[quote="Kolreth"]You don't have to make your own devices to make money, you can also license patents. Like MS did and continues to do to android phones while having a competing OS that costs money for companies to license. ARM has made a crapton of money from processors without ever having to make one. Come up with a key tech, and let other ppl pay you to use it. It's a proven business strategy.
Sometimes having things in the market as well, even if being pushed by a competitor, is of benefit to yourself, like when AMD came up with the patent that allowed 64 bit processors to run 32 bit code in effective ways, until that point 64 bit processors ran 32 bit programs like total arse. AMD saw that letting intel license the patent at 0 cost was good for themselves.
Sometimes having things available for free increases sales in many other ways. Nvidia were once pretty good at seeing the big picture, maybe since AMD grabbed the entire share of the console market this gen cept for ninty, maybe this has shaken them up a bit.[/quote]
Somewhere along the lines the point got lost. The question was..
What does Nvidia have to offer Oculus [u]at this point in time[/u] [If the big news was a partnership between the two]? My original answer was it makes no business sense they have nothing [u]at this point in time[/u] to offer so a partnership makes no sense.
Using hypothetical examples is just arguing for the sake of arguing. You can just as easily replace nvidia/microsoft/amd/sony/ a hundred different company names. You need to actually say what nvidia has then oculus wants or vice versa. They said they weren't interested in g-sync which is proprietary regardless. So till you can identify a piece or technology/patent they have it could just as easily be a hundred different companies. These examples are hypothetical and "if the stars align". The stars can just easily align with one of another hundred companies.
I could hypothetically make a material more conductive then gold and cheaper then copper. Then everyone wants to be my friend. Just cause I said hypothetically doesnt make it a valid arguement in any situation.
Kolreth said:You don't have to make your own devices to make money, you can also license patents. Like MS did and continues to do to android phones while having a competing OS that costs money for companies to license. ARM has made a crapton of money from processors without ever having to make one. Come up with a key tech, and let other ppl pay you to use it. It's a proven business strategy.
Sometimes having things in the market as well, even if being pushed by a competitor, is of benefit to yourself, like when AMD came up with the patent that allowed 64 bit processors to run 32 bit code in effective ways, until that point 64 bit processors ran 32 bit programs like total arse. AMD saw that letting intel license the patent at 0 cost was good for themselves.
Sometimes having things available for free increases sales in many other ways. Nvidia were once pretty good at seeing the big picture, maybe since AMD grabbed the entire share of the console market this gen cept for ninty, maybe this has shaken them up a bit.
Somewhere along the lines the point got lost. The question was..
What does Nvidia have to offer Oculus at this point in time [If the big news was a partnership between the two]? My original answer was it makes no business sense they have nothing at this point in time to offer so a partnership makes no sense.
Using hypothetical examples is just arguing for the sake of arguing. You can just as easily replace nvidia/microsoft/amd/sony/ a hundred different company names. You need to actually say what nvidia has then oculus wants or vice versa. They said they weren't interested in g-sync which is proprietary regardless. So till you can identify a piece or technology/patent they have it could just as easily be a hundred different companies. These examples are hypothetical and "if the stars align". The stars can just easily align with one of another hundred companies.
I could hypothetically make a material more conductive then gold and cheaper then copper. Then everyone wants to be my friend. Just cause I said hypothetically doesnt make it a valid arguement in any situation.
Co-founder of helixmod.blog.com
If you like one of my helixmod patches and want to donate. Can send to me through paypal - eqzitara@yahoo.com
[quote="eqzitara"][quote="Kolreth"]You don't have to make your own devices to make money, you can also license patents. Like MS did and continues to do to android phones while having a competing OS that costs money for companies to license. ARM has made a crapton of money from processors without ever having to make one. Come up with a key tech, and let other ppl pay you to use it. It's a proven business strategy.
Sometimes having things in the market as well, even if being pushed by a competitor, is of benefit to yourself, like when AMD came up with the patent that allowed 64 bit processors to run 32 bit code in effective ways, until that point 64 bit processors ran 32 bit programs like total arse. AMD saw that letting intel license the patent at 0 cost was good for themselves.
