Oculus Rift Development on OS X 'Paused' to Focus on Strong Windows Launch

[Renzatic]

Two? Tri-SLI man... so I don't have to cut anymore acrylic tubing for my watercooling system.

Yah... going to go for the VRAM for future proof for 4K... and update later to either Broadwell-e or Skylake-e... with the hopes that DDR4 comes down in price. Planning on updates and building is another reason why I stick with Windows PC's.... but I'm a technology fan... so I like Apple products too. I think us lower end consumers can get along with Mac people too.

To go off on an aside for a sec, my problem with investing in about $4500+ worth of graphics solely for playing games is that in 3-4 years, those three cards are going to match what'll be a $350 mid-high spec GPU, like the 970 I just got. You'll be untouchable for a year or so, but the return on the investment almost seems to shrink exponentially per year.

Don't get me wrong. If you get three Titan X's, I'll be envious and covetous. But at the same time, I just can't justify it for myself. If I want to keep up with that much power, it's cheaper just to upgrade every 2 years.

 

[Tech198]

It's from Microsoft, of course they'd be a bigger launch with Windows users..

For some reason these *snorkels* kind of lookt like the goggles u see in Notting Hill in the theater...

http://www.prescriptionsnorkelmask.com/assets/images/mk-121.jpg

(kazoos!!.... I don't wanna look like that )

 

[Evil Spoonman]

You're taking that about 10 steps further than it needs to go. Seriously, just stop because gaming on a Mac is not "shockingly bad" neither are the GPU's "garbage".

This is what I told myself for years as well. As I tried to shoehorn my hobby into substandard hardware and non-optimized software. Turns out, I was just being silly. It IS shockingly bad. There are numbers to back it up too. Generally speaking the fastest iMac you can buy has gaming performance which is less than half as good as a decently outfitted PC. The PC costs less as well. That's like for like, Windows to Windows, a direct hardware comparison. If you flip over to Mac OS X, you're talking less than half as fast and worse looking simultaneously (OpenGL titles often do not support the same level of shader quality).

Lets be clear: I love my Mac, I own a nice Mac. I do a majority of my computing on it. Apple has simply not served my needs, so I went elsewhere. If you are a gamer and Apple is not serving your needs, build a PC.

Lets also make the only salient point here. The value of any platform is what you can do with it. The Mac is great at many things, the PC is great at some other things. Embrace all platforms for their ability to do what you need.

I guess you missed the rMBP intro where they showcased Diablo 3 in 4K.

I currently own the Retina MacBook Pro 15" on which they did that demo. D3 is unplayable at 2880x1800, framerates are low 20s to high teens. All games on the rMBP 15" have to be played at 1440x900 (quarter res) to perform acceptably.

I have absolutely no problem with this, you trade off thin and light for performance. The 15" rMBP has the thin, the light, the amazing screen, and in many cases the performance as well. Pushing over 5 megapixels is hard for desktop GPUs. It's not a gaming machine, and it isn't pretending to be.

 

[elgrecomac]

These days the vast majority of people spending money on third party software are Apple customers. Microsoft's third party large investor customers are primarily corporations, and those won't be buying Ocolus.

Big mistake: they picket the wrong OS to start first with.

I love it when a statistic is quoted but totally unsubstantiated

One of the more ridiculous posts in recent memory....Thanks, Teddy

 

[erayser]

To go off on an aside for a sec, my problem with investing in about $4500+ worth of graphics solely for playing games is that in 3-4 years, those three cards are going to match what'll be a $350 mid-high spec GPU, like the 970 I just got. You'll be untouchable for a year or so, but the return on the investment almost seems to shrink exponentially per year.

Don't get me wrong. If you get three Titan X's, I'll be envious and covetous. But at the same time, I just can't justify it for myself. If I want to keep up with that much power, it's cheaper just to upgrade every 2 years.

