Valve’s goal is to have the first wave of Index hardware arrive to homes on June 29.
We’ve seen reports surfacing in various places from early buyers seeing order status changes in anticipation of shipping the Valve Index VR headset and its new controllers. While we don’t know when the first shipments might actually arrive, a Valve representative responded to my email seeking clarification about shipping by saying that “our goal is to have the first wave arrive to homes on June 29th.”
We previewed the Index hardware last month but were asked by Valve Corporation to hold reviews until June 28 at 10 am Pacific “as a large number of updates will be made.” Valve issued software updates last weekend, for example, and PC-based software titles continue to be updated on an ongoing basis with formal support for the new Valve Index controllers.
Here’s a look at Tilt Brush with Index controller integration:
The full Index VR kit is around $1,000 with 2.0 tracking base stations, controllers and the head-mounted display (HMD). For people who already have the “lighthouse” base stations which came with the HTC Vive or Vive Pro, the HMD and controllers can be purchased for around $750. Interest appears to be pretty high and reservations placed today on Valve’s website for the controllers and Index HMD may not arrive until October.
For those unfamiliar, Valve’s tracking technology powered the HTC Vive in 2016 and Vive Pro in 2018. Valve Index works with the second generation of the SteamVR tracking technology as well as Valve’s new wearable controllers. Developers have had their hands on the Index controllers — formerly known as Knuckles — for years now. They’ve changed over successive versions and, in their finalized form, can enable new kinds of interactions — such as the sensation of picking up and dropping something or a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors with a robot.
Check back at UploadVR on Friday for our hardware review of the Valve Index HMD and controllers.
