Product Review

VR

Virtual Reality has been the talk of the internet ever since the Oculus Rift was announced on Kickstarter. It was one of the most funded Kisckstarters ever. The Kickstarter itself can be found here. 

Oculus has already had multiple iterations and multiple price points. It got large enough that Facebook bought them. Oculus has been exploring not only virtual reality for gaming but also for medical and teaching purposes. 

They aren't the only companies to get into this field, however. HTC, Microsoft, Samsung, and many other technology companies have started to try their hand at virtual reality. HTC has arguably been in the actual virtual reality field for longer than these other companies. The release of the HTC Vive was a huge thing. It has arguably been considered better than the Oculus Rift. 

Microsoft started off in augmented reality with the Microsoft Hololens.

Currently, they are getting into virtual reality, having designed a form of virtual reality headset with controllers. These are being made by companies like Acer, Dell, HP, and more. They are all labeled as Windows Mixed Reality headsets. "Mixed reality" however is not what these mostly do, although they may in the future. Mixed reality is between augmented reality and virtual reality. These are also some of the cheapest options for entering into virtual reality. 

Samsung has their Gear VR powered by Oculus and a Windows Mixed Reality Headset. They have been in the market but only through other companies, though I would expect to see them in the market on their own soon.

I chose to review the HP Mixed Reality headset. Part of this decision had to do with the price point and the other part had to so with the reviews on Amazon. It has overall been well received and some people have claimed the Windows headsets, which are virtually all the same except the Samsung one, are better in their opinion than the Oculus and the Vive.

Personally, I have really enjoyed my headset. The inside-out tracking works great, except for sometimes when you have your arms outside of sight of the headset. The resolution is good, and I don't really notice the screen door effect most of the time. WMR has some great apps and it has been a lot of fun. the controllers track well and control well. Most things are very intuitive and work well. If you are interested in VR I highly recommend it to you, especially if you are on a budget.