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Well, well, well, it appears as if the very first pre-orders of the HTC Vive are finally beginning to be processed by the company. Reports late this morning and early this afternoon indicate that numerous individuals, who had pre-ordered the HTC Vive virtual reality headset, have had their credit and debit cards charged. This is the first sign that the company is preparing to ship orders very shortly. HTC had officially stated that the Vive would launch on Tuesday, April 5. Whether they meet or beat their self-imposed timeline, from a shipping standpoint, is yet to be seen, but already Oculus customers, who had expected to receive their orders prior to HTC launching the Vive headset, are showing their disappointment.

Many individuals who had pre-ordered their Rift before the Vive still remain in limbo, unsure of when their Oculus headset will ship, as you can see from this internet survey of those who had orders a Rift.

“Oculus needs to get their sh*t together. My X:05 Oculus order is still in limbo. How f**king embarrassing. So excited that my Vive charge went through. I may get my Vive before my Rift now. Nice,” wrote one VR enthusiast on Reddit, who clearly was disappointed at the way in which Oculus has been handling shipments.

“Honestly I am pretty disappointed with Oculus. I wanted the Rift to be my first experience in VR and it won’t be. I ordered both Rift and Vive 1 minute past the hour orders opened. I have a pending charge from HTC, Oculus has yet to charge me for my Rift. I didn’t get the March ship date I was promised on my pre-order, and my Vive is going to be getting here first, on time as they promised me,” wrote another Reddit user, expressing further disappointment towards Oculus.

To be fair, HTC did have more time to prepare for the influx of orders, and likely had less volume to deal with. Also it doesn’t hurt that HTC has been in the tech manufacturing business for years, whereas Oculus and their parent company Facebook are new to the game. Ultimately any backlogs should be sorted out over the next several days and weeks ahead. It is understandable, however, that many of these VR enthusiasts lack much patience. After all the technology behind both the Rift and the Vive is quite impressive, and we all want to be able to experience it ASAP.

Has your card been charged yet? What are your thoughts on this news? Let us know in the HTC Vive Orders Being Processed forum on VRTalk.com