Intel Gives Up on Project Alloy?

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Road to VR reports Intel has given up on Project Alloy-- the reference design for an all-in-one self-contained VR solution promising to "cut the VR cord."

Project Alloy demoDescribed as "the future of merged reality" back at its 2016 Intel Developer Forum reveal, the Project Alloy headset carried all components to power VR experience. As such, it allowed a full range of motion with 6 degrees of freedom (6DoF), as well as Augmented Reality (AR) via RealSense technology.

However a statement provided to Road to VR reads Intel is winding down the reference design because of lack of partner interest. The reason why partners are not interested is unclear, but it could be due to costs associated with essentially cramming a full Windows PC in a headset.

In addition, Microsoft is currently pushing partners into building headsets based on the Windows Mixed Reality design-- and major players including Dell, HP, Lenovo, Acer and Asus are all doing so, with plans to launch a selection of headsets in Q4 2017, the same timeframe the Project Allow open reference design was to launch on.

However Intel insists it is still working on VR/AR technologies, such Movidius visual processing or RealSense depth sensing. Recently it announced plans to focus WiGig 60GHz wireless networking on VR applications, and is also supporting VR content development and VR eSports initiatives.

Go Intel Scraps Plans to Launch Project Alloy Reference Headset (Road to VR)