Awesome! SiliconMicroDisplay listens to their customers and have a great product. Ofcourse I still have to recieve and try it but I'm sure the wait was worth it (F5'ing the track&trace page :D).

One word : Beautiful.

I was craving for a monitor replacement , now with enhanced 2D support and VGA resolution [480p@60Hz] added - st1080 will be great !

Mr Jin has finally delivered a 'monitor replacement' with latest 3D support [st1080] - Kudos to u Mr Jin

I wish st1080 be the ultimate HMD for VR and AR enthusiast and look forward to the 8M version and higher - u guys will only make this better and better

Thank u Mr Jin - God Bless U and the SMD familly

Best wishes
Mr Nigam

lol ironically enough first person i thought of after seeing this update was Mr Nigam and low and behold hes here

good for you dude that it meets your needs now, (i do mean that in a good way,)

I would like to know if I can attach this ST1080 to my Xbox 360 and play games that support 3D such as Batman: Arkham City?

Hi Paul,

I am eagerly awaiting my pre-ordered unit and in the meantime have been reading The Game Veda’s review in progress which is hugely complimentary thus far except when it comes to the side-by-side 3D console gaming. In part 4 of his review (just up today), all but one of the games tested in 3D (Uncharted 3, Killzone 3, Crysis 2, Halo Anniversary, - all major titles) apparently suffered from the virtual 100” screen size being reduced to what the reviewer described as a 60” x 30” letter box, just over a third of the screen’s original / non-3D size, rendering the aforementioned games “frankly unplayable in 3D on the ST1080”.

Only the Avatar video game worked without affecting the screen size. He went on to say that “trying to change 3D method does not help as only frame-packing or top-bottom options are selectable. Even when you select side-by-side outside or inside the game, the games revert to a frame packed box.” The reviewer attributes this to the games outputting a 3D image of a lower res format than currently supported by the ST1080 and no subsequent facility to upscale the image in question...

This is somewhat worrying for me as I made the purchase primarily for the purpose of 3D console gaming. Is the reviewer missing something here or is this result unavoidable at present? If so, can it be fixed through firmware?

Please let us know & thank you for your time.

Received mine last night, wonderful box waiting for me on my doorstep. First thoughts are they are larger and bulkier than I expected. The visual quality is stunning. I do get some prism artifacts because of my astigmatism. I've got some issues with the picture being blurry in the top corners, but focus seems to be dependent on the angle they face your eyes.

The only disappointment is the lack of scaling. 1080 images are full screen, while 720 images are 3/4 screen. On the other hand, Killzone3 in 3D was stunning, even at 3/4 screen.

Great job guys! I will write a more thorough review after I've spent a few days with them.

Very very surprised by the 720p comment. Does that mean the lower resolutions are essentially smaller real estate on the screen?

Hi
This 'd not be an issue to bother Mr Jin with !

Plz correct me if i am wrong !

For PC users - my advise upgrade your hardware - better graphic cards + CPU + RAM and SSD hard drives for great gaming fps so that u do not have to downscale to 720p for better game frame rate at all.- FYI - Mr Jin will not help u financially for this - trust me !

For console gamers - simple make sure that the games can be played @1080p before u purchase the game as PS3 can output 1080p via HDMI so it becomes game limitation to play @720p NOT Mr Jin 's fault !

refer here : http://manuals.playstation.net/document/en/ps3/current/settings/videooutput.html

For those using st1080 for on-the-cinema using nettops (me) / blu-ray players / media players - the upscaling is already built-in into the devices mentioned so u will get to have full fov @1080p anyway so the best part cinema users will not bother with this '720p reduced fov' crap !

In short - please DO NOT bother Mr Jin with this "720p-reduced FOV crap" as he's delivered a great product which makes the HMZ-T1 a dorky crap worth usd50 only

Kudos to u Mr Jin

I will place the order once there is immediate dispatch possible upon payment as i know SMD is too occupied with pre-orders !

best wishes to SMD family
Mr Nigam

Not scaling 720 material (which should be scaled 2:3 in both axes) is sad. I'd understand it if that mode was rushed, but needing 720 would be obvious from the start (as has been said, most modern console games use that mode). Perhaps there's an option buried somewhere for 1:1 pixel mapping which should be turned off?
Scaling will matter even more for SD modes which have rectangular (not square) pixels.

