14 DAY TRIAL // Samsung held a much anticipated press conference during MWC 2017 and announced the new Galaxy Tab S3, the official date when the Galaxy S8 would be announced, and its newest Exynos 8895 chipset. Samsung plans to incorporate the chipset in international variants of Galaxy S8 phones and, perhaps, in standalone VR headsets, according to a new report.
Samsung has apparently showcased standalone VR headsets behind closed doors at MWC 2017 in Barcelona. The untethered VR headsets were powered by the company’s own Exynos 8895 chipset, said to take on Qualcomm’s latest Snapdragon 835 SoC designed for phones.
Current virtual reality solutions are available for either PC or mobile. Both platforms require external hardware to power the VR experience, which means that, for mobile headsets, users need quite capable phones with the latest chipsets and high pixel resolution.
Exynos 8895 has a vision processing unit for VR
Samsung’s concept would remove the need of external hardware, as it would incorporate processing power directly inside the headset. Exynos 8895 would be quite suitable for VR, considering that the chipset comes with a vision processing unit built specifically for virtual reality, as well as support for head tracking and motion detection.
It’s worth mentioning that Samsung most likely showcased a prototype headset that would better highlight the performance of its latest chipset. But that doesn’t mean that the company isn’t exploring the idea and that it won’t make it available to customers at a certain point in time.
Samsung’s current Gear VR headset was announced last year and is compatible with a number of smartphones, like the Galaxy S7, S7 edge, S6, S6 edge, and so on. At MWC 2017, Samsung announced a new controller for the Gear VR, which would enrich user experience when playing games. The controller is similar to what Google offers for Daydream VR users, but a bit different in design.