Oculus Rift Headsets Are Working Again Following Unexpected Downtime
Owners of the Oculus Rift VR headsets who tried to play a game yesterday found that the headsets weren't working. The reason for the non-functioning devices was unknown at the time. The error that users were seeing on their headsets stated, "Can't Reach Oculus Runtime Service." Oculus admitted there was an issue not long after complaints started rolling in and stated that it was working on a fix.
It turns out that the problem was that Oculus forgot to renew its security certificate. That expired security certificate caused the Rift app to crash and prevented access to the VR software. The fix involved the issue of a new security certificate from the Oculus Rift website that wasn't expired.
Oculus is stepping up and has stated that Rift owners affected by the error "will be provided with an Oculus store credit" as an apology.
Rift is back online as of ~12am. This was a mistake on our end, and we apologize. Folks impacted by today's downtime will be provided with an Oculus store credit. More details to follow soon. Thanks again for everyone's patience as we worked through this one.
— Nate Mitchell (@natemitchell) March 8, 2018
If you own a Rift that is affected, the instructions for fixing the issue and getting the device working again can be found in the tweet below.
Hey all - thank for your patience. We now have an Oculus software update in place that fixes the issue where Rift may fail to start up. For more info and instructions, please go here: https://t.co/gYz2G4Fon7
— Oculus Rift (@OculusRift) March 8, 2018
Thank you once again for your patience.
That last time that we talked about the Rift was back in December of 2017 when it had a price cut to $379 for holiday shoppers. Right now, you can pick up the Rift headset and the motion controllers for $399.