No worries... I don't take things personal. When I game, I like to play in 3x NVidia surround in landscape. When I move to 3x 4K monitors... I feel better with a Tri-SLI setup then to run all 3 on one card. I say I want Titan X's... but I'll probably end up with 980's or whatever is the latest when I start my build.

I don't just game on my rig. I do a lot of photoshop and video editing... but building and upgrading is my main hobby. Custom watercooling is addicting... and have spent 1k on just watercooling parts alone. I Also like to mod and overclock... and do a of personal benchmarks. I do it for the fun of it... not just gaming.

 

[MH01]

You threw in so many words that were never said or even suggested by me. I never said anything about Macs being good for gaming or anything about the Core 2 duo. I just said Mac GPU's aren't "garbage". Please move on.

In some people's opinions they are garbage . All depends where your bar is for GPU performance when it comes to gaming. Though I believe we agree macs strong point is not gaming.

 

[MH01]

Exactly, console gaming (Xbox ONE/PS4) is on top of it's game now. PC gaming is declining badly. The more recent popular games aren't even being released on PC at the same time as the Xbox ONE and PS4.

Yet again, completely wrong on a topic. Please don't spread incorrect information .

http://***********/?q=pc+gaming+popularity

May I say, you do not get a PC gaming rig for console ports..... Some of the best games out there are not on consoles, the PC gaming industry is huge.

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I didn't say I wouldn't support Windows. I'm just not going to make a feature that only works on one platform and not another. That's the kind of crap that EA does.

Fair enough. If you have time and resources to do both go for it, though OS X with its poor drivers for gaming is going to give you a lot of unnecessary headaches, I hope it does not delay you launching for too long, if you want to release both at the same time.

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No worries... I don't take things personal. When I game, I like to play in 3x NVidia surround in landscape. When I move to 3x 4K monitors... I feel better with a Tri-SLI setup then to run all 3 on one card. I say I want Titan X's... but I'll probably end up with 980's or whatever is the latest when I start my build.

I don't just game on my rig. I do a lot of photoshop and video editing... but building and upgrading is my main hobby. Custom watercooling is addicting... and have spent 1k on just watercooling parts alone. I Also like to mod and overclock... and do a of personal benchmarks. I do it for the fun of it... not just gaming.

So so true. I have found myself upgrading less when I started building water cooled rigs. In the end, like a Mac Pro, you pay for the power, and than you get to push it even further. I do not hunk I will ever stop building custom rigs, it's just so much fun

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This is what I told myself for years as well. As I tried to shoehorn my hobby into substandard hardware and non-optimized software. Turns out, I was just being silly. It IS shockingly bad. There are numbers to back it up too. Generally speaking the fastest iMac you can buy has gaming performance which is less than half as good as a decently outfitted PC. The PC costs less as well. That's like for like, Windows to Windows, a direct hardware comparison. If you flip over to Mac OS X, you're talking less than half as fast and worse looking simultaneously (OpenGL titles often do not support the same level of shader quality).

Lets be clear: I love my Mac, I own a nice Mac. I do a majority of my computing on it. Apple has simply not served my needs, so I went elsewhere. If you are a gamer and Apple is not serving your needs, build a PC.

Lets also make the only salient point here. The value of any platform is what you can do with it. The Mac is great at many things, the PC is great at some other things. Embrace all platforms for their ability to do what you need.

Very well put, and summarises the reality of many people who own both platforms for their pros/cons.

 

[AlecZ]

Anyone who's "gamer enough" to use this probably has a custom-made PC, meaning they probably run Windows at least as a dual-boot option. Macs can play games nicely, but anyone who's putting a lot of money into games and using a PC mainly for games isn't going to go for machines with non-upgradeable GPUs and higher hardware costs and limitations.

Apple really has no support for the computer hobbyist. They tease them with crap like Mac minis. The closest you can get is with an older Mac Pro (unless you go with Hackint0sh). I use one just because it's the only Mac I can upgrade/repair myself (gotta have my expandable internal storage and stuff), plus it seems more reliable somehow than iMacs and has great cooling. I'll use it until it breaks.