Sometimes having things available for free increases sales in many other ways. Nvidia were once pretty good at seeing the big picture, maybe since AMD grabbed the entire share of the console market this gen cept for ninty, maybe this has shaken them up a bit.[/quote]
Somewhere along the lines the point got lost. The question was..
What does Nvidia have to offer Oculus [u]at this point in time[/u] [If the big news was a partnership between the two]? My original answer was it makes no business sense they have nothing [u]at this point in time[/u] to offer so a partnership makes no sense.
Using hypothetical examples is just arguing for the sake of arguing. You can just as easily replace nvidia/microsoft/amd/sony/ a hundred different company names. You need to actually say what nvidia has then oculus wants or vice versa. They said they weren't interested in g-sync which is proprietary regardless. So till you can identify a piece or technology/patent they have it could just as easily be a hundred different companies. These examples are hypothetical and "if the stars align". The stars can just easily align with one of another hundred companies.
I could hypothetically make a material more conductive then gold and cheaper then copper. Then everyone wants to be my friend. Just cause I said hypothetically doesnt make it a valid arguement in any situation.[/quote]
As neither you nor I work for nvidia, are not privy to what is going on in their development labs and the dealings between themselves and other entities I do not know what their plans are. Neither do you. You asked a question, I gave an answer and provided specific examples to back them up. Maybe a tegra chip is driving the LCD display in the occulus. Something has to. Why not use a licensable high power chip for driving small high res LCD devices to drive a small high res LCD.
And you seem to be ignoring the fact that the OP is theorising about a possible link between valve and nvidia, not valve and occulus/rift whatever they call the frikken company. Along with the end quote of "Abrash said "several" companies are working on VR headsets, though we only know of two officially creating consumer products (Oculus and GameFace Labs)" I don't know why you keep going back to the rift. We've all seen the prototyping vids for the nvidia HMD screens, perhaps another company has picked up that tech to run with, which would work quite well with 3D vision.
Kolreth said:You don't have to make your own devices to make money, you can also license patents. Like MS did and continues to do to android phones while having a competing OS that costs money for companies to license. ARM has made a crapton of money from processors without ever having to make one. Come up with a key tech, and let other ppl pay you to use it. It's a proven business strategy.
Sometimes having things in the market as well, even if being pushed by a competitor, is of benefit to yourself, like when AMD came up with the patent that allowed 64 bit processors to run 32 bit code in effective ways, until that point 64 bit processors ran 32 bit programs like total arse. AMD saw that letting intel license the patent at 0 cost was good for themselves.
Sometimes having things available for free increases sales in many other ways. Nvidia were once pretty good at seeing the big picture, maybe since AMD grabbed the entire share of the console market this gen cept for ninty, maybe this has shaken them up a bit.
Somewhere along the lines the point got lost. The question was..
What does Nvidia have to offer Oculus at this point in time [If the big news was a partnership between the two]? My original answer was it makes no business sense they have nothing at this point in time to offer so a partnership makes no sense.
Using hypothetical examples is just arguing for the sake of arguing. You can just as easily replace nvidia/microsoft/amd/sony/ a hundred different company names. You need to actually say what nvidia has then oculus wants or vice versa. They said they weren't interested in g-sync which is proprietary regardless. So till you can identify a piece or technology/patent they have it could just as easily be a hundred different companies. These examples are hypothetical and "if the stars align". The stars can just easily align with one of another hundred companies.
I could hypothetically make a material more conductive then gold and cheaper then copper. Then everyone wants to be my friend. Just cause I said hypothetically doesnt make it a valid arguement in any situation.
As neither you nor I work for nvidia, are not privy to what is going on in their development labs and the dealings between themselves and other entities I do not know what their plans are. Neither do you. You asked a question, I gave an answer and provided specific examples to back them up. Maybe a tegra chip is driving the LCD display in the occulus. Something has to. Why not use a licensable high power chip for driving small high res LCD devices to drive a small high res LCD.
And you seem to be ignoring the fact that the OP is theorising about a possible link between valve and nvidia, not valve and occulus/rift whatever they call the frikken company. Along with the end quote of "Abrash said "several" companies are working on VR headsets, though we only know of two officially creating consumer products (Oculus and GameFace Labs)" I don't know why you keep going back to the rift. We've all seen the prototyping vids for the nvidia HMD screens, perhaps another company has picked up that tech to run with, which would work quite well with 3D vision.
