Reality in the modern day doesn’t seem to be enough for us. With virtual reality (VR) developing so quickly users are able to visit different landmarks from across the world in the comfort of their own home, courtesy of virtual reality headsets.
When you hear the words; ‘Virtual reality headsets’ the first thought that pops into your mind is that they are going to be expensive. However this isn’t always the case, whilst there are headsets out there which can cost hundreds of pounds, there are also some that can cost you just £2.50. Saying that these aren’t so much headsets but instead are cardboard viewers with two lenses which brings what is on your phone screen to life. These gadgets sit at the bottom of the virtual reality headset range, the reason for the cheap price is because of the quality of the material isn’t very good and you have to hold the gadget up to your face rather than having a strap that goes around your head like some of more expensive VR headsets.
If you want a cheap product that isn’t cardboard then the Stealth VR pocket is a very good product to buy, costing as little as £3.99 (Argos). This handy little device is simply to use and the results are also very effective. A problem with the Stealth VR is that you have to hold it to your face so if you want to use the VR device for a long period of time this probably is not the device for you to get. For and casual use however this is an excellent little product.
Not to threat there are still comfortable headsets that you don’t have to hold to your face out on the market, that also feel like top of the range products for reasonable prices such as the VR Shinecon. The VR Shinecon is an excellent product if you are interested in testing virtual reality out. When using this gadget I found that the result very much depended on the app that was being used. I was using my iPhone 6 with this gadget. Some of the VR apps from the app store do not work as well as you would like them to, with the images becoming blurry through the goggles, I can only presume that this is no fault of the actual headset because I tried the same app on three other VR gadgets and the result was the same with the blurriness. With virtual reality being a faze that is start to become more popular there are a number of apps that are still in trial and error on ensuring users can get the most out of their virtual reality experience.
One con that I did notice when using virtual reality apps on my iPhone was that the battery didn’t cope too well when using the apps. I was playing around with all the headsets for a couple of hours and it used 80% of my battery on my phone. However android tend to have better battery lives than iOS so VR apps may be better suited to android applications.
This blog was written by our work experience student Oly in November 2016.