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I'm continually baffled that people outside the corporate world still voluntarily use windows for anything.

It's a rational decision if you want a machine mainly for playing games, but the "wanting a machine mainly for playing games" part is enough to baffle me. I mean, unless you have the money and wanna spend it...

 

[0098386]

Exactly, console gaming (Xbox ONE/PS4) is on top of it's game now. PC gaming is declining badly. The more recent popular games aren't even being released on PC at the same time as the Xbox ONE and PS4.

Except it's not. PC gaming (if we're counting Steam and GOG active accounts as a metric) is on the increase.
Console gaming is doing great. The 3DS has surpassed Nintendo's expectations, the PS4 is currently mirroring sales seen on the PS2 (the best-selling console ever). And PC is good too with a recent surge in non-Steam services, as well as increases to the Steam playerbase too. The Wii U and Xbox One haven't done so great but it's usually the case that one system performs leaps and bounds ahead of the others.

What games get released on consoles first? The only huge one in recent memory is GTAV, a series which (since GTA3 onwards) has always been launched on consoles first.

 

[alexgowers]

I really wish apple would open up the os to any computer.

The install base is just too small but it's by far a better os, windows is ugly and runs older or clunkier tech, like ntfs and poor mouse scrolling etc.

It's a shame the software market is just bigger on windows and makes OS X bad for anything outside of apps that are designed for it.

 

[kmanmx]

If the screen I'm working with remains stationary in the VR world and the physical object in the real world are overlaid into the VR world, why not just use a real display like we already are? Where's the improvement? Display that can dynamically adjust in size for the task on which we're working? Other than that, I'm not sure I see it.

Looking out the window (vs the VR beach) has advantages, I can see what the weather outside is like, I could see the school bus dropping off my child, I can see that Jahovah witness coming down the sidewalk, etc

I like your analogy of headphones, but at the same time, it is different than that as well. I can see when people want to talk to me, eye contact and all that, even with headphones on (vs a VR headset, where even if the physical is mapped, you can't have real eye contact without taking them off).

Will definitely be interesting

Virtual Desktop will eventually allow you to have as many virtual screens as you want (Microsoft need to add some stuff to Win10 to make this possible, currently it can only replicate as many monitors as you physically have plugged in). So, while you may only have the room for a single 24" monitor on your desk, virtual desktop would allow you to have a 8 screen setup with 32" monitors. Or you could have a ring of monitors surrounding you entirely, if you so wish. You can also scale them to any size you wish, I've used virtual desktop and set it up so it looked like my PC was plugged into a cinema sized monitor. Even playing normal 2D non VR games through virtual desktop on a cinema sized screen is immensely satisfying.

I not sure we are actually disagreeing. For the sake of argument, I'll freely concede that it's perfect and has no glitches whatsoever. I'll agree that it's awesome and that most people, including myself, would absolutely would love it if they tried it.

I just don't think it will be a mass market success.

I think that mass market adoption failed on older models due to social issues and a lack of universal game support, two things that I don't think haven't changed for the Rift. Yes, they may have sucked too, but making them not suck doesn't automatically solve the other problems.

I think the first VR set that can crack universal game support will be the first to have a chance at achieving mass market adoption, but even then it will have to defeat social acceptance problems.

Different topic, but similar problem... Google Glass. From what I hear, those were great. Sure battery life could be better and lighter/small would be good. But their biggest problem, BY FAR, was the "Glass Hole" effect. Social acceptance is HUGE.

I guess it depends what you class as mass market. The Kickstarter campaign for the original Rift devkit blew up and was a huge success, proving there are people out there that want one. They've now go on to sell I believe significantly over 100K dev kits. 100,000 sales of something that isn't ready, very consumer unfriendly, and even tells people not to buy it on the store page, and also has zero advertising, is pretty good going in my eyes. Think of all the money and advertising being invested in consumer ready Android Smart Watches that only managed sales of ~500K between all devices in about a year.

