Is VR dead?

[Pär Öqvist]

Agree 100%

What's funny are how many comments under headset reviews cherry pick features from various headsets and say I'll buy a new headset that has all of these features. They will be waiting a LONG time.

I just want something I can enjoy comfortably that is sharp enough and looks good enough.

If my Aero was as light as and fit me as well as my Rift CV1 did, than I probably would have called it good, but my headsets got increasingly heavier and looser fitting with the Index and Aero and now that is an issue for me and has become a priority.

It took putting my CV1 back on to realize how far in the wrong direction headset designs were going in terms of comfort. The CV1 is so damn comfortable compared to the others. It is a night and day thing.

So the idea of having something much lighter and smaller than the CV1 along with dark blacks and great color and very good even if not class leading resolution seems like the right move to me. Fingers crossed it works out for me.

Then you approach the first corner at monza and where the heck is the braking marker I need it CV1 works for racing but boy is it borderline at times. But yeah inside out tracking did mess things up with the need to put heavy cameras in the headsets. Then wireless now we need battery in the headsets on some. Then eye tracking then you need cameras looking inside in the headsets. It´s just natural there is a cost in weight though. But the good thing is we can train our neck muscles to match f1 drivers and not have an issue

I used heavy hifi headphones prior to VR so I don´t really see it as that much of an issue. It´s something you weigh in of course. But for me having headstraps with adjustment knob on the back so you can´t use head rests is way worse! It increase the feel of weight that much more.

I just got my Varjo Aero home. I would say it certainly don´t feel night and day resolution wise to the Quest 3. But that is early impressions but seems like you need your glasses to really appreciate the difference. Aero seem to focus on getting things sharp in front of you and don´t care about blur to the side. Quest 3 instead gives a sharp image in the entire fov though it do have a smaller fov so it depend on how you look at it.

Interesting to see how they behave performance wise. The little I tried I am kind of amazed that I don´t have to reduce image settings from my old rift S. But I need to try ACC the VR killer but the drivers of these headsets seem to be better optimized then ever. eye tracking and foveated rendering finally working as advertized I suppose.

As for long time comfort the aero even have fans. Which is of course a con in other way but the quest 3 do get hot. I also heard people struggling with the big screen beyond. Not really surprising with so little surface aera to dissipate heat and panels close to you. I was between that and the Aero. Think I made the better compromise but I probably will never know.

I felt like a lunatic getting both the Q3 and aero but I do believe it will be very practical for my bedroom serious pc setup then my living room roomscale wireless setup with the quest 3.

I don´t think there will be something significantly better then this in a long time. I been on Rift S until now

 

[RCHeliguy]

Good luck! I hope you enjoy the Aero, but there will definitely be some setup to get the most out of it. You will want to join the Varjo discord if you are not there already. They have areas that are dedicated to iRacing, ACC, DCS, MSFS etc.. and have known good settings.

There are people happy racing with Reverb G2's, Aero's, Crystals, Pico's Quest's right now and many other headsets. All that matters is whether something works for you.

I've heard people hate on every headset out there and love every headset out there, so don't worry about what other people think. Dial what you have in as well as you can, get used to it and try to enjoy the process.

 

[Pär Öqvist]

Good luck! I hope you enjoy the Aero, but there will definitely be some setup to get the most out of it. You will want to join the Varjo discord if you are not there already. They have areas that are dedicated to iRacing, ACC, DCS, MSFS etc.. and have known good settings.

There are people happy racing with Reverb G2's, Aero's, Crystals, Pico's Quest's right now and many other headsets. All that matters is whether something works for you.

I've heard people hate on every headset out there and love every headset out there, so don't worry about what other people think. Dial what you have in as well as you can, get used to it and try to enjoy the process.

What issues did you have with yours? I have one odd thing. Chess Ultra VR is really blurry much blurrier then Rift S. Doesn´t matter if I run 300 % supersampling. pinball fx vr is as sharp as could be expected though.

As for racing I never had a vr headset that doesn´t work outside of struggling for fps so not really to worried outside of performance issues

 

[RCHeliguy]

What issues did you have with yours? I have one odd thing. Chess Ultra VR is really blurry much blurrier then Rift S. Doesn´t matter if I run 300 % supersampling. pinball fx vr is as sharp as could be expected though.

