Find out if your PC is Oculus Rift ready

Martin Brinkmann
Jan 6, 2016
Updated • Jan 6, 2016
Hardware
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12

Oculus Rift, a VR solution, is now available for preorder for $599 on the official company website (pricing is €699 plus shipping for Euro countries, and £499 Pound).

The VR solution ships with two games and an Xbox One controller instead of the promised Oculus Touch controllers which will be made available at a later point in time.

Virtual Reality is the next big thing, at least if you believe the hype train that has been in full swing for a while and several companies are working on getting their VR products ready for the market.

Preorders are only available for people from select countries (you can switch the country during checkout which reveals the correct price but cannot seem to preorder if you are living in a country not listed by the shop), and it is interesting to note that the price has been revealed today as well.

Included in the bundle are the headset, sensor, Oculus Remote, cables, the Xbox One Controller and the two games EVE: Valkyrie and Lucky's Tale. The estimated shipping data is May 2016, and there is a limit of one order per customer.

Compatibility Check

Oculus has released a compatibility check program for Windows that interested users can run on their systems to make sure the PC is compatible with the Rift. The program is linked directly from the shop page linked above.

oculus rift compatibility

The program checks the PC's graphics card, processor, memory, operating system and USB connectivity, and reports its findings after a short scan.

A result (your PC is not yes ready for Rift, or your PC is ready for Rift) is provided, as are options to display detailed information about each item tested.

Here is the recommended specification:

  • Video Card: At the very least an NVIDIA GTX 970 or AMD 290 graphics card.
  • Processor: An Intel i5-4590 or greater cpu.
  • Memory: At least 8 Gigabyte of RAM.
  • Video Output: Compatible HDMI 1.3 video out.
  • USB Ports: 3 USB 3.0 ports plus 1 USB 2.0 port
  • OS: Windows 7 SP1 64-bit or newer

Oculus has a solution for systems that don't meed the requirements: an "order PC" link is provided that opens a page on the Oculus website advertising Oculus-ready PCs.

The three PC systems listed on the PC start at $949 or $999 respectively, and only two of them are currently available while one is listed as "coming soon".

Closing Words

While I would really like to give this a try someday, it seems quite expensive right now for what it offers even if your PC meets the requirements. If your PC does not meet the requirements, you may very well add the same amount to updating it or even more, depending on the age of the machine.

It is unlikely that the Rift will become a mass market product considering its price, at least not in the near future.

As usual, it is a product for enthusiasts who don't mind spending money on cutting edge technology.

Now You: What's your take on the price?

Summary
Find out if your PC is Oculus Rift ready
Article Name
Find out if your PC is Oculus Rift ready
Description
The price of the Oculus Rift VR system has been revealed. A compatibility program for Windows is available to test PC compatibility.
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Ghacks Technology News
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Comments

  1. AAA said on May 1, 2017 at 4:32 am
    Reply

    Yay, it says mine is ready.
    But the clever fox i am, i don’t spend on extravagances :P
    Imma content with my two eyes :)

    View post on imgur.com

  2. KhaiJB said on January 9, 2016 at 2:27 pm
    Reply

    hmm I got
    “that would be a negative ghostrider, you cheapskate….”

  3. donny said on January 9, 2016 at 5:15 am
    Reply

    Well when you’re ready, be prepared to be in awe! I made this virtual scene with Unity 3D gaming engine with the DK2…I can’t imagine how this is going to look with the CV1! :)

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2E8_tGBwTCk

    1. Decent60 said on February 23, 2016 at 8:02 pm
      Reply

      Still better than the game called GASP.

      Tho I had a lot of tearing near the outer edge of the chrome sides at 720p, stepping it up to 1440 reduced it dramatically but still present and not much difference after switching to 2160. Still interesting to watch tho.

    2. T J said on February 23, 2016 at 3:05 pm
      Reply

      Sorry but no awe here. Only slightly less boring than watching paint dry. Rocks flying through space, exploding planets ? Why disappear into VR when you just have to look around at the real world you are actually living in and enjoy it !

  4. yep said on January 8, 2016 at 12:22 am
    Reply

    I can hardly wait to spend $600 to have ads beamed directly into my brain!

  5. Nebulus said on January 7, 2016 at 12:52 pm
    Reply

    I don’t think my pocket is ready for Oculus Rift :))

  6. Jon Wold said on January 7, 2016 at 4:47 am
    Reply

    Probably the software is not made to take advantage of all the cores in your processor. Or it depends of the single core performance of the i5.

  7. donny said on January 7, 2016 at 4:44 am
    Reply

    Yes to me the program is a marketing tool. If you are a developer and already running the DK2 with no issues, I would say save your money until you actually plug it in and test it before going out and upgrading!

  8. Jonathan said on January 7, 2016 at 3:00 am
    Reply

    I find it interesting that it seems to think that my AMD FX 8370 (8 cores, 8MB cache) is less powerful then an Intel I5-4590 (quad core with a 6MB cache.) I am assuming that the software does not recognize the AMD CPU

    1. Anonymous said on January 8, 2016 at 5:03 am
      Reply

      It does but the intel processor will preform much better due to the i5 having hyper threading. hyper threading is a huge leg up over amd cpu’s and is the main reason amd hasn’t been able to compete in the enthusiast market.

      1. wesbo said on January 8, 2016 at 5:36 am
        Reply

        Do you realize that the i5 4590 does not do hyperthreading ? …

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