You're going to have a bad time, but it's there if you want it.
Google has not been at all shy about whether the Nexus 6P is a good phone to use in their new Daydream headset. The big warning on the side of the Google Developers site letting you know this phone is only useful as a development model for future Daydream products should be enough. On the other hand, if all you have is a Nexus 6P and you want to see what you're missing out on, Google didn't work too hard to stop you from trying.
You're only going to get about 5 minutes into Daydream on the Nexus 6P before performance takes a hit.
You don't actually need the Daydream View headset and controller, but it certainly helps. Much like the Daydream demo Google unveiled back at I/O, all you really need is a pair of phones and simple Cardboard headset. The Daydream app can be sideloaded onto your primary phone, and Google's Daydream Controller Emulator can be installed on the second phone if you don't have a View. Daydream will start up and give you access to all of the same things you'll get on the Pixel and Pixel XL. If it sounds clumsy, that's because it is.
You're only going to get about 5 minutes into Daydream on the Nexus 6P before performance takes a hit. The phone will overheat, the processor will slow down to compensate, and the apps and VR motions will stutter. This isn't just a bad experience from a visual experience, it's one of the fastest ways to experience nausea through VR. a consistent framerate and accurate head tracking are two of the most important parts of a successful VR experience, and Daydream on the 6P guarantees neither of these things.
So like I said, it's possible to take a look but you probably shouldn't.
Reader comments
You can use the Nexus 6P in Daydream, but you really shouldn't
Interesting.. this was what I was looking for. I have the 6P and almost bought the Daydream. I decided to reach out to Google to verify if the 6P was compatible (to which they said no), but I had doubts as to the motives of the answer... Since 6P was okay for development, I was fairly sure it could work (in some capacity); the Pixel may have been optimal, but the 6P would still work.
It sounds like that is the case, albeit less of a capacity than I'd prefer. Thanks for the info!
Is there not a fan in the headset like with gear VR? Or would that probably not make a difference.
There's no fan. The device is passively cooled.
Also, welcome back
Thank you! I intend to be more helpful here.
You missed a ton
No kidding especially with the note 7 my grandfather had a replacement unit he had to return, he visited a couple weeks back and my parents after I mentioned the second recall said yeah you need to return that.
He turned on the TV and was convinced immediately.
Returned mine the moment they opened returns for the second recall.
Bought a Moto Z very recently. Only about a week old.
I miss my Note still, but it is refreshing to go into a more "vanilla" UX after years with custom skins.
There is no fan in my Gear VR, I wish there was because I immediately start sweating and my S6 starts to slow down and stutter after about five minutes. It is not ideal.
Did you get the headset for your Pixel?
Well, it's not really designed for Daydream, is it?
Clearly not. Which surprises me a bit. I would thing the 810 would be advanced enough to be able to handle it. It wasn't developed to run it I guess. But it does perform like a champ with just about anything you throw at it on the 6P
The 810 V2.1 in the 6P runs much better than the original 810 (with the overheating issues) in my experience with both. My 6P, on 7.1.1, handles everything I throw at it with ease.
I'm curious to know if things have changed regarding this article and 7.1.1 - I've been learning a lot that on 7.1.1 there's a lot of hacks a tricks to squeeze out better performance
The 810 can technically handle it. What it can't handle is the heat.
Well ya, and it's because of the throttling that it can't handle it
After rooting and with certain apps can't we adjust the thermal throttling and perhaps prevent this issue?
Further proof how the 810 processor is great for multi tasking but horrible for heavy graphics processing. If the phone distributed heat better, the 810 would have been a beast. I still love my 6P though because the 6P > Pixel.... IMO.
The 810 is still rather flawed in nature.
But the 6P does better than most in taming it. It doesn't excuse the chip since heavy loads will still get it to throttle, but in daily use, it's not bad on the 6P.
I've been surprised with mine at just how well it handles graphic intensive games on my 6P. I haven't pushed it to the absolute limit but I've never had an issue with throttling. What Google and Huawei did with the 810 on the 6p is nothing short of phenomenal. They were able to basically optimize it to run the way it was intended during development by Qualcomm prior to manufacturing.
I can verify that the 6p is garbage in daydream apps. Also, you do experience throttling, you just haven't run into anything where it's a serious issue yet.
Ya, I've experienced the same throttling that every heavy smartphone user has regardless of model. The type that's unnoticeable to the user
Sorry but that's bullshit. I love love loved my 6P. In fact, I would have paid extra to keep the 6P's design with the new hardware inside. But the 810 would throttle even under daily use. If I was on my phone browsing for any extended period if time (20+ minutes), it would start slowing down and occasionally stutter. It wasnt terrible, but it was noticeable. On a hot day and being outside, the problem is even worse. Or trying to use the phone when it's rapid charging. Or extended navigation use. My Pixel XL is nothing like that, and it's the best Android phone I've ever used from a basic usability stand point, but the design is ****. I miss 5.7". I miss the dual speakers. I hate this huge, ugly, useless chin.
If phone manufacturers would have made the handsets 1 mm thicker I wonder if the cooling could have been made better and let the 810 shine? It reminds me a lot of my Surface Pro 3. It has a great processor (Core i7) but if you use it for more than 5 minutes while doing any gaming it throttles really bad.
Making the phone thicker would provide more material to act as a heat sink and absorb the thermal output, but that would only delay throttling a few minutes longer. What you really need to do is move the heat produced by the SOC to the outer shell of the phone where it can dissipate to the air. The phone that came closest to this was the HTC M9, as they designed it so the processor could pass the heat directly to the back aluminum body of the phone, and used copper tape to maximize the thermal transfer from the SOC to the back. Unfortunately, the last step in getting rid of the heat is passing it to the surrounding air, and no phone body has enough surface area for the amount of heat produced by the 810... especially if it's being held in your warm hands. You would need to put fins on the back, and that would never sell.
I have fleeting ideas of a back-pack style water cooler running behind a nude 6P. Mount a heat exchanger plate behind the 6P, run the tubing up over the head or around the side and over the shoulders, into a reservoir, heat sink (or a bag of ice, lol), and pump system.
Yep, that's exactly what I was thinking!
Did they publish the requirements for Daydream? They said V20 wasn't compliant because the screen was not AMOLED based.
Apparantly the S7 (not edge) has a higher ppi than the Pixel (not XL) and is AMOLED ..but no one is saying its Daydream compliant even though they share the same architecture (Qualcomm SOC) .
Kenny
It doesn't need to be amoled, it needs to have a really high refresh rate though.
I cant attach the screensots, but in 7.7.1 (beta) on my nexus 6p there is a daydream - vr configuration to change brightness.
This i believe means that the device will support VR eventually