South Korean government shows Samsung VR headset that works without a phone

A supplier has posted images and info online about the ExynosVR III, the name of a prototype of a Samsung GearVR that can function without a phone. The headset has built-in OLED screens, just like the Oculus Rift and HTC Vive.

The K-ICT Born2Global Centre, a government institute that comes under the South Korean Ministry of Science, ICT and Futures Planning and aims to promote startups, put a press release online about the new VR headset, in which it describes the integration of eye tracking software in the upcoming vr headset. That software comes from Visual Camp, a company that is a member of that government agency.

With eye tracking, the vr headset called ExynosVR III can see what the user is looking at and sharpen only that part. In addition to eye tracking, the VR headset contains techniques for tracking the positions of the hands, facial expressions and voice recognition. The name Exynos comes from the chip division of Samsung. The manufacturer’s mobile socs have been given the Exynos brand name for years.

Born2Global Center claims that Samsung has shown the technology at its booth at a telecom fair in China, but no information was released about the prototype before. It is not yet a version of the VR headset that will be for sale in the store.

The prototype can control two wqhd+ screens, the resolution of the Galaxy S8 smartphone, at 90fps, but a single 4k screen is also possible. The soc in the headset seems to match that of the S8, with four Mongoose processor cores at 2.5GHz, four lower clocked A53 processor cores and an ARM Mali G71MP20 GPU. Samsung produces the soc at 10nm.

It is unknown when Samsung will launch a standalone version of a VR headset. Until now, the South Korean company has only released the Gear VR, a headset that uses the phone that users slide into the hardware and screen. Samsung said last year it was already working on a VR headset that works without a phone.