When I was in Qingdao, the general manager of Chinese manufacturer Skyworth has made me try a 3DOF VR headset called v901, and I was impressed by the 8K video I have viewed inside, so he has kindly given me a sample of the device to test and review. Are you interested in my impressions on this headset? Well, then keep reading…
Specifications
Let’s start with the specs set of the Skyworth v901:
- Display resolution: 3840×2160 (4K), 1920×2160 per eye
- Display type: LCD
- Refresh-rate: 72 Hz
- FOV: 105°
- IPD Adjustment: none
- RAM: 4 GB
- CPU: Samsung Exynos8895 8core 2.5GHz
- GPU: Mali-G71 MP18
- Storage: 64 GB + SD Card slot (up to 256GB)
- Tracking: None (3DOF)
- Audio: integrated speakers and microphone. 1 x 3.5mm audio jacks
- Connectivity: USB (Micro), Wi-fi, Bluetooth connection
- Battery: 3500mAh Li-battery cell, supports wireless charging
Unboxing
Here you are my unboxing video of the device! I tested a new way of making the unboxing, with a POV-approach, so that you can see what I am seeing. I think it is quite cool, but I’m curious to know what you think about this idea…
There is nothing special to say about the packaging: in the box, you find the headset and a white box containing all the accessories. Everything was very basic. This was the content of the box:
- Headset
- Controller + batteries
- USB cable
- Charger
- Lens wipe
- Instructions pamphlet (all in Chinese)
Design
The headset is made to get the job done without caring much about offering something visually appealing. The result is a headset that has a very basic and practical design, without being particularly stylish.
On the front side of the headset, there is nothing, if not the logo SKYWORTH. The shell is very dark blue and doesn’t feel very solid.
The left side of the device shows its connectors: an USB-micro port for charging the device and connecting it to the PC, and the 3.5mm jack for connecting external headphones. The headset features integrated audio, but in case you want more privacy (IFYKWIM), this port comes handy.
On the right, you can see 3 buttons that let you interact with the VR applications in case you don’t have the controller. I will talk about them in the section “Controller” of this review.
On the top, the headset doesn’t show anything special, but you can see some details of the facemask made in fabric and the fitting system.
The bottom of the headset is clearly more interesting since it shows the button to turn the headset on/off, the buttons to change the volume and the slot for the SD Card.
Looking inside the headset, you may notice the lenses and the sensor that detects if your face is inside the headset or not.
As you can see, everything has a very simple design. There is one thing that I personally loved of the design of this headset: the 3 buttons that make you use it even without the controller.
Visuals
Visuals are the category in which the Skyworth v901 has the true potential to shine. It is what impressed me when I tested the device in Qingdao.
With a 4K compound resolution, the headset offers really sharp imagery. The screendoor effect is almost inexistent, and the pixels just become “a sensation”, some disturbances that you have in the visuals and not a grid in front of your face anymore. You see the pixels only if you really focus on them, and only in some scenes. This is impressive. The total resolution of 3840×2160 is 2.25x the one of the Oculus Go, and being both the headsets LCD, this means that the fill factor has the same proportion.
The video I saw was impressive also because the headset has an integrated 8K video decoding hardware, that makes watching 8K videos in it great (remember that in 8K videos, the 8K resolution represents the full-dome of the 360 video, so the part that you see has actually a resolution inferior to 4K most of the time).
The headset has so amazing potential for watching videos, but there are some problems that currently reduce the value of its fantastic resolution. The most notable problem is chromatic aberration: if you look exactly in front of you, in the “sweet spot”, everything is nice, but if you start moving your eyes, or you don’t center the headset exactly on the center of your eyes, you start seeing the R, G, B components of the image separating, creating rainbows. This is a bit annoying, also because it doesn’t happen only in the very peripheral part of the lenses (that also have spherical aberration there), but also in the area quite closer to the sweet spot. This means that you can only watch in the sweet spot to obtain great visuals.
Godrays and glares, due to the use of Fresnel lenses, are also present. For what concerns the display, it is LCD, and this means that the blacks are washed out and the colors are not super-bright. For what concerns the colors, I want to say that in some videos, they appeared very bright, and that was cool. Anyway, they also appeared having something like wrong contrast.
I think that if Skyworth solves the problem of chromatic aberration, this headset may have impressive visuals.
Comfort
别提了. Please don’t make me talk about the comfort of this device.
The headset gets fit to the head using elastical straps that are very similar to the ones of the Oculus Go: there are two lateral straps and one that goes above the head and these three straps are connected in the end that goes around the nape of the user. It is a pretty simple and effective system, that lets you use the device even if you are lying on a bed.
The facemask is made of sponge covered in fabric, and while it is not the most comfortable headset I’ve worn, I think it is ok.
The real problem was in the fitting of the nose. I think that an image is worth more than a thousand words.
