Skip to main content

Oculus Rift still facing issues with room-scale tracking, but a fix is on the way

oculus acknowledges issues with rift room scale tracking touch sensor thumb
Image used with permission by copyright holder
The Oculus Rift virtual reality (VR) system needs a few thing to perform its magic. There’s the headset, of course, along with the PC that provides the computing power. There are also sensors that help the system keep the user and the physical environment in sync.

The most advanced of these sensors are those that provide what’s called “room-scale tracking,” meaning the ability for the VR system to keep track of where the user is located within larger spaces. Oculus offers additional sensor options that provide for tracking significantly larger rooms, but that solution has been running into some problems, as Road to VR reports.

The Oculus Rift was already at a disadvantage to its main competitor, the HTC Vive, since the latter has supported room-scale tracking out of the box with a pair of sensors, and arguably provides a stronger room-scale experience. Now, users are complaining of ongoing issues with room-scale tracking with the Oculus 1.11 update, with one Redditor posting a video demonstrating the issues.

The 1.11 update was intended to address room-scale tracking performance, which Oculus has kept in an experimental status. However, the update apparently has introduced more problems, a fact that Oculus acknowledged in a response on Reddit: “Thank you for sharing. We’re working on core software improvements that should hopefully address these issues. This is the top priority for the next two releases, including 1.12 which will ship this month. We’re determined to deliver rock solid robust tracking and appreciate all the feedback.”

While that’s not a terribly helpful response for users currently experiencing the room-scale tracking issues, it does provide some hope that the next couple of software revisions will help. While Oculus hasn’t been as excited about room-scale tracking generally for most VR users, at least the company remains committed to making it work for those users who find it an important part of the VR experience.

Editors' Recommendations

Mark Coppock
Mark has been a geek since MS-DOS gave way to Windows and the PalmPilot was a thing. He’s translated his love for…
HTC’s Vive Pro Eye, a $1,600 VR headset with eye-tracking, is all business
htc releases vive pro eye vr headset in the us 1

On the surface, the Vive Pro Eye looks like it could be yet another VR headset geared toward gamers. And yet, even after being given a summer release date (June 6) in the United States, and therefore more time to add gamer-friendly features, it seems HTC is doubling down on its original intent to launch the Vive Pro Eye with an emphasis on business and commercial use.

In fact, the Vive Pro Eye’s most prominent feature is it’s “precision eye-tracking technology,” which HTC asserts would be especially helpful for businesses looking to enhance product simulations in an effort to better understand what their customers see and experience.

Read more
Oculus Rift S gets a release date, pre-orders are now available
Stock Photo of Oculus Rift S

The Oculus Rift S finally earned a release date at Facebook's F8 Conference on April 30: The company is now taking orders, and shipping is scheduled to begin on May 21. The Oculus Quest is also available for pre-order, with both headsets listed at $399 -- a considerable step up from Facebook's more affordable and portable option, the Oculus Go.

A successor to Oculus’ original virtual reality headset was first announced at the 2019 Game Developers Conference. On March 20, the VR company debuted its newest headset, the Oculus Rift S. Despite its simple name, the headset will offer a number of new features and improvements including an increase in resolution, improved tracking, and a feature called Passthrough Plus.

Read more
This Alienware gaming PC with an RTX 4090, 64GB of RAM is $1,000 off
Alienware Aurora R15 placed at an angle on a table.

Dell is consistently a great place to check for gaming PC deals and that’s certainly the case today. If you want a high-end gaming rig for less, you can currently buy the Alienware Aurora R15 gaming desktop for $2,900 instead of $3,900. The $1,000 saving is particularly sweet when you bear in mind that this is a truly high-end gaming PC packed with all the latest hardware. If you’re keen to know more, check out what we have to say about it below or you can simply hit the button below to go straight to the deal.

Why you should buy the Alienware Aurora R15 gaming desktop
Alienware makes some of the best gaming PCs around and the Alienware Aurora R15 gaming desktop is a perfect representation of that. It’s packed with the latest hardware. That includes an AMD Ryzen 9 7900X processor, 64GB of memory and 2TB of M.2 SSD storage. It’s great to see so much RAM with many gaming PCs still sticking with 32GB when 64GB really does set you up for the long term. Similarly, the large amount of fast storage is perfect for ensuring you won’t run out of room any time soon even when handling large installs like Call of Duty: Warzone or Hogwarts Legacy.

Read more