I apoligize for being overly harsh, I just hate hypotheticals.
-------
Though part of it is being annoyed that people see "Big 3d vision news" as a software/hardware deal with rift.
I apoligize for being overly harsh, I just hate hypotheticals.
-------
Though part of it is being annoyed that people see "Big 3d vision news" as a software/hardware deal with rift.
Co-founder of helixmod.blog.com
If you like one of my helixmod patches and want to donate. Can send to me through paypal - eqzitara@yahoo.com
[quote="eqzitara"]I apoligize for being overly harsh, I just hate hypotheticals.
-------
Though part of it is being annoyed that people see "Big 3d vision news" as a software/hardware deal with rift.[/quote]
Apology accepted, playing hypotheticals has made me buckets of money so I like to practice. For what it's worth I think you're 100% correct about it being nothing to do with the Rift. Maybe cross driver support like tri-def has worked on, and even that's fairly optimistic.
Personally I think it will be mid march, 3d vision model 3 glasses that have new interesting bumps to form divets in new places on your skull.
eqzitara said:I apoligize for being overly harsh, I just hate hypotheticals.
-------
Though part of it is being annoyed that people see "Big 3d vision news" as a software/hardware deal with rift.
Apology accepted, playing hypotheticals has made me buckets of money so I like to practice. For what it's worth I think you're 100% correct about it being nothing to do with the Rift. Maybe cross driver support like tri-def has worked on, and even that's fairly optimistic.
Personally I think it will be mid march, 3d vision model 3 glasses that have new interesting bumps to form divets in new places on your skull.
[i]A corollary is that the PC – Linux, Windows, and OSX – is going to be the best place for VR, because that’s where the most FLOPs are.[/i]
From M.Abrash (Valve)
(http://media.steampowered.com/apps/abrashblog/Abrash%20Dev%20Days%202014.pdf)
Obviously, Nvidia and Oculus VR already have a partnership: VR will need a lot of power, and Nvidia need to sell powerful GPUs. No hypothesis in this.
That's why Nvidia have to jump in the VR business and show themselves as a solid VR partner: people will want VR and they have to choose Nvidia hardware. Unless Nvidia want to let AMD taking the lead with their "VR ready" hardware...
"3D ready" tag is obsolete: tomorrow, companies will use the "VR ready" tag to sell their hardware.
Obviously, Nvidia and Oculus VR already have a partnership: VR will need a lot of power, and Nvidia need to sell powerful GPUs. No hypothesis in this.
That's why Nvidia have to jump in the VR business and show themselves as a solid VR partner: people will want VR and they have to choose Nvidia hardware. Unless Nvidia want to let AMD taking the lead with their "VR ready" hardware...
"3D ready" tag is obsolete: tomorrow, companies will use the "VR ready" tag to sell their hardware.
I don't see how tying Nvidia to certain VR hardware is even remotely helpful for Nvidia. Nvidia is going to benefit immensely from VR taking off.
Abrash and Valve seem to think 95hz is the ideal (possibly get away with 90hz). They've also said for "presence", 1k X 2 is the minimum resolution. With Abrash stating you could LITERALY benefit from 100X that resolution. And he has blogs showing the arithmetic on it, so it's not hyperbole. They've also stated that the higher the resolution gets, the lower the persistence level needs to get (IE even higher refresh is required).
All of this means that if VR takes off, PC is going to be the epicenter of it. And the GPU companies are going to be selling power for decades. Without VR, we kind of have hit diminishing returns in the graphics department. The last thing Nvidia needs to do is introduce some stupid proprietary format that requires all Nvidia hardware and buys software exclusives (since AMD will also buy exclusives). These things always end up fragmenting the market and destroying traction.
So it truly is in Nvidia's best interest to stay out of the proprietary format on this. They need VR to become established and mainstream. And if it does, there's going to be GPU demand for a long time.
I don't see how tying Nvidia to certain VR hardware is even remotely helpful for Nvidia. Nvidia is going to benefit immensely from VR taking off.
