Gadgetory

okay so part two we're ready to get back at this actually we had never intended to shoot a part two of this but it would have been like a 40 minute long video so yeah let's go intel skull canyon nook features a 6th generation Core i7 processor and Thunderbolt 3 you can learn more at the link in the video description we've got through all the troubleshooting crap and it looks like the way that it can work because you have to understand that HDMI / DisplayPort is not quite the same thing as native HDMI and that's what the vive uses it uses HDMI / DP so the way to handle that then was to feed my DP signal all the way through the Thunderbolt cable to my Elgato dock out again through a display port cable into DisplayPort here and we were able to do the translation that way it didn't work when we just tried to use a mini DisplayPort to HDMI cable and go HDMI into the box but that means the proof-of-concept is running now so let's assemble it I'd love for this to be able to fit like right here so we'll call that kind of good enough for a proof-of-concept and then power to this it's an output sneak I also need this valves box that goes to right Oh actually oh that's kind of tricky this one needs cables going into both sides of it I wish I could oh you know what that would be a pretty freakin cool place to put it yeah because there's already there's already a velcro strap here so I'll just grab some double-sided okay I don't understand of this bag would there we go so that is theoretically the light tether now I've just got to get the bag attached to the headset so I've done another round of cable shaving which I'm hoping is going to give us enough clearance here to close the top of the bloody headset so first is HDMI then USB although this is a very short USB cable the three-and-a-half millimeter audio extension I realized I could just use the original one it's already light and short and the last thing we need is power I could have grabbed an extra power adapter see they all use the same for the cable breakout box and for the headset itself they all use the same 12 volt power and the same sized connector but even if I did bring one from home it wouldn't be right angle and I really don't want to just try that cable so I hit a bit of a roadblock while I was able to strip down the HDMI cable and the USB cable to make the cover fit on the vive headset which is more important than I thought because the head strap doesn't go into place without it I don't have a DC power plug that I can use for it because the only one that comes with the vibe that's a reasonable length and isn't attached to the tether is a straight and B already needed for the breakout box the good news is I found this a USB to the same size DC plug freaking wicked so all I have to do then is take a 12 volt 1.5 amp power adapter which I can power in the backpack and splice it on to that plug Boop oh my god how am I gonna do this it's just ripping away one of the wires every time I try and strip the outside but I'm not going to be defeated by a wire not today link do you need to shoot crap these are so crappy like the sheathing is stronger than the copper wires inside okay what did I just do Oh son of a bitch I just spliced the two frickin ends together okay what's my excuse this may work though hold on a second I could totally claim to have done that on purpose I just created an adapter for that other battery bank now I don't need to use AC power for the vive headset boom that's what I meant to do okay so we're back in business and this is great because carrying around this power brick honestly isn't much worse than carrying around all this copper cabling and now we can power the vive with this instead I just have to find a place to put it actually that might work nicely oh-oh-oh don't you love it when things just work I probably would but I wouldn't know Oh sick okay that's a beautiful thing that I just witnessed right there so now we can go HDMI in here oh this is one other thing that I grabbed off camera just a short USB extension because by that USB cables really short this is a fun discovery even though these ports are all color coded blue they're USB to ports I had no idea I was running I'm looking high and low for USB 3 a to a cables and then I found the original one included with the vibe I didn't really want to destroy that why don't I kind of what the hell these are USB 2 cables anyway so anyway I've got a short extension here it's kind of a ghetto extension it's got this like the stupid extra cable on it then power which oh crap I hope that fits I actually didn't if you're cutting towards yourself is only dangerous if you get impatient and press too hard slip really not through yet okay got to be through now not area come on the wires are basically just soldered right to this connector and here so effectively by just bending it I think we can make it 90 degrees Hey okay now let's see if it fits and if I can put it in without damaging it sort of fragile now well that is a ghetto wiring job if I've ever seen one the new and improved Linus tether Oh no that's why all the wrong way I guess this look like it's wrong it doesn't it'sit's weird isn't it okay is it open or something like sideways isn't it okay fine ah okay so it's the other shoulder then now I'm getting this all tangled up so this shoulder yes this arm sir okay clearly this backpack is not the one that I would want to use because I can't figure it to top that come on I mean aside from it being a horrible piece of crap okay let's back on my USB extension is m.i.a there it is okay okay so I still have to power the headset which admittedly there isn't a super crazy easy way to do right now so let's try it oh okay my Thunderbolt doodad is not showing up okay let's try the old reboot see if that fixes it what I would do if I were actually setting this up for real as I would tie this in a knot like a tension relief knot so that I don't pull too hard on it because one that side from the weight and size advantage these Thunderbolt cables are very very strong so you could also tie it like around the leg of a chair at the bottom if you have a bit of extra length and tie it here so you don't risk ripping the connectors out of it either and something I have definitely done with my standard tether at home okay everybody the headset it's on okay uh what cable is that is that oh I went off for a second what cable is this can I get a little bit more length for that one - no no frickin way frickin away I think it worked I mean no I worked okay hold on hold on I'll get a game open oh my goodness I can't even believe this look at that I mean that's a better tether Hey I mean yes I'm wearing a backpack now but I can't even feel that okay let's see if it's actually working seems like it though oh shoot right the this backpack is certainly not ideal during my benchmarking I noticed that if I turn to the side quickly it loosened also it actually has a bunch of other random crap in it right now so it's much heavier than it needs to be but something like a body pack that has all the appropriate pieces slotted into it so it's nice and tight against the body actually wouldn't add a lot of weight and now that I've done the proof of concept would work absolutely fantastically there's still a lot of question marks how long the battery life would be for the vive headset as well as for the thunderbolt dock as well as how many actual customers would exist for a product like this I mean we're adding another $200 to the cost with the cable alone we're adding another hundred dollars for a thunderbolt ii X card for and it only works on a Zeus motherboards and it's got to be Thunderbolt 2 because Corning doesn't have Thunderbolt 3 optical cables yet there's still some things to work out you're adding another hundred over dollars for the Thunderbolt dock plus all of the batteries and all that kind of stuff and we're looking at a solution that would cost probably as much or more than a vive in the first place though the way that I see it there are only two kinds of people who shop for a vive the kinds of people who just spent all of their money or the kinds of people to whom $600 is nothing so maybe the potential customer base for this is not as small as you might think either way this was a lot of fun for me I'm still not sure if I'm going to convert my personal rig we'll see about that because there's a lot of refinement that would have to be done to the idea but it's very cool to see it working in practice and not have to worry about stomping on a super heavy thick and oh man it's awesome so thanks for watching guys if you dislike this video what is wrong with you but if you liked it hit that like button get subscribed maybe even consider checking out where to buy the HTC vive or any of the other stuff that we've got featured in the video today at the link in the video description over on Amazon while you're down there you might 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