Future of Intel RealSense hardware

[Apolon_I_]

Can anyone from Intel supply some feedback on how the RealSense hardware is intended to play out?

Committing to the RealSense SDK commits developers to the hardware available and defines the maximum marketplace for software. I can see there's a place for embedded Realsense devices looking at the user from the display (front models) and looking at objects from behind a portable display (back models). My concern is the continued availability of a standalone unit such as the Creative F200 and the ability to apply the technology to use cases beyond what Intel is envisaging.

Also, why do the developer units only work with Haswell processors? This also limits the scope of software app sales.

[samontab]

Hi Apolon, I am not from Intel, but from I have read, it seems that the USB camera was just a developer thing for the contest. It is not intended to be a product in the long term. They want to integrate the camera into tablets and notebooks. So I don't think that this USB camera is going to be available in the future. You will get the camera embedded in newer tablets/laptops.

About the limitations, this is really in the SDK. You can still get raw data from the camera using other CPUs. I was able to read raw data from the camera with a very cheap Asus T100 (which has an Intel Atom), and it worked fine. This means that in theory you could even run it with an Edison!. (I need to try that!). The SDK (hand tracking, etc, ) on the other hand, was not supported. But, you are free to use other libraries, like OpenCV, or PCL for example.

[Robert_Oschler]

@simontab - If you ever do get the RealSense camera or the old PercSDK camera working with the Edison board, please write about the project.  I would love to see that.

Robert

[samontab]

Sure Robert,

Trying to use the RealSense camera with the Edison actually aligns nicely with another project that I am preparing now. Will keep you guys posted.