Abrash and Valve seem to think 95hz is the ideal (possibly get away with 90hz). They've also said for "presence", 1k X 2 is the minimum resolution. With Abrash stating you could LITERALY benefit from 100X that resolution. And he has blogs showing the arithmetic on it, so it's not hyperbole. They've also stated that the higher the resolution gets, the lower the persistence level needs to get (IE even higher refresh is required).
All of this means that if VR takes off, PC is going to be the epicenter of it. And the GPU companies are going to be selling power for decades. Without VR, we kind of have hit diminishing returns in the graphics department. The last thing Nvidia needs to do is introduce some stupid proprietary format that requires all Nvidia hardware and buys software exclusives (since AMD will also buy exclusives). These things always end up fragmenting the market and destroying traction.
So it truly is in Nvidia's best interest to stay out of the proprietary format on this. They need VR to become established and mainstream. And if it does, there's going to be GPU demand for a long time.
If it isn't proprietary then it isn't in anyone's best interest and if it isn't in anyone's best interest then there's not much sense of getting involved in it as it'll work on anyone's tech ... not just your own.
It's only in their best interest if there's a reason, other than performance or cost, to absolutely have to buy their GPU over the other GPU, 3D Vision, G-Sync, etc. I agree they shouldn't be paying off game designers, maybe game engine designers or OSs ... but in order to stay above the competition you need more than just being the 'other' choice ... you need to be the 'definitive' choice.
If they can find a way to improve the VR/3D experience using only their tech, then it would be in their best interest to do so, be it through hardware (G-Sync,Tegra,etc.), software (3D Vision), or both. They would be stupid not to be trying to get a proprietary piece of the pie ... hell, they are/were stupid to have let 3D Vision sit so long in the state it's in ...
If it isn't proprietary then it isn't in anyone's best interest and if it isn't in anyone's best interest then there's not much sense of getting involved in it as it'll work on anyone's tech ... not just your own.
It's only in their best interest if there's a reason, other than performance or cost, to absolutely have to buy their GPU over the other GPU, 3D Vision, G-Sync, etc. I agree they shouldn't be paying off game designers, maybe game engine designers or OSs ... but in order to stay above the competition you need more than just being the 'other' choice ... you need to be the 'definitive' choice.
If they can find a way to improve the VR/3D experience using only their tech, then it would be in their best interest to do so, be it through hardware (G-Sync,Tegra,etc.), software (3D Vision), or both. They would be stupid not to be trying to get a proprietary piece of the pie ... hell, they are/were stupid to have let 3D Vision sit so long in the state it's in ...
Well it's why I don't think this "announcement" has anything to do with VR. Because I don't think it's in their best interest to get involved in a proprietary VR format. It's my opinion they're better off letting Oculus release a highly competent piece of hardware and for Valve to do the API in Steamworks.
Now if VR takes hold and they can somehow release a superior piece of hardware, go for it. But I'm skeptical on that. These displays seem like they're all going to have to go through Samsung for the panel/OLED (even the little OLED microdisplays that Sony uses in the HMZ are from Samsung BTW and this is also the OLED microdisplay that Nvidia used in their prototype thing they showed). So I don't really see what more they can do that the Oculus/Valve engineers aren't already doing.
Which gets back to the best interests of Nvidia. VR success is going to make their bottom line fat. it's the best thing that could possibly happen to the PC platform's outlook.
Well it's why I don't think this "announcement" has anything to do with VR. Because I don't think it's in their best interest to get involved in a proprietary VR format. It's my opinion they're better off letting Oculus release a highly competent piece of hardware and for Valve to do the API in Steamworks.
Now if VR takes hold and they can somehow release a superior piece of hardware, go for it. But I'm skeptical on that. These displays seem like they're all going to have to go through Samsung for the panel/OLED (even the little OLED microdisplays that Sony uses in the HMZ are from Samsung BTW and this is also the OLED microdisplay that Nvidia used in their prototype thing they showed). So I don't really see what more they can do that the Oculus/Valve engineers aren't already doing.
Which gets back to the best interests of Nvidia. VR success is going to make their bottom line fat. it's the best thing that could possibly happen to the PC platform's outlook.
