If Huawei was planning a big reveal of its previously unannounced Daydream virtual reality headset, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has ruined that opportunity for the company. Documents from that agency have now confirmed its existence by detailing its companion controller.
As versatile as Google’s Daydream platform is, the choice of headsets at this time is quite limited. There is the Daydream View, and we’ve known about Lenovo’s design based on Qualcomm’s reference headset for a while, but Huawei’s is a little more surprising. As 9t05Mac points out, there were hints made about it previously by Google, but these documents make it far more clear what we can expect.
The documents, however, don’t detail much about the headset, but its controller. The “virtual reality handle” looks to differ slightly from Google’s Daydream View controller. Although it retains the same wireless-remote style, it has more buttons, including a trigger switch. The button at the front of the controller is said to handle volume adjustments and can also answer and reject calls while in virtual reality.
You’ll also be able to use a combination of the home button and trigger to take a screenshot of what you’re doing. That image will then be saved into the smartphone’s storage.The controller maintains the same touchpad for navigation as the Daydream View.
In terms of aesthetics, Huawei has opted for a clean, white paint job, which is a little different from the gray theme that Google opted for. Internally the controller has a small circuit board that’s powered by a pair of AAA batteries.
Since these documents are moving through the FCC at this time, that likely means that the Huawei headset is just about finalized. That should mean we’re getting near to release, but with no official announcement to help bolster awareness before the holidays, it seems unlikely that Huawei will push the launch out this year.
The likely first debut of the headset and its newly detailed controller will be at CES 2018 in January. If that turns out to be true, we’ll no doubt learn more about this headset and potentially even get a hint about when we can expect it to be released to the public.
