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Backpack PC for Vive Pro


tobi_s

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I do hope there’s an option of a cable even if the backpack manufacturers start including the port. Would suck to have a load of PCs we can’t remove having the link box for.

 

As for Optitrack, I find a lot of people invest a fortune in the kit and then stick by it because they’ve just spend $50k on a tracking system that’s completely overkill for VR purposes. There’s also the whole getting your foot in the door thing.

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I do hope there’s an option of a cable even if the backpack manufacturers start including the port. Would suck to have a load of PCs we can’t remove having the link box for.

 

As for Optitrack, I find a lot of people invest a fortune in the kit and then stick by it because they’ve just spend $50k on a tracking system that’s completely overkill for VR purposes. There’s also the whole getting your foot in the door thing.

If you buy such an Optitrack system for an arcade, you're also renting a large room somewhere in a convenient area, you're having a number of people working there shuffling people in and out, making sure they don't run into eachother etc, and you're buying backpack PCs, building your custom controllers and whatnot. All-in-all the Optitrack rig is a large chunk of money, but it's not so large compared to all the other per-site costs.  At the same time, it allows you to enter the market now, learning about which games work etc before it (maybe) becomes much cheaper and you can deploy something proven in mass.

 

So my recommendation to all is: get the Optitrack, get the Vive Pro, and buy my company's IMUs to get responsive tracking! :smileyhappy:

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I do hope there’s an option of a cable even if the backpack manufacturers start including the port. Would suck to have a load of PCs we can’t remove having the link box for.

 

As for Optitrack, I find a lot of people invest a fortune in the kit and then stick by it because they’ve just spend $50k on a tracking system that’s completely overkill for VR purposes. There’s also the whole getting your foot in the door thing.

If you buy such an Optitrack system for an arcade, you're also renting a large room somewhere in a convenient area, you're having a number of people working there shuffling people in and out, making sure they don't run into eachother etc, and you're buying backpack PCs, building your custom controllers and whatnot. All-in-all the Optitrack rig is a large chunk of money, but it's not so large compared to all the other per-site costs.  At the same time, it allows you to enter the market now, learning about which games work etc before it (maybe) becomes much cheaper and you can deploy something proven in mass.

 

So my recommendation to all is: get the Optitrack, get the Vive Pro, and buy my company's IMUs to get responsive tracking! :smileyhappy:

A 30x30m Optitrack kit is $500,000. Half a million! A 10x10m to match Lighthouse is anywhere from $50,000 to $70,000 plus a few grand in extras for markers, calibration units, etc. That's a lot of money upfront. A retail premises in my nearest city could be around £50,000 a year for 3,000 sqft which is a good starting point - however that extra $50-70k on top could be the killer that means your business doesn't happen.

 

Optitrack won't even help out developers, I asked if they could do a loaner kit or a discount in exchange for us pushing a considerable amount of business their way and they wouldn't give me the time of day. Qualisys is more expensive but their local reseller wanted to lend me a kit to work on a project with it.

 

Either way, this is getting off topic now. ;)

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Cool, thanks. I assume that backpack vendors will be very interested in keeping their backpacks compatible with the high end of the market, so I'm sure that there's interest in a short, direct connection 3-to-1 cable also on their side, though they may be encumbered by patents and the like.

Yes this is being looked into. Could you also share which VR PC backpack you plan to use? 

Just a thought , would it be possible for you guys to provide/sell a much shorter cable in the meantime? 1.5ft-ish would probably suffice. Just enough to connect to the linkbox without having to hang 5m of redundant cable off the user's head.

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Cool, thanks. I assume that backpack vendors will be very interested in keeping their backpacks compatible with the high end of the market, so I'm sure that there's interest in a short, direct connection 3-to-1 cable also on their side, though they may be encumbered by patents and the like.

Yes this is being looked into. Could you also share which VR PC backpack you plan to use? 

Just a thought , would it be possible for you guys to provide/sell a much shorter cable in the meantime? 1.5ft-ish would probably suffice. Just enough to connect to the linkbox without having to hang 5m of redundant cable off the user's head.

I don't think that's very appealing, because besides having to attach the Link Box somewhere, you would still have to run three cables from the PC to the LinkBox. In particular, you couldn't use one of the combined cables that are on the market for that purpose because the Vive Pro uses Displayport and USB-3 whereas old cables are HDMI and USB-2.  The price of progress.

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wrote:

Cool, thanks. I assume that backpack vendors will be very interested in keeping their backpacks compatible with the high end of the market, so I'm sure that there's interest in a short, direct connection 3-to-1 cable also on their side, though they may be encumbered by patents and the like.

Yes this is being looked into. Could you also share which VR PC backpack you plan to use? 

Just a thought , would it be possible for you guys to provide/sell a much shorter cable in the meantime? 1.5ft-ish would probably suffice. Just enough to connect to the linkbox without having to hang 5m of redundant cable off the user's head.

Ideally there would be a cable option that you could connect directly to the backpack PC. This is what we are investigating. Thanks. 

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