If the picture is reduced in size when using 720p resolution to 3/4 of the 1080p screen it might be just using the pixels without any drop of picture quality ! That was a thing i wanted to know or a long time.

If the resolution is reduced to another than native resolution you automatically have a drop of picture quality on TFT Monitors.

This might be different on the ST1080 because it might use the needed pixels without upscaling and dropping quality of the picture.

Please Chris give us detailed information about this !
Thank you !

Your right , people use lower resolutions to have bigger icons and fonts but for the price of being kind of blurry /unsharp !
This is not really wishfull ..at least not for me and i believe also not for many other customers.

This way the picture quality would stay sharp, the only thing you have to do is to enlarge fonts in Windows Options.
Also any Internetbrowser increases fonts by pressing : Strg+Mousewheel-up

This should be sufficient to work in Windows at maximum sharpness of the shown picture.

I would rather give up FOV for a brilliant picture than the other way around.

Especially for Flightsimulation fans ( as i am ) the Full HD resolution at 24-30 FPS should absolutely sufficient.
If not enough Frames per second then i woul use the reduced resolution but then i still would have a perfect picture quality.
All cockpit gauges and HUD information and Chat messages will be shown in a sharp picture quality ... i hope i could explain why i like this technical solution

Stuff like this is exactly the reason I didn't preorder. I'd be VERY upset. Having 720p on a smaller virtual screen (actually not 3/4 but closer to 1/4-1/3...)... and this in turn reduces FOV to what? - 20 degree or something?

Tomorrow I'll recieve my unit and check of I can confirm this and check if there isn't just some setting (like most screens have) for scaling up. I will post my results here and on my blog (url will be posted here then, and on my twitter). Also other configuration settings and resolutions will be reviewed (Will test it from my PC). I'm a bit more active than the others on here, so hopefully I can answer most of the questions quickly.

Agreed

Hi Chris, when did you pre order the product? If it was 1st March what time Eastern? Also any update on the scaling issue?

That is exactly what i was thinking when i was reading his review on his blog !!!
He used a weird language that not everyone could clearly understand ... there are many people from all places all over the world who follow any information available in the internet about this awsome new product and this guy uses slang phrases and weird expressions, may be regional slang ...unbelieveable !!!!

You should have known better Veda !
Please correct your review in a way we all understand what you want to tell about this piece of Hardware.
Thank You !

I haven't really used the 'built in' earphones yet. But after reading your message I tried it. I must confirm the buzzing noise. There is indeed a noticable buzzing noise as soon as you turn the ST1080 on.

For the feint vertical bar of pixels, it took me a while to find it but I must also confirm that one. 1/3rd on the left there is a small (10 pixel?) line being a little bit darker than the rest. I only noticed it with a gray background. I didn't even noticed it during my gaming and movie watching this week but yes it is there. Well waiting for firmware updates is not a new thing for early adopters ;).

1080p content on this device is really awesome yeah :).

Awesome! The firmware update download page however is not. It requires you to mail to techsupport@siliconmicrodisplay.com. Which bounches my mail directly back to me 'Delivery to the following recipient failed permanently'.

Hi
Correction :

This 'd not be an issue to bother Mr Jin with !

Plz correct me if i am wrong !

For PC users - my advise upgrade your hardware - better graphic cards + CPU + RAM and SSD hard drives for great gaming fps so that u do not have to downscale to 720p for better game frame rate at all.- FYI - Mr Jin will not help u financially for this - trust me !

For console gamers - simple make sure that the games can be played @1080p before u purchase the game as PS3 can output 1080p via HDMI so it becomes game limitation to not play @10820p - NOT st1080's fault !

refer here : http://manuals.playstation.net/document/en/ps3/current/settings/videooutput.html

For those using st1080 for on-the-cinema using nettops (me) / blu-ray players / media players - the upscaling is already built-in into the devices mentioned so u will get to have full fov @1080p anyway so the best part cinema users will not bother with this '720p reduced fov' crap !

In short - please DO NOT bother Mr Jin with this "720p-reduced FOV crap" as he's delivered a great product which makes the HMZ-T1 a dorky crap worth usd50 only

Kudos to u Mr Jin

I will place the order once there is immediate dispatch possible upon payment as i know SMD is too preoccupied with pre-orders fulfillment !

best wishes to SMD family and special thanks to Mr Jin
Mr Nigam

I don't think you can do 30hz in 3d. 24hz is your limit. 30hz is actually not bad at all if your computer puts out stable 30 fps, you can play comfortably at that framerate.

