eMagin z800 price increased by 2.5, and some words about other HMDs
18:36 
VR Displays, Virtual Reality DIY
The eMagin Z800 was the closest thing to a good consumer HMD, at a somewhat affordable $599. The only reason why I didn’t buy it yet is that I haven’t been able to test it yet. But last week eMagin decided to increase the price to a much much less affordable $1,499.00, with the hardware being exactly the same ! ! !
It seems that eMagin is much less interested in gamers than in commercial an military applications, although their webpage still puts a lot of emphasize on gaming.
I’m really surprised and sad about that fact. Does it mean the market is still not ready? Will a price increase help the consumer market? Will the price decrease once the commercial market is good enough? Why don’t they make a commercial price and a consumer price, just like 3dConnexion Space Navigator SE?
For the last two weeks I have been able to test a Virtual Research V6 (640×480) and a Virtual Research 1280 (1280×1024) both with a 60° field of view diagonal. And guess what? the V6 is much more comfortable to use! Even if you have big pixels, having a constant head movement (read, you’re not still) and putting some antialising gives a really great immersion feeling.
This is due to the optic lens that stands between your eyes and the displays. The lens of the V6 is much more tolerant to where you put your eyes. Even if you’re not exactly where the eye is supposed to be, you won’t be bothered by the induced deformation. This is more a problem on the VR 1280, and much, much more a problem on the piSight Sensics.
I’d still like to try the eMagin z800 though, but also the Trimersion HMD which seems to have a tracking option.
Are they other options out there for an affordable 3D HMD, possibly with tracking?
I just went to the 3d visor forum and found this post : “As eMagin refocuses its Z800 marketing program towards VR and simulation developers, we recognize the need to restructure the user forum. We also recognize the importance of customer questions and insights. We will move this information to the FAQ section of website.”
Comment by cb — Wednesday, 24 January 2007 @ 18:39
If you are intersted…. The visor is still selling at tekgear.com for $549. They bought a lot during the initial rollout and are stuck with them. They also sell one on ebay every two weeks or so you can get one cheap (relatively) if you want - but keep in mind eMagin is going under so you won’t get any support
Comment by jd — Wednesday, 24 January 2007 @ 22:19
thanks for the tip jd
Comment by cb — Saturday, 27 January 2007 @ 10:01
aha, they are also increasing the price!
“In order to “soften the blow” to our customers, we will be increasing the price by about $65/day over the next two weeks in order to end up matching the eMagin MSRP.”
Today it’s alreay $685 !
Guess they’re trying to improve their margin
Comment by cb — Saturday, 27 January 2007 @ 10:03
I found this store on ebay that sells some consumer vr hardware : http://stores.ebay.com/VIRTUAL-REALITY
Comment by cb — Friday, 2 February 2007 @ 10:04
eMagin seems to be in trouble, according to this article : http://smallcap.seekingalpha.com/article/22244
“eMagin is a classic “rock bottom stock” — in dire financial straits and maybe doomed. Some might say its tank has been running on “eMagination” and is close to empty. Although its technology is widely acclaimed, its stock has performed poorly in the real world. The company reported a $13 million loss for the last quarter”
Comment by cb — Friday, 2 February 2007 @ 14:55
[…] eMagin z800 price increased by 2.5, and some words about other HMDs […]
Pingback by A VR Geek Blog » The story behind the Trimersion HMD — Friday, 9 February 2007 @ 0:38
[…] The eMagin Z800 was the most used HMD on the show. People must have got it before the price increase I can only hope that they’ll work on the drift of their gyroscope; you have to recalibrate the HMD every two minutes or people would break their neck trying to compensate the drift. The Verdun installation shows that the Z800 is good enough to be fully immersed provided that the content is good. (I know that they did a lot of manual recalibration during each run). […]
Pingback by A VR Geek Blog » Laval Virtual 2007 — Monday, 23 April 2007 @ 13:31