Quite honestly I think the "announcement" came and went already and it wasn't really an announcement like someone perceived it to be ... I'd really like to be wrong though, I'd really like NVIDIA to start shivinagit about 3D Vision once again.
It's in their best interest if they can add a necessary piece to 'that' VR puzzle but if they can't even do that through software support, then 'VR' taking off isn't in any one GPU manufacturers best interest ... which means NVIDIA completely missed one of the biggest 'proprietary ships' to 'sail' in PC gaming in quite some time. :)
Not to mention if it's all Oculus/Valve proprietary tech ... VR on SteamOS (I meant SteamBOX, more specifically) could possibly be one of the worst things to happen to the PC platform.
edit: Lol ... http://www.businessinsider.com/oculus-rift-swapping-bodies-2014-1
Quite honestly I think the "announcement" came and went already and it wasn't really an announcement like someone perceived it to be ... I'd really like to be wrong though, I'd really like NVIDIA to start shivinagit about 3D Vision once again.
It's in their best interest if they can add a necessary piece to 'that' VR puzzle but if they can't even do that through software support, then 'VR' taking off isn't in any one GPU manufacturers best interest ... which means NVIDIA completely missed one of the biggest 'proprietary ships' to 'sail' in PC gaming in quite some time. :)
Not to mention if it's all Oculus/Valve proprietary tech ... VR on SteamOS (I meant SteamBOX, more specifically) could possibly be one of the worst things to happen to the PC platform.
The PC just had it's biggest decline in sales in history last year. Unless there's a disruptive technology like this, the PC is not going to exist (outside of extreme niches) in 10 years. It's just going to be made redundant by mobile tech.
Requiring honking processing power (that can't use the cloud due to latency) is what the PC has always excelled at. And VR would require upgrades for decades to come. VR success is definitely in Nvidia's best interest. Anything that fragments adoption/success isn't.
Even if AMD/Nvidia split market share 50/50, 50 percent of a HUGE pie is a lot bigger than 100 percent of a small pie.
EDIT: And I don't get the boogie man tactics about SteamOS. They've already stated the VR API is platform agnostic and will support all GPUs and VR solutions. Developers won't have to worry about API or warping shaders. The API will do it and automatically retrofit old games to work with new hardware. As for SteamOS itself, it's Linux. That's the best thing that could happen. It's againt the ToS for Valve to do anything shady there. They're required by license for it to be completely open. Even if they wanted to be evil.
The PC just had it's biggest decline in sales in history last year. Unless there's a disruptive technology like this, the PC is not going to exist (outside of extreme niches) in 10 years. It's just going to be made redundant by mobile tech.
Requiring honking processing power (that can't use the cloud due to latency) is what the PC has always excelled at. And VR would require upgrades for decades to come. VR success is definitely in Nvidia's best interest. Anything that fragments adoption/success isn't.
Even if AMD/Nvidia split market share 50/50, 50 percent of a HUGE pie is a lot bigger than 100 percent of a small pie.
EDIT: And I don't get the boogie man tactics about SteamOS. They've already stated the VR API is platform agnostic and will support all GPUs and VR solutions. Developers won't have to worry about API or warping shaders. The API will do it and automatically retrofit old games to work with new hardware. As for SteamOS itself, it's Linux. That's the best thing that could happen. It's againt the ToS for Valve to do anything shady there. They're required by license for it to be completely open. Even if they wanted to be evil.
[quote="Paul33993"]The PC just had it's biggest decline in sales in history last year. Unless there's a disruptive technology like this, the PC is not going to exist (outside of extreme niches) in 10 years. It's just going to be made redundant by mobile tech.
Requiring honking processing power (that can't use the cloud due to latency) is what the PC has always excelled at. And VR would require upgrades for decades to come. VR success is definitely in Nvidia's best interest. Anything that fragments adoption/success isn't.
Even if AMD/Nvidia split market share 50/50, 50 percent of a HUGE pie is a lot bigger than 100 percent of a small pie.
