News This Raspberry Pi VR Headset is Virtually From the 1990s

[Admin]

A gorgeous render shows what a Raspberry Pi VR headset would've looked like in the 1990s

This Raspberry Pi VR Headset is Virtually From the 1990s : Read more

 

[kyzarvs]

I first experienced VR in the mid 90's in an arcade on holiday in Florida, I guess from this article that it could have been Amiga powered. As a 'miggy-freak (I still have an A500, A600 and A1200) I'm very suprised I didn't know that.

It always makes me smile whenever I hear 'this is the year of VR' - been a looooong time coming!

 

[fireaza]

What kind of display would it have used? LCD still wasn't super-common in the 90s, and what was around had really slow refresh rates. Which would make you start blowing chunk after only a few seconds of using it. Dual CRT displays would probably rip your head off without some kind of tether to support it!

 

[DotNetMaster777]

VR headset seems to be heavy and uncomfortable

 

[bit_user]

I first experienced VR in the mid 90's in an arcade on holiday in Florida, I guess from this article that it could have been Amiga powered. As a 'miggy-freak (I still have an A500, A600 and A1200) I'm very suprised I didn't know that.

It's really amazing how VR captured so much attention, back in the early/mid 90's, considering how we barely had the tech to do interactive 3D graphics to begin with.

BTW, Nintendo's codename for the N64 was "Project Reality" and the SGI-designed GPU was called the "Reality Coprocessor". I don't know if Nintendo ever got far enough to actually experiment with headsets for it, but then we got Virtual Boy:

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It always makes me smile whenever I hear 'this is the year of VR' - been a looooong time coming!

Yeah, I was surprised when I first heard about the Oculus Rift. It was like "oh, yeah... I guess it is time for another VR hype bubble, I guess."

Each time VR comes back, it's better than the last time. Eventually, I do think it'll gain some real mainstream traction.

 

[bit_user]

What kind of display would it have used? ... Dual CRT displays would probably rip your head off without some kind of tether to support it!

Would've probably had to be CRT. That's a good point, as the render obviously doesn't leave room for them.

There actually were HMDs, back in the 90's. I'm pretty sure they were CRT, and they didn't rip anyone's head off. I guess CRTs scale down pretty well.

The Virtual Boy used a very interesting technique, involving a 1D strip of LEDs and an oscillating mirror:

"The display consists of two 2-bit (four shade) monochrome red screens of 384×224 pixels and a frame rate of approximately 50.27 Hz. It uses an oscillating mirror to transform a single column of 224 red LEDs into a full field of pixels. Nintendo claimed that a color display would have made "jumpy" images and have been too expensive. A color display would have required red, green, and blue LEDs; blue LEDs were then considerably expensive."

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_Boy#Display
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