Please do not post so combatively. Nigam, you are indeed missing the issue as "decent frame rate gaming" and "24Hz" are a plain conflict for a lot of games and gamers (who would go higher than 60 if they could). Also, the HDMI limitation is one of convention; we can shift the compromise around, and acquire 960x1080 or 1920x540 resolution at 60Hz for PCs. This matches what passive 3D monitors can do, at less load to your graphics card - but requires driver support. The problem is consoles don't support that. In the end, I believe the update to optionally scale 720 mode will be sufficient until such a time there's a higher bandwidth successor.

I have played several console games on the ST1080 at 1080p in 2D and they are great! The FOV is huge.

720p is only a limitation for 3D. The 720p limitation is because the PS3 and xbox360 can only do 3D at 720p. While 3D is a pretty cool novelty for me so far, I'm not sure I'll stick with it.

For gaming, I'm finding the 720p better because I can see the entire screen. Playing MW3 in 1080p using the ST1080, I have to shift my eyes to the corners to read messages.

Last night I was also playing shadowgun 3D on my Transformer Prime tablet using the ST1080 - so freaking cool!

Chris

Chris still interested to know when you ordered? Thanks.

Jeff,

I mentioned above that I do wear glasses. I thought they would interfere with my glasses, but not at all. The goggles sit farther out than my glasses. I'm still playing around with the nosepieces to get the best placement of my pupil to the screen itself.

Not sure if that got mentioned elsewhere, but the unit ships with two interchangeable nosepieces to adjust where the goggles sit in relation to your pupils.

Chris

For better understanding of this complex stuff please have a look at this website !

There is a really good explenation of Pixels and Screensize :

http://www.besthdtvscreen.com/guides/720p-vs-1080p-comparison

It's great that you're going to address this issue! I'm not sure if Mr Nigam will be satisfied with this answer though since you only mention up-scaling 720p haha

Mr Nigam, I'm glad you don't have an issue with the non-scaling 720p resolution. But if I remember correctly you were concerned about lower resolutions like 640x480p@60Hz not being included. Well now it sounds like these resolutions won't be scaled up either so if you use the device to show native 640x480 resolution it'll be less than 1/4 of the screen giving you about 10 degrees of diagonal FOV.
I'm not saying I have an issue with the ST1080. I love it so far. But I'm just pointing out your sudden overwhelming support for the ST1080 despite it not changing anything you were vehemently complaining about before.

@Dennis - well i wanted VGA@60hz for my nettop irrespective of the 'real screen estate ' issue as i wanted to see the startup screen on the laptop/nettop so that i'd confirm that windows is indeed going to load.

As soon as windows loads the graphic card [ nvidia GT218 known as ion 2] will come into play and pass the optimal resolution hdmi to st1080 [native 1080p]

i have thie issue with z800 [via VGA] as for some moments the z800 screen is black while windows is loading then windows loads 800x600 to get me started with z800

So in a nutshell - normal fov or smaller screen real estate - whatever , i need to get the boot / startup screen showing on st1080 to chk if windows loading normally or getting stuck at startup as once windows loads , the native resolution will be passed on auto or after some settings [first time startup]

Rest of the devices like blu-ray player,media players - they have a built-in scaler to output 1080p so i need not worry about them

BTW - i am not a gamer just need this for movies on the go !
Currently interested in getting this cowon z2 [info refer here : http://cowonglobal.com/] to stream movies on wifi home network [no internet] - small device plays music and video upto 1080p with hdmi output and micro-usb for power just right for this st1080.

hope this answers yuor question Dennis

Thanks for clearing that up Mr Jin! The 720p question was beginning to show up on some forums and was the only real grumble I have heard so far about the ST1080.

That settles it, I'm in! I'll be ordering mine today or tomorrow! I've waited about 20 yrs for something close to this and can't wait any longer. I'm really anxious to visit "other worlds" in games & movies.

Soon afterward, I expect I will be unable to resist ordering the TrackIR head-tracking to compliment the headset.

