Yesterday Oculus revealed the details of the first PCs that will be able to show the “Oculus Ready” tag. These computers will come from makers such as ASUS and Alienware and will allow end users to enjoy a guaranteed VR experience that (theoretically) won’t suffer for glitches and problems.
Do-it-yourselfers who scrounge around part-picking websites may be able to get a slightly better deal on an extremely bare-bones PC that can power the Oculus Rift, but the bundled savings mean these Oculus Ready towers actually provide some decent value for the money. The Oculus Ready line should also provide an easy, “all-in” solution for eager virtual reality early adopters that have more curiosity than hardware-building prowess.
Those PCs won’t be exactly cheap, and even if you upgrade your system or decide to build one of your own, you’ll have to admit one thing:
Oculus Rifts are great news for the PC market.
I suspect there won’t be an enormous growth of those PC offered with the “Oculus Ready” certification, and the reason is that I guess early Rift adopters were already gamers and had systems that complied with the minimum requirements.
The $599 price for the Oculus Rift hardware won’t appeal most users if they have to spend another $1K in parts or a whole system. Not at least virtual reality really delivers what is expected from it -and we expect a lot-. If it does, if it indeed delivers, the Post-PC era could in fact be a great lie again.
