Critical Evaluation of Virtual Reality Platforms

Over the last few years the field of virtual reality developed from a subject known to a few select researchers to a household discussion topic. Research into the subject over that period has increased the available software from a few systems running on expensive machines to systems that can give reasonable results on an inexpensive PC. This paper introduces the design of one such system, developed specifically for creating virtual reality applications on a parallel architecture. This system, referred to as the VROS (Virtual Reality Operating System), is then compared with other systems, which were being developed at the same time. Practical experience with the other systems is limited since many require specialized hardware, both for computation and for interaction. For this reason, the discussion will concentrate mainly on design rather than performance issues.