I think it will be tricky convincing the average person that they need one. It's just not something that is easy to demonstrate to people over a TV advert. It's easy to show why a new phone is good on a TV advert, but it is practically impossible to convey just how compelling of an experience VR can deliver without actually trying it on for yourself. My parents are complete technophobes, I tried explaining VR to them but it went straight over their heads. If they saw an advert for it, they'd ignore it and have no real interest. But as soon as I sat them down with my DK2 and showed them Titans of Space, they were blown away. Two people that do not care for technology were totally slack jawed when I showed them. My dad is going to get one for himself, and my mom can't wait for me to get one. She keeps asking when it comes out. I definitely think it's going to be a case of advertising this thing by getting demo stands set up in every supermarket and shopping mall across the world and demoing it to as many people as possible, and then letting them tell their friends just how good it is.

 

[Marx55]

Apple should make true 3D displays (including the new*Apple Thunderbolt Display) to support nVidia 3D Vision
http://www.nvidia.com/object/3d-vision-main.html

 

[2IS]

These days the vast majority of people spending money on third party software are Apple customers. Microsoft's third party large investor customers are primarily corporations, and those won't be buying Ocolus.

Big mistake: they picket the wrong OS to start first with.

Link? Kinda sounds made up to me.

 

[Aeolius]

I'm convinced they're going to get beaten to market by a better product.

Remember 2008? Apple files for head-tracking display patents

2012 - Apple Interestingly Updates Head Tracking Patent & More

2015 - Apple awarded patent for virtual reality headset

 

[mdelvecchio]

I guess we'll have to wait a little longer to be disappointed by its performance on pathetic integrated graphics options on our £1000+ "Pro" Macs.

What nonsense. Mac Pro can handle these requirements.

If you're referring to the pro laptop, note that it's a working laptop (the "pro" is your tipoff), not a gaming rig. Even still, it has dedicated graphics in addition to the integrated video.

 

[2IS]

What nonsense. Mac Pro can handle these requirements.

If you're referring to the pro laptop, note that it's a working laptop (the "pro" is your tipoff), not a gaming rig. Even still, it has dedicated graphics in addition to the integrated video.

The dedicated graphics in a MacBook Pro is nowhere near as powerful as the GTX 970 that's recommended for the Rift

 

[erayser]

So so true. I have found myself upgrading less when I started building water cooled rigs. In the end, like a Mac Pro, you pay for the power, and than you get to push it even further. I do not hunk I will ever stop building custom rigs, it's just so much fun.

Great point. My Tri-SLI 780 have plenty of power to play current games at high settings, but if I want to up my specs to use oculus rift, I don't have to buy an entire system. I buy the components I want... and not what the manufacture gives you.

BTW... Nice rig in your sig. X79 is still a beast. You are tempting me to go with Titan's... LOL

Apple should make true 3D displays (including the new*Apple Thunderbolt Display) to support nVidia 3D Vision
http://www.nvidia.com/object/3d-vision-main.html

There was only one game I played from start to finish in Nvidia 3D... Tomb Raider looked amazing with TressFX, and Lara Croft look good in 3D too.

Other games didn't look as good... and lost interest. I'm thinking oculus rift will be the same... but as a fan of tech... I'll give it a try.

 

[peteo]

I don't think VR has an audience outside niche products, mostly training (write once, view often) or supervisory roles (like long-distance medical operations and pre-planning security escort details). It will falter like 3D tv, in that most families will balk at having to wear special glasses to enjoy a movie together in their own home.

Wow I love reading articles about VR on sites with people clueless about the subject. It's like reading an android msg board taking about apple an iOS
VR/AR is the future of computing they is no "maybe"
3DTV failed because it did not add any thing to the experience, it was a gimmick. It was not because you needed glasses.
VR/AR are totally different. Even just putting on the primitive Rift (DK2) your whole understanding of VR wi change. This not just some addon. It's going to have massive effect on just about every industry. Just like the internet has done.
Do your self a favor keep an open mind. when the HTC vive, oculus rift or Sony morphus are released try one out. This is the verry beginning of VR. Don't be left behind. Well you really can't be because within 5-10 VR will be all around that's why companies are spending billions. It's the future of basically everything.
We'll be interesting to see how Apple tackles it.

