During the Facebook Connect keynote today, Mark Zuckerberg made the Oculus Quest 2 virtual reality wireless headset official. Improvements have been made to almost every aspect of the device over the original, featuring a higher resolution display, better battery life, new and improved controllers, and more, all for $299.
As Facebook itself leaked a few days ago, the display is now LCD, coming in at 1830x1920 per eye over the original"s 1440x1600. Unfortunately, the refresh rate will be 72Hz at launch, but Facebook says this will be upgraded to 90Hz following the launch through an update. The inside-out tracking will be utilizing four cameras on the front of the headset, just as before.
The headset is running on the Qualcomm Snapdragon XR2 platform, making it the first headset to utilize it. The RAM has been upgraded to 6GB over the original"s 4GB, and while the base $299 model only has 64GB of in-built storage, opting for the $399 model will get customers 256GB of storage.
According to Facebook, the headset will be around 10% lighter than the original, includes optics adjustments, and uses a new cloth head strap that promises to be more comfortable. Meanwhile, the new white Touch controllers will feature better tracking as well as optimized haptics for improved force feedback. There is also Link support that lets Quest 2 owners plug in their headset onto a VR ready desktop to use it for playing PC VR titles.
The Oculus Quest 2 will be releasing on October 13, and pre-orders available now. The headset is coming as a replacement for the first Quest as well as the Rift S platforms, with both of the original devices being discontinued soon, though Facebook will continue to support them.