Date: Tue, 28 Feb 1995 17:00:16 LCL From: Niall Fraser Organization: SCi (Sales Curve Interactive) Ltd. Subject: Re: PROD : N-Vision OJ asked about the N-Vision HMD from Division. The following is from a friend of mine that works for Division. ------- Forwarded Message Follows ------- On the HMD side (I didn't even know we were in Edge this month), the N-Vision is an extremely high fidelity HMD. It uses small field sequential CRTs to produce a high resolution full colour stereo or mono display. I suspect the FOV isn't as wide as your friend had hoped, the reason the HMD extends around the head is to accomodate the CRTs and the optics. Horizontal FOV depends upon the overlap you configure the eyes with. Each eye has a Horizontal FOV of about 50 degrees and you can overlap 0% to 100%, vertical FOV is about 40 degrees. I think the N-Visions CRTs will sync to lots of field sequential signals but we display either 640x480 resolution or 1280x1024 resolution. We drive 640x480 stereo from a single pipe ONXY with an MCO and 1280x1024 stereo with a twin pipe system. Obviously you can also run 640x480 on a twin pipe without MCO. You can have high resolution mono with a single pipe but you must then have 100% overlap with the eyes. The HMD costs 60k pounds for an immersive virtual reality configuration and 70k pounds for a see-through augmented reality version. I've used these HMD's and they can be extremely effective when they're set up correctly. My main personal criticism is the attachment to the users head. It can move slightly which is a real pain, particularly since you look through a couple of holes in the casing at the display but we have lot's of satisfied customers using these devices now. -- Angus Dorbie Division Ltd, Software Engineer 19 Apex Court, Niall Fraser, Programmer, Sales Curve Interactive Viceroy House, Mountbatten Business Centre, 16 Millbrook Road East, Southampton, UK, SO15 1HY Tel 01703 330930 Fax 01703 339316 Email niall@sci.co.uk Neat SG info at : http://www.cee.hw.ac.uk/~mapleson