Wednesday, 3 September 2014

Samsung's Gear VR is a portable Oculus Rift for the Galaxy Note 4

Samsung has officially joined Virtual Reality world. The Gear VR is a headset designed to fit around the 5.7-inch Galaxy Note 4, which serves as a screen. That makes it completely wireless and powered by the phone, unlike the Oculus Rift or Sony's Project Morpheus. The Gear VR has been leaked for a while, with rumors of a Samsung partnership with Oculus going back to earlier this year.

The new Note 4 has a 2560x1440 , which means that the Gear VR has a higher resolution than the latest Rift development kit. In addition to turning the Note image into an immersive 3D display, the Gear VR adds a side trackpad designed for navigating menus and playing games, a back button, and a volume key. The rear camera can also be turned on to give you an image of the real world around you. Oculus has contributed technical knowledge, likely including software tweaks to reduce latency and help choosing lenses. And Samsung has lined up a handful of games and other media experiences to go with it, including a tour of Tony Stark's lab from Avengers: Age of Ultron,HD music videos from Vevo, and the Pacific Rim Jaeger Pilot demo we saw at Comic Con.

The Gear VR uses same dual-lens method — showing different images to each eye to trick your brain into seeing depth that isn't there — that's the basis for all sorts of virtual reality and 3D applications, but the difference this time is that there's a simple smartphone powering the experience. When you remove the grey plastic cover from the front of the Gear VR, you'll find a latch that accepts the Note 4 (and only the Note 4) horizontally, connecting to the USB port and latching in place securely.

Since the phone is completely covered when in the Gear VR, you then control the interface with a combination of head movements and a touchpad, which is found on the right side of the headset. That touchpad takes both swipes and taps to make selections in the interface when you're wearing it, and is also accompanied by a "back" button for quicker navigation and external volume keys.