As for racing I never had a vr headset that doesn´t work outside of struggling for fps so not really to worried outside of performance issues

With a 13900K + 4090 I'm getting great performance in all titles and it is sharp as a tack. (iRacing, Dirt Rally 2.0, DCS, various room scale games). I don't use ACC.

I've found the Aero comfortable and reliable. The cooling fan works well once it turns on about 10 minutes after it powers up. The tracking works great when you aren't covering the tracking sensors with your hands moving the headset on your face.

I have to click on the red shift tool link to adjust those settings before I start.
I installed the DFR plugins for iRacing and DCS. ACC has one as well.

I don't think the Aero is a bad headset and I'm still using it.

The reason I ordered a Bigscreen Beyond is that I find it very distracting when the Aero moves around on my face. In room scale it's very distracting and now that I'm sensitized to it, it drives me crazy in Dirt Rally 2.0 with my motion system. To be fair my Index moved as well. The CV1 was the last headset that held my face well.

Both with the Index and the Aero tightening the head strap doesn't keep the headset from moving and just makes the headsets painful to wear. I purchased the apache head strap for the Aero and didn't find it helped with this any and it felt more like I was wearing a hat (a bit warmer)

So the primary reason I ordered a BSB was comfort. Past that there is some blurring when I move my head. I got used to that, but still notice it from time to time, and the best the Aero does is a dark grey for black areas. It also has a smaller vertical FOV than I would like.

So mostly I'm counting on the BSB being something that I forget I'm wearing in VR. The dark blacks and improved color with zero moire will be icing on the cake, but I'm also not suggesting the BSB will be better than the Aero for everything. I just think that I'll like it better.

I'm keeping my Aero for my wife and visitors.

 

[Deleted member 197115]

Quick synopsis of the 90 minute video:

Question: People are asking us why the Somnium VR1 is not microOLED with pancake lenses.

Answer:
1. If we used the larger microOLED displays and pancake lenses like the Apple Vision we would have to limit the FOV and it would be crazy expensive.

2. We don't consider the extremely accurate IPD, lens placement and closer eye spacing necessary to use smaller microOLED like the Bigscreen Beyond is using acceptable.

Question: People seem to think that we are on the cusp of having microOLED and large FOV in the near future.

Answer: It will be many years before we see it. Here is another solution that we will see in a few years.

( show your work here for 90 minutes )

Are you looking at Somnium already with BSB not even shipped?

 

[RCHeliguy]

Are you looking at Somnium already with BSB not even shipped?

Not at all. In fact I replied to Artur's question about the direction I saw optics and form factors going. To be fair I'm quite sure I would like the Somnium better than my Aero, but I want the Bigscreen Beyond for reasons that haven't changed. If anything, Artur's video helps me appreciate what a rare thing the Bigscreen Beyond is warts and all.

I have nothing but respect for Artur and his plan for the Somnium VR1 and VR2 etc..

 

[RCHeliguy]

Speaking of the VR2 which is still years off.
They showed this with a FOV that I'm sure many of us would love to see

 

[Deleted member 197115]

Remember that Valve patent, looks like it was this thing.

Steam Deck OLED Announced With Better Screen, Battery Life, And More

The popular handheld PC is getting a big upgrade, while older models get price drops.

www.gamespot.com

 

[RCHeliguy]

Yeah, some of us got riled up over nothing. I know I'm going to do my best to get my Bigscreen Beyond and unplug from that whole scene.

 

[Pär Öqvist]

Varjo is really as sharp as you could ever demand for simracing. I am not even using my glasses (1.0) and no supersampling yet everything is just perfectly sharp. The real test is combat flight sims where you are supposed to spot small tiny objects km away before they see you. Also movies perhaps. This actually work for that task but there I could see new headsets actually make a meaningful impact as well. But for simracing no

As for wider fov I tried it with pimax and I was surprised how little that did for immersion. I ended up using it with the smallest fov possible for better visual quality/performance and in pimax case also less issues with artifacts. Also not sure if there is to little overlap on pimax because it was more 2.5D then 3D

 

[wajdi]

 

[Rebel_488]

So many people who rushed to buy it at the price drop will be clenching their cheeks at that

 

[gamma123152]

View attachment 707181

It will probably not be an Aero 2 but an expensive business/enterprise device(or multiple) first. That's at least what I expect. I expect that an new consumer hmd will follow later after it. But I'm not sure about that maybe they'll launch both together this time...

