If you’ve got an Oculus Rift you might want to make sure you’re running Windows 10 in the near future.
Today, Oculus announced that it is updating both the recommended and minimum specifications for its PC VR headset, listing Microsoft’s latest operating system on both. Previously the recommended specs asked for Windows 7 SP1 or newer and the minimum asked for Windows 8.1 or newer.
So why the change? Oculus says that Windows 10 will be required for some of the new features it’s adding to its Rift Core 2.0 platform in the near future. Currently, the beta for 2.0 does support Windows 7 and 8.1, but if users don’t upgrade then they won’t get the full experience in later updates. Oculus didn’t go into specifics about which features would require Windows 10, but we do know that 2.0 is set to introduce things like multiplayer support and user-generated content in the near future.
Not only that, but Oculus told UploadVR that it expects more Windows 10-required apps to arrive in the Oculus Store as time goes on. Right now the Rift’s store has around 100 apps that require Windows 10 and another 60 or so that require Windows 8.1. Effects on multiplayer games will be specific to each title.
According to Oculus, 95% of Rift owners are already running Windows 10, so this news won’t have any consequence to many. Other than that, there are no other changes to either set of specs; you won’t need any new hardware.
The fully updated system specs are below:
Rec Spec
- Graphics Card: NVIDIA GTX 1060 / AMD Radeon RX 480 or greater
- Alternative Graphics Card: NVIDIA GTX 970 / AMD Radeon R9 290 or greater
- CPU: Intel i5-4590 / AMD Ryzen 5 1500X or greater
- Memory: 8GB+ RAM
- Video Output: Compatible HDMI 1.3 video output
- USB Ports: 3x USB 3.0 ports plus 1x USB 2.0 port
- OS: Windows 10 operating system
Min Spec
- Graphics Card: NVIDIA GTX 1050Ti / AMD Radeon RX 470 or greater
- Alternative Graphics Card: NVIDIA GTX 960 / AMD Radeon R9 290 or greater
- CPU: Intel i3-6100 / AMD Ryzen 3 1200, FX4350 or greater
- Memory: 8GB+ RAM
- Video Output: Compatible HDMI 1.3 video output
- USB Ports: 1x USB 3.0 port, plus 2x USB 2.0 port