 

[spinedoc77]

Look, I agree with most of what you say, but the number of PC gamers is quite small compared to those playing games on Xbox or Playstation and casual gamers on iOS. If they want Oculus to have a bigger long term number of customer, hard core PC gamers only limits their goals.

I don't think the PC gaming market is doing badly, if anything it is doing quite well. In 2014 it made 21.5 billion and is projected to make 23 billion in 2017.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/marcochiappetta/2014/07/14/the-console-war-is-over-the-pc-already-won/

Global PC games sales have surpassed combined console sales.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/jasonev...how-long-should-console-makers-keep-fighting/


Long term, IMO, the mobile market will be the dominating force. Microsoft understands this, that's why Windows 10 is transformable and you can take your Windows 10 phone and plug it into a dock and it will function exactly like a desktop computer. Eventually theses phones/tablets will have the power needed to run high end games, maybe with the help of GPU enabled docks at first. But we aren't there yet, and the PC is the ONLY place for something like the Oculus to make sense in light of the minimum specs and the seamless experience they want to provide. I have no idea if it's true, but I strongly suspect the current consoles don't have the juice to run the Oculus the way they want it to run, today's consoles are barely any better than an entry level gaming PC.

NVIDIA, AMD, motherboard manufacturers, AMD/Intel, peripheral makers, Logitech, just way too many companies to list are chomping at the bit for the next big thing, the thing that will make all those PC gamers have to upgrade their rigs. Oculus seems to be that thing and a great strategy in terms of selling these products. Think about it, 21.5 billion in revenue just on games sales, what else are those gamers spending money on? Upgrades to their rigs, and of course Oculus will come out with new models every 1-2 years.

 

[xnu]

Apple is missing an opportunity. Sometimes people who work hard also play hard. I have been forced to buy a Windows PC to game and I have been a Mac user since 1987. Apples hardware is beautiful, but at best always a compromise. Steve Jobs said we will always need trucks, Apple only makes motorcycles. I own three 2013 Mac Pros as well.

 

[Noble Actual]

Good.

They need to make Oculus as best as possible during launch to get it out.

Macs have never been good at gaming.

Macs are good at other things. Windows are good at other things.

Having priorities is important especially for such a cool product.

 

[Skie77]

Since Windows 8 was released, each new version of Windows has been a reboot, and the OSs image has suffered as a result. OS X is a much more mature platform at this point, so I find it a little perplexing that OS X would be put on pause. We don't yet know how Windows 10 will be received in the marketplace, at the same time that Apple's share is growing, so this move may have been a bit misguided.

You mean Windows 8 that has twice the market share than OS X?
Apple share growing? 7% share after 12 years that's quite an accomplishment. Quite sure Windows 10 will exceed that within short time.

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These days the vast majority of people spending money on third party software are Apple customers. Microsoft's third party large investor customers are primarily corporations, and those won't be buying Ocolus.

Big mistake: they picket the wrong OS to start first with.

Let me rephrase that..

These days the vast majority of people spending money on games are Microsoft customers. Hence why the focus on Windows.

 

[Skie77]

People with Macs have better things to do.

You mean standing in line for the next Apple product?

 

[RDSns]

SO... do these make 25 % of the people who use them feel sick like 3D TV did?

If so DOA.

 

[Bubba Satori]

People with Macs have better things to do.

Did you conduct a survey?
The great thing about rationalization is that it doesn't cost anything.

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I really wish apple would open up the os to any computer.

It would lose it's niche, clique, fashionista and cultic status.
Nobody's going to stand in line for something that cost twice as much
and has half the capability without an Apple label on it.