Varjo has a lot to solve before they can innovate. They must first solve the following issues before even thinking about anything else: the low(mainly vertical) FoV, the insanely low stereo overlap, the motion blur issue, the warping/distortion issues, the ca/color shifts, the comfort, the local dimming. If the lenses and local dimming(or they must go for oled) aren't solved then they can forget it no matter how high the resolution is/nits are.

If they go for pancake lenses then they can solve most of these issues at once but the nits will be to low then probably, so I expect that they continue with aspherical lenses because the high nits was always an big selling point of Varjo. But we'll see, an exciting event, that's for sure.

 

[wajdi]

It’s here
Next week I should receive the Bobo M3 strap.

 

[HoiHman]

View attachment 707312
It’s here
Next week I should receive the Bobo M3 strap.

Good luck trying out the Q3 with the standard straps

Guess it's gonna be a long couple of days until that Bobo M3 arrives

 

[Deleted member 197115]

Is it a boo-boo without Bobo?

 

[wajdi]

Good luck trying out the Q3 with the standard straps

Guess it's gonna be a long couple of days until that Bobo M3 arrives

After 2H of testing I really don’t understand how the hell meta did release this headset with this kind of head strap ?!! After 10min it’s unplayable. Fortunately I have the Apache strap from my old G2 reverb and it helps a lot… can’t wait for the Bobo strap. However apart from the comfort, so far good first impressions. The pancake lenses just wow.
Inside outside tracking works great. 30 laps( rfactor2) I didn’t use the recenter button once.

 

[HoiHman]

After 2H of testing I really don’t understand how the hell meta did release this headset with this kind of head strap ?!! After 10min it’s unplayable. Fortunately I have the Apache strap from my old G2 reverb and it helps a lot… can’t wait for the Bobo strap. However apart from the comfort, so far good first impressions. The pancake lenses just wow.
Inside outside tracking works great. 30 laps( rfactor2) I didn’t use the recenter button once.

Yes 10 minutes, that's about how it took me before i decided to use the deluxe headstrap instead.

Looking forward to see if your Quest 3 can keep it's battery charge when using the cable.
Be sure to checkout Virtual Desktop to. It has some cool features like switching in and our vr with a hotkey ( so you can use a buttonbox) and having pass through with a virtual screen floating above your rig.

Also, depending on your facial structure, you might want to heat up the facial interface and bend the edges a little outward for better comfort

 

[RCHeliguy]

Be careful if you are using the USB charging port in the hinge. I've already seen a failure of that joint.

It does seem that by not including a usable headstrap Meta just created a soft price increase to get many people to by the premium strap.

Speaking of straps, most people are not in love with the BSB head strap. It's not uncomfortable, but takes a little time to place. With the Aero or Index, I have always been able to hinge the display up, put it over my head and hinge the display down.

However, there are people who actually want to lay down or sit back into a pillow and the soft strap accommodates that. So that is a VR Chat and Bigscreen movie watching thing and it certainly won't interfere with racing seats.

I do have the audio strap ordered just in case I like it.

Shipments are picking up, so hopefully I'll see my shipping notification soon.

 

[wajdi]

Yes 10 minutes, that's about how it took me before i decided to use the deluxe headstrap instead.

Looking forward to see if your Quest 3 can keep it's battery charge when using the cable.
Be sure to checkout Virtual Desktop to. It has some cool features like switching in and our vr with a hotkey ( so you can use a buttonbox) and having pass through with a virtual screen floating above your rig.

Also, depending on your facial structure, you might want to heat up the facial interface and bend the edges a little outward for better comfort

So you are using link cable or VD ?
Please post your setting ( oculus debug tool). Did you receive your new 4090?