Accessories VR

[emmzone22]

Has anybody used a good quality VR for the Turbo, such as a VR ONE or anything else? I have a cardboard viewer, but want something better. I'm having trouble finding something that actually says it will fit the Turbo.

 

[Kevin-B]

Bear in mind that anything using the Turbo screen for VR is going to be moderately poor resolution. I love Google Cardboard for what it is (cheap and fun), but the pixels in the image are pretty noticeable when blown up to that apparent size. That's not going to change with a different headset or better lenses as long as the Turbo is providing the pixels.

For those keeping score, the Turbo screen is 1440 x 2560 pixels which divides into two screens of 1440 H x 1280W. While each half-screen appears to compare favorably to HDTV resolution of 1920W x 1080H, the sacrifice is in the all-important width dimension. The lenses make the image appear very large and close, so the pixels are chunky.​

The VR One has better sensors and other features that improve the experience. However, it uses the native Turbo screen in a tray, just like Google Cardboard.

 

[emmzone22]

Thanks for the helpful insight. I have a work provided iPhone 6 also, but my phone of choice is an Android and as of right now, the Turbo. Would I have better luck with the iPhone? Also, my cardboard viewer is the free Star Wars edition that Verizon was giving away. I'm not complaining about it, but it does leave me wanting more, and yes it's the pixels I'm trying to get rid of or at least decrease. Are there better quality cardboard viewers, or once again am I just limited by the Turbo. I didn't realize the Turbo had such bad screen specs.

 

[Kevin-B]

On the contrary, the Turbo's screen is pretty darn good. The hot new Galaxy S7 and S7 Edge, for example, has exactly the same 1440 x 2560 screen resolution. Apple's so-called "retina" display for the iPhone 6 is a mere 1080 x 1920. The purpose-built VR headset Oculus Rift's resolution is actually slightly less than the Turbo.

The issue is that any tiny handheld screen just doesn't look great when magnified to appear the size of your living room. The pixel tiling is going to be visible. By my very casual estimate, you might need a resolution over 6000 pixels wide per eye to exceed the ability of your eye to see the pixels -- implying a screen about 12,000 pixels wide and correspondingly high: roughly 20 times current smartphone resolution.

That's my two cents. Perhaps someone more in tune with the state of the art of VR hardware can fill us in on where the industry is headed in this regard.

In the mean time, the Cardboard platform is a fun and cheap way to figure out what else you love or hate about the VR experience. Content sucks? Sound is not integrated with head motion? Sensor lag? Navigation and controls? Walking into walls? Then get into a store and see if the expensive headsets solve enough of the problem to be worth it to you.

There are nicer Cardboard viewers in terms of build quality, comfort, and materials. You can find Turbo-compatible ones on Amazon and on Google's Cardboard site. But since the weakness is the screen itself, which you supply, you're not going to improve the visual quality much at all. The lenses that came with your generic Cardboard viewer are essentially as good as you'll get.