OS and firmware independence

[MrMormon]

There are (at least) two things about the Hydra that disappoint some people. One is that it still only works on Windows computers, and the other is that firmware etc. still limits its frequency.

Not my project, but take a look at https://github.com/rpavlik/razer-hydra-hid-protocol - someone has made some progress with figuring out the controller's USB protocol.

Will Sixense and/or Razer be faster to give us Linux and Mac support and 250Hz control?

[MrMormon]

I lost confidence a long time ago that Sixense cares about people on its forums whether or not they've given you money, but

bump.

[cookies4you]

I lost confidence a long time ago that Sixense cares about people on its forums whether or not they've given you money, but

bump.
They do care. Just remember that there are only about 2-3 of the Sixense dudes watching the forums, which means that they're pretty busy. Chances are, they're working on something at the moment. I haven't seen any of the moderators lately. I highly doubt that they would abandon something that's so unique.

Software programming takes a long time to do.

However, the source code would be nice. A public release, maybe?

[MrMormon]

According to memberlist.php?mode=group&g=5 (http://www.sixense.com/forum/phpBB3/memberlist.php?mode=group&g=5), there are ten admins.

[TiagoTiago]

In the past i've seen 6ense employees reaching to people even in thirdparty forums, even in situations people weren't even expecting to be noticed by them; are things much different nowadays?

[MrMormon]

Trying to get publicity is a mark of sales smarts, not good service imo.

As for my first post, I found out the SDK can do 250 Hz! So the only real question is when non-Windows users can use possibly the only affordable absolute 6dof tracking device out there, which Sixense/Razer have right here. Maybe they should focus more on the hax 'market'; this device could be really cool for more than just music and casual gaming.

[TiagoTiago]

The easier somthing is to tweak and adapt ("hack" for short) the easier it is to get people to create new uses for it for free. Focus on making it hackable (and, of course, interesting) and you're on your way to getting free "advertising", both from plain word of mouth as well as getting news coverage about people using it for all sorts of things you didn't have to pay them to work on.

[Opadong]

Thanks for the link, sounds like a very promising project. Good to know there will be alternatives to the razer/sixense software... that so far unfortunately stays unsatisfying in several points.

[MrMormon]

Unfortunately, it looks there's been no work since August.

[xchaotic]

I agree, that especially on the Mac where a lot of the Steam games including the fully integrated Portal 2 work, there should be some raw support for the device, but I also understand resource limitations...
I am certain that there were good reason for implementing the drivers the way they are now, but I think it'd be great if the controller were detected as a standard USB game controller + USB mouse - that way at least some of the things could be used w/o the Razer driver...

[TiagoTiago]

Being able to remap axis and buttons into virtual input devices like joysticks, mouses and keyboards at a driver level in a flexible manner would indeed be quite awesome.