VR Tech Demo at UCLA in TV & Film school using nMP & Oculus Rif, total success !

[Rominator]

7/11/2016

Was a fun demo.

The nMP running Oculus via GTX1080 ran fine. (Thank you Netkas)

The rift itself crapped out for a moment, not sure if it overheated or what. nMP still worked on 24" LED, just nothing on headset. Reboot fixed it.

Bunch of Film/TV students got to try, I ran "Catatonic". Retired NFL player as first to try.

Had amazing reactions, while person with headset is freaking out, jumping around, etc rest of folks could see the 2D image on screen of 24" Apple LED display. VR works and is AWESOME for some applications.

When I got it all set up, was amazed how nice it looked.

6,1 nMP with Sonnet TB2 enclosure for GTX1080 using internal power. Apple 24" display for boot up, etc.

Oculus sensor, keyboard and headset. Nice rig.

Will get some pix up shortly.

Told some folks that it was only setup like this on planet, they didn't care. One guy said, "A Mac, I didn't think Macs ran VR?"

Film students also didn't know what the 6,1 Trash Can was either. These were artists making content, or hoping to.

They don't care about Tech.

Too bad only way to get a nMP to "work" was using an eGPU in Windows.

[netkas]

Maybe it's time to start doing egpu.
Waiting for some photos of setup, should really look nice.

btw, family issues getting solved ?

[Squishy Tia]

Told some folks that it was only setup like this on planet, they didn't care. One guy said, "A Mac, I didn't think Macs ran VR?"

Technically it isn't really a "Mac" when in Windows. The trashcan pro is just an X99 platform with actual ACPI functionality and extra TB2 controllers (three of them). That isn't to say what you did wasn't impressive - it was. It's just a bit sad that you can't do that in the Mac's native OS. Still, progress on this front by you and any others that venture into the field is greatly appreciated, since it looks like Apple's going the eGPU route, or at least forcing users into eGPUs thanks to always insisting on the shittiest hardware (read: LAPTOP parts) in their machines.

I'm hoping that nVidia puts in 1080/1070 support in their 10.12 drivers (wish they'd do it for 10.11.6), since that would at least let you use some of that beastly 1080 in OS X too.

It's surprising how well the demo went for you with that setup since eGPUs are currently limited to PCIe 2.0 x4 + overhead for bandwidth, which is less than 1/8th of what a full PCIe 3.0 x16 slot gives to modern GPUs.

[Rominator]

Here are some images.

I had been testing the VR setup amongst a pile of Minis and other stuff with variety of TB enclosures. Didn't see it as a singular entity. When all buttoned up with system I could easily move to Westwood, I was amazed how nice it looked once collected on desk.

The students loved it. (The guy wearing headset just retired from NFL)

BTW, the main presenter that evening was Brian Seth Hurst from Story Tech. I was there representing MVC and our nMP eGPU tech and it's ability to run Oculus Rift. (Still only ones on the planet that I know of, 9 months now)

Brian and I have no connection other than a common employer many (too many) years ago.

He and I had no communication before the demo. I had chosen to use "Catatonic" as my demo material. Halfway through his presentation he mentioned how it made him "violently ill" so I knew he wasn't going to be happy that I had chosen to use it as my demo. I asked him for other things to use but the site he was familiar with did not support Oculus, so Catatonic it was. Students loved it despite his admonition. One girl (Sylvia) ripped the headset off halfway through, not because she was ill, because she was scared. To me this was ultimate admission that it WORKED. Saw her tonight at a get together for UCLA programs in Burbank, she reiterated how much she enjoyed it.

[Spacedust]

It looks like Sonnect chassis for me: http://www.sonnettech.com/PRODUCT/echoexpress3d.html