EDIT: And I don't get the boogie man tactics about SteamOS. They've already stated the VR API is platform agnostic and will support all GPUs and VR solutions. Developers won't have to worry about API or warping shaders. The API will do it and automatically retrofit old games to work with new hardware. As for SteamOS itself, it's Linux. That's the best thing that could happen. It's againt the ToS for Valve to do anything shady there. They're required by license for it to be completely open. Even if they wanted to be evil.[/quote]
They only have to open source the parts of their software that use other open source software as a part of it's complied code base. I can guarantee you the steam client for linux is not open source. In fact I checked the TOS for it and it specifically says it's not.
Paul33993 said:The PC just had it's biggest decline in sales in history last year. Unless there's a disruptive technology like this, the PC is not going to exist (outside of extreme niches) in 10 years. It's just going to be made redundant by mobile tech.
Requiring honking processing power (that can't use the cloud due to latency) is what the PC has always excelled at. And VR would require upgrades for decades to come. VR success is definitely in Nvidia's best interest. Anything that fragments adoption/success isn't.
Even if AMD/Nvidia split market share 50/50, 50 percent of a HUGE pie is a lot bigger than 100 percent of a small pie.
EDIT: And I don't get the boogie man tactics about SteamOS. They've already stated the VR API is platform agnostic and will support all GPUs and VR solutions. Developers won't have to worry about API or warping shaders. The API will do it and automatically retrofit old games to work with new hardware. As for SteamOS itself, it's Linux. That's the best thing that could happen. It's againt the ToS for Valve to do anything shady there. They're required by license for it to be completely open. Even if they wanted to be evil.
They only have to open source the parts of their software that use other open source software as a part of it's complied code base. I can guarantee you the steam client for linux is not open source. In fact I checked the TOS for it and it specifically says it's not.
Somewhere along the lines the point got lost. The question was..
What does Nvidia have to offer Oculus at this point in time [If the big news was a partnership between the two]? My original answer was it makes no business sense they have nothing at this point in time to offer so a partnership makes no sense.
Using hypothetical examples is just arguing for the sake of arguing. You can just as easily replace nvidia/microsoft/amd/sony/ a hundred different company names. You need to actually say what nvidia has then oculus wants or vice versa. They said they weren't interested in g-sync which is proprietary regardless. So till you can identify a piece or technology/patent they have it could just as easily be a hundred different companies. These examples are hypothetical and "if the stars align". The stars can just easily align with one of another hundred companies.
I could hypothetically make a material more conductive then gold and cheaper then copper. Then everyone wants to be my friend. Just cause I said hypothetically doesnt make it a valid arguement in any situation.
Co-founder of helixmod.blog.com
If you like one of my helixmod patches and want to donate. Can send to me through paypal - eqzitara@yahoo.com
As neither you nor I work for nvidia, are not privy to what is going on in their development labs and the dealings between themselves and other entities I do not know what their plans are. Neither do you. You asked a question, I gave an answer and provided specific examples to back them up. Maybe a tegra chip is driving the LCD display in the occulus. Something has to. Why not use a licensable high power chip for driving small high res LCD devices to drive a small high res LCD.
And you seem to be ignoring the fact that the OP is theorising about a possible link between valve and nvidia, not valve and occulus/rift whatever they call the frikken company. Along with the end quote of "Abrash said "several" companies are working on VR headsets, though we only know of two officially creating consumer products (Oculus and GameFace Labs)" I don't know why you keep going back to the rift. We've all seen the prototyping vids for the nvidia HMD screens, perhaps another company has picked up that tech to run with, which would work quite well with 3D vision.
-------
Though part of it is being annoyed that people see "Big 3d vision news" as a software/hardware deal with rift.
Co-founder of helixmod.blog.com
If you like one of my helixmod patches and want to donate. Can send to me through paypal - eqzitara@yahoo.com
Apology accepted, playing hypotheticals has made me buckets of money so I like to practice. For what it's worth I think you're 100% correct about it being nothing to do with the Rift. Maybe cross driver support like tri-def has worked on, and even that's fairly optimistic.
Personally I think it will be mid march, 3d vision model 3 glasses that have new interesting bumps to form divets in new places on your skull.
From M.Abrash (Valve)
(http://media.steampowered.com/apps/abrashblog/Abrash%20Dev%20Days%202014.pdf)
Obviously, Nvidia and Oculus VR already have a partnership: VR will need a lot of power, and Nvidia need to sell powerful GPUs. No hypothesis in this.
