The current Oculus Rift development kit will being to sell out, region-by-region, as their current inventory depletes. This is because "certain components" which they require are no longer available nor will they be produced. They claim to be looking for alternate suppliers but do not know how long that will take. In case you are wondering, they will be floating a stash of units to fulfill replacement requests (RMAs).
As of five days ago, they currently have stock in the following regions:
- United States
- Canada
- European Union
- Japan
- South Korea
- Australia
- Switzerland
- Norway
Of course, there is now speculation that Oculus is preparing to launch a new development kit revision. It is obvious that something new is in the works, especially since they presented a prototype at this year's CES, less than two months ago. The cynical way to take this is that they are looking to deplete their stock before releasing a new unit. The other direction is that they were intending to sell the first kit for a little while longer but one or two parts became difficult to acquire. Either way, unless finding a replacement source is easy enough and they do resume production of the original kit, we might be seeing a refresh at some point.
The question is then, "How long will that take?"
John Carmack: “Uh, guys? Can
John Carmack: “Uh, guys? Can I have my old job back?”
id Software: “Hell yeah!”
ZeniMax Media: “Fuck you.”
I think the title is
I think the title is misleading. They are moving forward with the newest version and d/c’ing the old version (that is supposed to happen); that is all.
No it’s not. Quoting the
No it's not. Quoting the source:
"Certain components used in the Oculus Rift developer kit are no longer being manufactured, meaning they are no longer available to us for production. As a result, we don't have the necessary materials to produce additional kits. We still have some stock available, but we're quickly running out. We are looking into alternate sources for the needed components, and we don't yet have a timeline for when additional units will be available. We'll be sure to keep everyone posted.
As we sell out of inventory in each region we plan to suspend sales in that region until we are able to deliver new orders. Currently we are only selling and shipping to the following countries:"
Sorry Scott,
Did not mean to
Sorry Scott,
Did not mean to imply that you were trying to be disingenuous. Just aware of how well they are doing and the momentum they have. I just see this whole thing over the first version dev kit as moot. Who would want one when the new version is coming out imminently? Why would a dev want to work on an already obsolete version?
ah ha ha ha, wow, you are off
ah ha ha ha, wow, you are off the mark.
The sales of the Oculus rift have been amazing, even ignoring the fact that it hasn’t been launched yet.
The amount of buzz that surrounds it continues to grow, and more and more games include support for basic
I completely expect to see information on the consumer version start to leak,
TL:DR Dont walk south when you want to go to the north pole
>>Dont walk south when you
>>Dont walk south when you want to go to the north pole<< You mean he wouldn't eventually end up there anyway?
A lot of support and interest
A lot of support and interest was also shown in OUYA. 🙂
Google has had numerous failures, yet the interest in Google Glass is peaking at $1,500 a pop. Failure isn’t measured in interest, but the lack of audience willing to put their money where their mouth is and a community who’s willing to develop for it. Hardware is just hardware without massive developer weight to make it a success. Even the Steam Box will struggle in its current form with radically different hardware compared to its original goal of creating tiered performance levels.
Time will tell indeed. 3D has been tried with TV’s and Movies 3 times since the 1970’s and each time failed. Virtual Reality has also been tried numerous times. Who knows maybe people will enjoy wearing huge blocks on their heads again.
the huge block is actually
the huge block is actually the least of oculus’ challenges as we hopefully head to mainstream VR. They need to solve system requirement issues and after that they can readdress design.
In other words the price will
In other words the price will increase in the future 🙁
I am an occulus rift
I am an occulus rift optimistic so take my speculation with a grain of salt.
I would imagine that the first version of the occulus rift dev unit headsets have stopped because the components used in these models are no longer being produced. The lifecycle of hardware in the mobile market moves at a blistering rate and from what I understand the occulus rift is made up of re-purposed mobile parts. Why would a panel maker continue to make a low response 720P panel if the market has moved to a pretty standardized 1080P panel standard. I understand this isn’t necessarily a standard yet but is certainly more common than when the dev units were being created a couple of years ago.
If anything they are gearing up for either a DEV 2.0 model or getting ready to finalize hardware in the consumer model. I hope.
I think this means that you shouldn’t automatically assume a price jump because those components are getting harder to find. If anything, we should be getting far better components (higher res, faster response time, lower latency) for the same price or lower. This is like the shift from DDR2 memory to DDR3. You can buy DDR2 but it’s very expensive compared to DDR3 because it’s no longer mass produced.
ugh! the price is obviously
ugh! the price is obviously going to skyrocket! http://goo.gl/AKz1EX