Mike Wuerthele
Facebook has launched a six-week summer sale on the Oculus Rift headset — and while there is no official support for it from the company, it can be used in conjunction with High Sierra and the SteamVR beta.
The headset and set of two Touch controllers normally retail for $500 for just the headset and $100 for the controllers. The "Summer of Rift" promotion, launched on Monday, cuts this price to $400 for the set.
"What we learned with the [March] price cuts is that price matters," Oculus vice president of content Jason Rubin told Fortune on Monday. "This is a good time to test a mass-market price."
Valve's preferred VR hardware, isn't the Oculus Rift, but the HTC Vive — developed by the company in cooperation with HTC. But, AppleInsider has confirmed both from a Valve FAQ page, and some preliminary testing, that the Oculus Rift functions in the SteamVR beta with the eGPU Developer's Kit connected to a Mac running the High Sierra beta.
Apple's $600 External GPU Developer's Kit is intended to test VR content creation on any Mac with Thunderbolt 3 connectivity. The product includes a Sonnet external GPU chassis with Thunderbolt 3 and 350-watt power supply, AMD Radeon RX 580 8-gigabyte graphics cards, Belkin USB-C to 4-port USB-A hub, and a promo code for $100 towards the purchase of an HTC Vive VR headset.
Full support for external GPUs in High Sierra will launch in the spring of 2018.
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13 Comments
But... But.... But... Didn't Occulus state clearly that the Mac's were nowhere near adequate to drive the superb, magnificent, unbeatable OR?
Firesale anyone?
Did FB buy a lemon/load of hot air?
Interesting times indeed.
... "the Oculus Rift functions in the SteamVR beta with the eGPU Developer's Kit connected to a Mac running the High Sierra beta." Is there information on which Macs this is true of. My 6 Core 2013/14 Mac Pro booted into Windows with latest AMD drivers and Catalyst on passes the Stream VR Test so I wonder if it will pass muster even better in macOS High Sierra, I never thought to try that yet? I also wonder if I'd even need an add on GPU kit or is the lack of dual GPU Catalyst under macOS the snag?
Personally, I wouldn't even buy an Oculus for a dollar.
I've used the Oculus headset. It was interesting, but after 30 minutes I had my fill. Uncomfortable and low resolution, I don't see VR being compelling for awhile. Can't see spending my money on it.