That's why Nvidia have to jump in the VR business and show themselves as a solid VR partner: people will want VR and they have to choose Nvidia hardware. Unless Nvidia want to let AMD taking the lead with their "VR ready" hardware...
"3D ready" tag is obsolete: tomorrow, companies will use the "VR ready" tag to sell their hardware.
Abrash and Valve seem to think 95hz is the ideal (possibly get away with 90hz). They've also said for "presence", 1k X 2 is the minimum resolution. With Abrash stating you could LITERALY benefit from 100X that resolution. And he has blogs showing the arithmetic on it, so it's not hyperbole. They've also stated that the higher the resolution gets, the lower the persistence level needs to get (IE even higher refresh is required).
All of this means that if VR takes off, PC is going to be the epicenter of it. And the GPU companies are going to be selling power for decades. Without VR, we kind of have hit diminishing returns in the graphics department. The last thing Nvidia needs to do is introduce some stupid proprietary format that requires all Nvidia hardware and buys software exclusives (since AMD will also buy exclusives). These things always end up fragmenting the market and destroying traction.
So it truly is in Nvidia's best interest to stay out of the proprietary format on this. They need VR to become established and mainstream. And if it does, there's going to be GPU demand for a long time.
It's only in their best interest if there's a reason, other than performance or cost, to absolutely have to buy their GPU over the other GPU, 3D Vision, G-Sync, etc. I agree they shouldn't be paying off game designers, maybe game engine designers or OSs ... but in order to stay above the competition you need more than just being the 'other' choice ... you need to be the 'definitive' choice.
If they can find a way to improve the VR/3D experience using only their tech, then it would be in their best interest to do so, be it through hardware (G-Sync,Tegra,etc.), software (3D Vision), or both. They would be stupid not to be trying to get a proprietary piece of the pie ... hell, they are/were stupid to have let 3D Vision sit so long in the state it's in ...
[MonitorSizeOverride][Global/Base Profile Tweaks][Depth=IPD]
Now if VR takes hold and they can somehow release a superior piece of hardware, go for it. But I'm skeptical on that. These displays seem like they're all going to have to go through Samsung for the panel/OLED (even the little OLED microdisplays that Sony uses in the HMZ are from Samsung BTW and this is also the OLED microdisplay that Nvidia used in their prototype thing they showed). So I don't really see what more they can do that the Oculus/Valve engineers aren't already doing.
Which gets back to the best interests of Nvidia. VR success is going to make their bottom line fat. it's the best thing that could possibly happen to the PC platform's outlook.
It's in their best interest if they can add a necessary piece to 'that' VR puzzle but if they can't even do that through software support, then 'VR' taking off isn't in any one GPU manufacturers best interest ... which means NVIDIA completely missed one of the biggest 'proprietary ships' to 'sail' in PC gaming in quite some time. :)
Not to mention if it's all Oculus/Valve proprietary tech ... VR on SteamOS (I meant SteamBOX, more specifically) could possibly be one of the worst things to happen to the PC platform.
edit: Lol ... http://www.businessinsider.com/oculus-rift-swapping-bodies-2014-1
[MonitorSizeOverride][Global/Base Profile Tweaks][Depth=IPD]
Requiring honking processing power (that can't use the cloud due to latency) is what the PC has always excelled at. And VR would require upgrades for decades to come. VR success is definitely in Nvidia's best interest. Anything that fragments adoption/success isn't.
Even if AMD/Nvidia split market share 50/50, 50 percent of a HUGE pie is a lot bigger than 100 percent of a small pie.
EDIT: And I don't get the boogie man tactics about SteamOS. They've already stated the VR API is platform agnostic and will support all GPUs and VR solutions. Developers won't have to worry about API or warping shaders. The API will do it and automatically retrofit old games to work with new hardware. As for SteamOS itself, it's Linux. That's the best thing that could happen. It's againt the ToS for Valve to do anything shady there. They're required by license for it to be completely open. Even if they wanted to be evil.
They only have to open source the parts of their software that use other open source software as a part of it's complied code base. I can guarantee you the steam client for linux is not open source. In fact I checked the TOS for it and it specifically says it's not.