

VR headsets effectively need to run two 4K displays, one for each eye, and you have all the processing for controller tracking too. You also have eye tracking, they’re doing the whole foveated streaming thing everybody has been gushing over about (it’s really cool tech!). The mobile chip they used is nothing special, it’s a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, a 3 year old smartphone processor (certainly powerful enough to run lighter PC games, but nothing more than that. It’s kind of insane that a phone can even do that nowadays!)

It’s 2160x2160, so less than 4K (which is 3840x2160) horizontally, since it’s a different aspect ratio but it’s still more pixels. About 8 million for a standard 4K display, while it’s 9 million for the Frame. Even streaming games on such a high resolution display is performance intensive, plus you have the controller + eye tracking