Oculus Rift Over Fibre Optic
Well here’s a niche article if ever there was one.
In our recording studios, we have no computers. Rather, the computers are kept in a separate room, connected to each studio by a mixture of analogue audio cabling, CAT5e and fibre optic. The fibre is used for FireWire and any display connectivity we may need, using whichever converters are suitable.
This results in super-silent rooms with no whirring or squeaking or clicking, but it does present some odd challenges. Not all conversion systems are made equal and not all devices will happily get along with the adapters we use, for whole host of reasons. So when we started exploring the world of immersive 3D with Oculus Rift, I suspected I may have some headaches.
Display Chatter
Adding a new display in most places involves nothing more than plugging it in, but in our setup we first have to program the transmission end of the fibre converter with the EDID of the display we’re about to use. This way the computer knows what it’s talking to without actually being connected to the real thing. Seeing as the Rift’s video is nothing more than a display on a HDMI cable, you might assume that the same technique would work just fine. This is not the case.