual reality headset cables are the biggest obstacle standing in the way of their success. For that reason, he thinks that wireless VR, such as with the Samsung Galaxy Gear, will be more popular with the public.

“Most people don’t have a servant to watch the cable for them,” stilt Luckey on Twitter. “I myself have danced around people for many hours with the cables to keep the VR experience convincing for them.” He emphasizes the importance of tuning both the hardware and software to these limitations.

The Oculus Rift is designed as a glorified computer screen; it must be connected to a PC, where the image signal and the computing power come from. Sending the signals wirelessly would indeed solve the problem with the cables, but that again introduces lag, which leads to motion sickness in the user.

With products such as Google Cardboard and Samsung Gear VR, the computing power is located in the headset, which means that a cable is no longer necessary. Because of this distinction, Luckey thinks mobile VR will be a success before the Rift does. Oculus is therefore more of a ‘seated VR experience’, something Oculus itself has often said. Mobile VR does of course have less computing power than a full desktop PC, which is also reflected in the offer on this platform.

The Oculus Rift is still under development at Palmer Luckey’s company. Alternatives such as Google Cardboard and Samsung Galaxy Gear VR are already available. The HTC Vive, which is being developed in collaboration with Valve and will also be wired, should also be available in the first quarter of 2016. Finally, the PlayStation VR for the PlayStation 4 will hit the market sometime in the first half of next year. Final prices have not yet been set for the Rift, Vive and PSVR. The Rift should in any case cost more than 350 dollars. Converted that is 317 euros.