I had to use the wipe included in the box on my nose because if I put the headset on my head in the position of the sweet spot of the visuals, it hurted a lot my big Western nose.
This headset is made for Chinese people, and if you have a big nose, you may find it uncomfortable. I think that if Skyworth wants to enter the western market, it should produce a second version specifically built for us.
Apart from this, the headset has the advantage that it should accommodate well people wearing glasses. The fact that it has been made using a single 4K display means that the IPD is fixed and this may be a problem if you have an unusual distance between your eyes.
Controller
The controller is very basic as the headset: it seems a simplified Daydream controller and features:
- One button for the thumb;
- One trigger for the index finger;
- Two buttons on the top face.
The controller works using 2 AAA batteries, that are included in the box. Being the headset 3DOF, the controller is 3DOF as well. I haven’t found it super-ergonomic like the one of the Oculus Go, and also the material was a bit rough on my hand, but it was functional.
I had problems in making the controller connect to the headset in the first minutes, and in the end, I solved changing the batteries and rebooting everything.
Personally, I haven’t loved the controller, but I have loved instead the “controller” included in the headset. As I have shown you above, on the right side, the headset features 3 buttons, that represent exactly the three buttons of the controllers. If the controller is not connected to the device, you can point elements in VR with your head, and then use these three buttons to interact with them.
This is cool for two reasons:
- If the controller doesn’t work or the batteries have run out of power, you can still use your headset;
- If you have to demo your VR movie or 3DOF experience, you don’t necessarily need to take the controller with you and hand it to the other people. You just give them the headset… and then they can use just it to enjoy the experience.
Long life to the lateral 3 buttons…
Audio
The headset features integrated audio. The approach is different from the one of the Oculus Quest, and the speakers are not embedded into the lateral frames, but directly into the main body of the headset, laterally, outside the fabric faceplate.
As I always say, I am not an audio expert: the audio worked, and that was enough for me. It was not cool as the one of Valve Index, but it was usable.
Battery
The battery lasted around 2 hours to me.
What is cool about this headset is that you can actually charge your battery wirelessly! This is very very handy, and I haven’t seen that in any other VR headset on the market. I haven’t tried it myself, but I read this information on the Skyworth presentation.
Initial Setup
The headset required no setup: I just turned it on and after a while, I found myself into the main menu. It is nice that in the latest update, if it is the first time that you use the headset, the device provides you a little guide on how to install the straps and how to operate with the buttons of the device.
All the menus were in Chinese, so I had to use my super-Mandarin-skills to be able to enter the Android menu and switch the language to English.
User Experience
The menu is not bad. Pretty basic, with a 360 photo around you and some buttons in front of you, but I think was good. It has some shortcuts to directly play some 360 videos, use some useful apps (e.g. Chromium to navigate the web), launch some games, launch Viveport or change the settings.
I appreciated that I had not to switch between different screens to do different things like selecting to watch videos or photos, but I was able to easily operate inside the main menu by just changing some sub-tabs. I could do many things within only one screen. The shortcuts to play videos were also very handy.
Here you are a video of me touring around it, if you are interested.
Content
Apart from some 360 videos and photos, and some apps like Chromium and a Cinema app to play videos, there wasn’t much pre-installed with the device. Some of the 3D videos that come with the device were pretty cool to be seen, though. Luckily there was Viveport, that gave me access to all 3DOF content collected by HTC Vive.
Content is not much, and this headset seems more suitable to insert your own content, like your own 360 videos.
Special considerations
The headset overheated a bit while I used it, and the front part became quite hot. When I met a Skyworth representative at WCVRI, she told me that they have already made a new model with a front vent so that to solve this issue.
China
Being Skyworth a Chinese manufacturer, you don’t have problems buying it and using it in China, even without a VPN.
Price
You can find the headset on Taobao for 2000-2500RMB (280-350$).
Final considerations
Skyworth v901 is, in my opinion, a pretty basic 3DOF headset. It lacks the polish, the attention to design and the quality of other products like Oculus Quest, but it gets the job done in making the user enjoy 360 videos.
It has some special features like the 4K display (+8K hardware video decoding), that make it very cool to watch high-resolution VR videos. The almost unexistent SDE is stunning. Wireless charging is something that also blew my mind.
The few content available onboard makes it more suitable for premium users, like directors that want to showcase their own VR videos. And for this kind of people, the possibility of using the device also without the controller is very handy for demos.
Anyway, if Skyworth wants to really compete with brands like HTC and Oculus, it must absolutely step up the game, and solve its problems with chromatic aberrations and make also the headset a bit more international, making it suitable also for Westerners (both regarding comfort and having an easy option to switch language).
I really hope that the next version will fix all these issues.
I hope you have enjoyed this review! If you have questions on this device, please let me know in the comments or on my social media channels!
(And don’t forget to make a little donation on my Patreon account… Christmas is coming! 😉 )