Your responsiveness to questions & users' desires is very much appreciated and reflects well on the company. Thanks! ;)

Like a kid in a toy store( I'm 53 btw.. :P ) I can't wait to experience things such as Avatar 3D, Skyrim, Second Life, the upcoming Planetside 2, Urthecast (free live 24/7 HD streaming of the Earth from the ISS space station!!), concert videos, etc etc

FYI: for good examples of the above search Youtube for "Planetside 2 - Night Ops", "Skyrim VR with Sony HMZ-T1".

Package is recieved! :D. I'm now at work so I'll try and review it tonight :)

Paul Fay - yes. We have been working on a forums section, which will go live either today or tomorrow. Thanks.

Hey Jeff, can you test rapid head movents as if you had head-tracking and see if you throw-up? lol

This will give us Flightsim guys some heads up on what meds to take before flying the A-10!

Mr Jin would you be able to say if the majority of the orders were placed at the beginning of the march and at the end of march,

cause i contacted sales last week asking about my order and they said that my march 21 order is expected to ship out next week (end of the month)

so im guessing and based of the comments in the blog posts that the majority of orders were placed near the beginning and near the end of march then

great review! There are shortcomings with the device.. there's no denying that. But overall it sounds like a great device! Do you happen to wear prescription glasses? If you do could you comment on the comforts of the device over another pair of glasses? Thanks!

thanks for the quick reply! Since the device sits a bit further away would you say you get a smaller virtual screen and some reduction in quality of the image?

that's pretty much what I wanted to hear!! OK time to order this beast =) Thanks Jeff!

Can someone get a rough input lag measurement with Rock Band or Guitar Hero (how many milliseconds?)

Thanks

I, too, am interested in the Rock Band test. Rock Band latency testing is always a bit iffy since you never know if you are in dead center of the hitbox, but it's a good indicator of overall speediness.

In talking to SMD, they said that it's about 21ms latency.

thanks for the link. I just preordered one. I am sure that thing will have a huge preorder today

I hope it is the real deal! Are there any other articles on the Leap to indicate it is before I hand over my money? hmmm check out Crunchbase and do a search for Leap Motion. Looks real so far..

I agree that $70 is a wonderful price!

This would be awesome combined with a head-tracker & the ST1080!

I am pre-order it also. It would be nice complement with St1080.

Hi Mr. Jin,

I would like to ask is it possible of shipping the ST1080p HMD to country like Malaysia?

Thanks

This should answer you ... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fy7f1sunyS8 ... scroll to 0:21

Jeffery,Great review !!! do you notice blurry corners of the screen while paying games and watching movies or is it just while reading text off the computer?Thanks.

Paul my fingers are crossed I get an email with a tracking number this week. Have you got one yet?

Placed my "pre-order"(what it says after clicking Buy) for a black one a few min ago!

I wonder what the approximate *estimated* shipping time is for one ordered today?

Thanks,
Russell

Placed my "pre-order"(what it says after clicking Buy) for a black one a few min ago!

I wonder what the approximate *estimated* shipping time is for one ordered today?

Thanks,
Russell

oops, form kept giving me an error until I un-checked the "Notify me of ..." box. Please delete the extra posts. TIA

i game with z800 using the sims package @800x600 in 2D
Sometimes i play trackmania forever @800@600 on z800 too - looks very cool but now playing this at native 1080p seems exciting !

So now a question for those who received st1080 and tested it and who have eMagin z800 already -

1)Does anyone have eMagin z800 to compare with this regd. exit pupil / optics/screen door effect / sweet spot

2)Does st1080 have effortless focus just like emagin Z800 3dvisor where you can see all four corners of the screen without strain or effort needed to focus?

This is one big question for me before i order st1080 to upgrade from z800

Anyone in the St. Louis MO area receiving one already or soon? I'd like to see it first hand if you would be willing to let me come by and attach my hdw source. Thanks!!

I will be using it exclusively outside, so want to read reviews about sunlight interference if anyone can review that aspect. Also, how do I order the mobile battery pack? I went to order and all I could include in the cart was the unit, black or white. I absolutely will need the battery pack. Lastly, is the battery pack rechargeable or AA or AAA? take 2.

here you go serp, this is a pretty powerful battery

http://www.amazon.com/Veho-VCC-A010-PRO-XT-13200mAh-Blackberry-Smartphone/dp/B0068JATHQ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1337732671&sr=8-1

i second this would love to hear the progress if its ok by you Mr Jin

hes talking about when they had the special where you preorder the st1080 at $100 off the regular price

Ahhhh stupid me. Yes of course.....

