HTC Vive pre-orders were supposed to go live back in December 2015 but the whole thing got abruptly canceled as HTC and Valve came upon some sort of technological breakthrough they felt would make all current Vive models obsolete.
Since then we've seen the announcement of the second generation of Vive headsets & controllers and now, through an interview the Telegraph did with HTC's CEO Cher Wang we know that the pre-orders for Vive will be going live on February 29th.
With their mobile phone sector in a constant downward spiral the past couple of years it seems HTC is fully embracing the yet untamed VR market and while I have no idea how all of this will pan out its good to see that their CEO is quite excited at the future prospects of VR technology:
"Virtual reality is something people have talked about for 20, 30 years, in movies, in books and finally it is real, VR has been on our minds for a long time, and now HTC has made virtual reality real.
With virtual reality, technology becomes limitless. You can inhabit a different world with a head mount. Think how it could change surgery, education, science, even shopping"
The second generation of the Vive headset was showcased during this year's CES, featuring a much better display as well as heavily redesigned controllers and headset. The headset has changed significantly from its first iteration as it has been re-done to rest more comfortably on the wearers head and to be a lot easier to adjust which is especially important to those wearing glasses.
It also features a much improved display screen though information on that topic is surprisingly scarce and will most likely be talked about as we get closed to the pre-order start date on February 29th. Along with the improved display the Vive headset now also has a front-facing camera allowing you to still interact with the real world as you're running about slaying Orcs.
Close up of the newly redesigned Vive headset
As for the controllers they've gone through a bit of reworking as well in order to improve comfort and usability. The buttons have been slightly remodeled and are now textured in order to make them easier to find, the edges have been softened and the batteries have been replaced with lithium polymer ones that can be charged via USB and last somewhere between 3 to 4 hours.
Without trying all of them personally I don't feel I can state that one headset is better than the other but I'm rather happy with the design decisions the Vive team opted to go with and I look forward to seeing some good ol' competition between giants.
As of right Vive's price is unknown but one can only hope its going to be less than the Rift's $599 / €699 (without shipping). Either way we'll find out as we get closer to February 29th.