Look for the messages marked in blue among the comments. For your convenience, the quote in this thread near the middle reads: "we are committed to providing a firmware upgrade in about a month that will give you the option to view 720p content in scaled-up full-display mode." So you'll be able to turn that border off by scaling the image up once that firmware update is available. (It does already show them in 3D, it's just the games don't use the whole screen.)

I would be seriously surprised and even quite aggravated if firmware updates of such basic nature were extra cost. I am taking it as given that this function is included in the sale, just delivered late.
As for small boxes being "unplayable", do you generally say that of 60" screens? I for one play my Kinect via a 23", so either way I get an upgrade. Sure, it doesn't beat the HMZ-T1 on field of view for 720p games.. but it's as good as most other HMDs.

Yann what about graphical wise in 3d 60 inch is not bad but comparing to hmz t1 does It supersede it graphic wise in 720p 3d ?

Most firmware upgrades will be free. We don't have anything planned that will be for a fee, but there could be in the future so I don't want to rule it out.

To be clear, the firmware upgrades that's been discussed so far will be free of charge.

We will provide more information about formats that we'll support in the future at a point where we've made enough progress to share that information with you.

Hi, I'm eager to get mine, the sole purpose for me would be to watch 3D Blu-Ray movies. How will the 3D effect be compared to cinema and to lets say 60" 3D LED/Plasma's? I really only feel depth when watching demo display units in shops oppose to popping 3D in cinemas.

In my review I already covered some of your questions. But I'll try here to answer as many as I can:
1. Colors seems to be a bit worse than my LED/LCD laptop screen. But still more than good enough for watching movies/playing games etc.
2. Not great, Black is dark gray. It also seems to be having some light bleeding issues on the sides.
3. Text is very sharp, good readable. Only the corners are a bit out of focus. If you focus on them they are also sharp.
4. Don't have the HMZ-T1, So can't judge on that. But it looks like a big screen.
5. Depends on the movie. For some movies it is hard to see, and some are just amazing with floating stuff towards you and everything. For PC games you can sometimes adjust the effect to make it stronger. I liked the 3d effect in Unreal tournament 2004 (in combination with iz3D) the most. Especially flying with the redeemer ;).
6. Didn't got that mode to work yet (Have to play around with programs on my laptop, to get different modes to work). NVidia Vision 3D detects it but only for bluray playback. 3DTV Play from NVidia does not seems to work right now (all options disabled). I personally prefer 1080p 3D SBS 60Hz (half resolution). Its 60Hz and still looks very good.
7. At first you really have to get used to the HMD. You can adjust 2 slides for your pupil distance. After that it is just putting it on and have fun. Ofcourse there is a 'sweet spot', where you can see most of the screen perfect. But you can still see everything good when moving the HMD around. You can even shake your head while the screen stays good ;).

@Jeffrey -
1)i believe it's ur second HMD after HMZ - right ? u never tried emagin z800 - right ?

2)are u satisfied with st1080 with all it's pros / cons in other words - are u going to keep it OR sell it on auction sites like ebay !

Would you say the screen is like a movie theater or just looking at a monitor from a close distance?

Has anyone tried 3d movie from a 3d blu ray player ,is it full screen?can you use frame packing ?

I just found out about this and the HMZ-T1 a few weeks ago and thought they might be what I have been looking for since I was a child (an HMD with a cinema screen and quality to rival it.) From the review a few posts up it sounds like a 100" version of what my old E-machines 22" LCD monitor looks like. Could those who have one, or the HMZ-T1 let me know if I am way off base (I apologize for being blunt.) I would not be gaming at all, just watching blu-rays (mostly in 2D.) Anyone have a 1080p projector and either one of these HMD's that can compare the difference in quality? Also, would a light controlled environment help with the black levels? Thanks in advance!

Thanks for the review Jeffrey ,is the light bleeding only on the blacks in 3d or is it also seen in 2d ?Have you tried a 3d blu ray through a 3d blu ray player or just through your computer?cheers.

To Paul Jin :
any news about the firmware update for upscaling 720p to 1080p ?

Is there a scaling chip on the controller or is the process will be handled only by software ? (I guess there is one due to the Side-by-side capacity).

Thanks for your reply.

This is such a great resource that you are providing and you give it away for free. I love seeing websites that understand the value of providing a quality resource for free. It?s the old what goes around comes around routine.