Pimax 5K+ spotted after a 16 month hiberation.... First impressions

[anton_Chez]

Well, it's here. The Pimax 5K+ headset I backed on Kickstarter in October 2017 has finally made it from the depths of hell and everywhere else in between to my house in Australia. What a ride it's been.

To start, the box is fairly nice, nothing too fancy but definitely of Rift quality, nothing flimsy or cheap. The smell is actually like a brand new paid of shoes! I'd say that's the padding. Anyway who cares about the box, hey?

Upon fitting the strap, I was horrified at the comfort. Only after I messed around with it a little bit did I feel I could actually make it work. It's not as intuitive as the Rift but it's workable for me at least. One thing that's immediately struck me is I've nearly got my nose poking through the lenses from the inside out. My face is literally ON the lenses. We are going to have to order custom cushions. It's insane that they've left this unaddressed. I think additional face cushions are a stretch goal reward but I've not see them being any different to the standard one. We need thicker pads, Pimax. I have a small face and a not so overly large nose and I'm struggling. If it turns out my IPD is able to have the lenses moved to the outside of the headset I might just get away with it.

The strap does tighten on your face pretty well. I did not expect that based on other feedback. It's not ski mask type like the Rift but it does have the ability to stick to my face and feel pressure so there's some modular possibilities there especially for larger faces that won't need to tighten the straps as much. Between the side and top strap you should be able to get the HMD sitting nice and flat on your face without any tilting at least while sitting down.

I've yet to power it on so I'll go and do that now. One thing you'll notice is you need an additional power point for this. It comes with an external power source that plugs into the PC side of the cable. It isn't recognised by the PC unless you power it on.

 

[EsxPaul]

Yep just 3 DOF but some are fine with that for seated experiences.

At least it works at all without one though.

If you were to lean forwards in the car to take a close look at the steering wheel for example, would the wheel move away from you?

This is what I think would happen with 3DOF but I'm not sure I have that right.

 

[anton_Chez]

Correct. You'd need to keep your head from going back and forth but you can look left right up down and tilt left right.

 

[EsxPaul]

Correct. You'd need to keep your head from going back and forth but you can look left right up down and tilt left right.

Thanks for confirming that, mate. I keep going back and fourth in whether I should upgrade my original Odyssey to the 5K+ and it's been the base station requirements that have made me hold back.

I'm definitely going to be needing those then, once the SFX is completed

 

[anton_Chez]

Yeah you just need one. It's perfect with the SFX-100 then.

 

[Gary Warke]

Mark, you will definitely be selling the rift, no comparison.
Don't forget to check uk.webuy.com for used wands and base stations, might also find a Das vive audio strap there which can be modded to fit pimax.

 

[RCHeliguy]

If you are referring to me, I will likely donate my Rift to a friend who works with people suffering from PTSD. They don't have much of a budget and there has apparently been a lot of work creating software for this area.

As much as I'm very interested in this technology, I'm not rushing anything. I may even end up with a Valve Index if they have 135 degrees FOV mostly because it will probably have a "reasonable" bundle including the Index Controllers and base stations and they have built in headphones. I have no interest in Vive handsets. I have never liked their design. I also spend more time playing room scale than in my rig and the Pimax looks a bit bulky for that.

I love being able to just pop my Rift on and off easily with headphones attached. It's light, comfortable and convenient. Right now the Index looks like it has a good form factor, the hand controllers are what I want and the hand tracking is what I want. I still have no idea what the final specs are, so I'll continue waiting until I see something that is the right combination of what I want.

 

[Gary Warke]

No mate , that was for the other Mark.

Upon reading in here though, I’m pretty sure the rift will be the one going on sale.

 

[Steve D]

Have had my Pimax 5k+ for just over a week, bought as a replacement for my trusty Oculus Rift.

Quality & Comfort
Out of the box the HMD is not a patch on the Rift. Build quality and materials are okay if unspectacular and I couldn't get on with the cheap foam cover and poor fit. However after adding a Kiwi Design face cover, adapting the nose area with a piece of the same material and carrying out the DAS mod, (Vive Deluxe Audio Strap), to give me a more comfortable and adjustable head strap solution with integrated audio, comfort and fit is now 'night and day' compared to OEM. I'm really chuffed with the end result.

Set up
All originally very straightforward and PiTool, (I'm using the latest beta), has some nice / clever options. However as I'm running motion, after trying it 3DOF just wasn't for me and I immediately invested in a lighthouse. Unfortunately, it wasn't seen by PiTool / SteamVR, which is required before headset tracking can be established and I tried absolutely everything I could find on the official forum, Reddit etc to sort it but to no avail. Was extremely frustrating. Ended up having a 45 minute Team Viewer session with Pimax Support, (based in Beijing), who, after a fair bit of tinkering, resolved the problem and everything has been rock solid since. 'Hats off' to Pimax as well because I bought the unit second-hand and yet they responded, arranged a remote session and fixed my issue within 24 hours of me posting a ticket. That's pretty impressive all things considered.

Performance (8700k / 1080ti combo)
After some great tips from @anton_Chez and @RobertR1 it didn't take me long to dial in some values for AC, RaceRoom and Rfactor2, (uses parallel projection which isn't ideal), which provided a noticeable bump in 'eye candy' whilst maintaining solid performance and mostly using medium in-game graphical settings. (I've also settled at Normal FOV, 72hz, which is perfectly acceptable for me), I'm sure there's more to be had with further experimentation but the improvement is already considerable over the Rift. Another shout out to @RobertR1 for recommending I use fpsVR, (Steam purchase), to monitor frame rates and other very useful info in-game. It's a cracking little app, pretty unobtrusive and allowed me to tweak my set up so that 72hz could be maintained with a little headroom built in.

Strangely though, the biggest win for me isn't the improved fidelity, which I thought would be the case. It's the increased FOV, which apart from being immediately beneficial both on the track and in terms of comfort, (no more major twisting of the neck to see who's pulling alongside), adds more than I expected to immersion, especially where the racing is at close quarters.

Conclusion
I'd say that compared to the Rift, which is extremely comfortable, lightweight, simple to put on and use and (update 1.31 aside), has always just worked for me without issue, (maybe I was lucky?), the Pimax requires a little bit more effort and even expenditure to get the most out of it. As a result, for some, initial impressions might be less than enthusiastic but if you are prepared to accept one or two compromises and address the issues, where you can, an already impressive headset can be turned in to a cracking one.

Like an old but very comfy pair of shoes, I didn't think I was going to easily be able give up the Rift because of how well it worked both for me and within my set up. After a week it's been packed away for back-up purposes only and that says a lot about the Pimax.

 

[RaceNut]

If you are referring to me, I will likely donate my Rift to a friend who works with people suffering from PTSD. They don't have much of a budget and there has apparently been a lot of work creating software for this area.

As much as I'm very interested in this technology, I'm not rushing anything. I may even end up with a Valve Index if they have 135 degrees FOV mostly because it will probably have a "reasonable" bundle including the Index Controllers and base stations and they have built in headphones. I have no interest in Vive handsets. I have never liked their design. I also spend more time playing room scale than in my rig and the Pimax looks a bit bulky for that.

I love being able to just pop my Rift on and off easily with headphones attached. It's light, comfortable and convenient. Right now the Index looks like it has a good form factor, the hand controllers are what I want and the hand tracking is what I want. I still have no idea what the final specs are, so I'll continue waiting until I see something that is the right combination of what I want.

I agree that the Rift CV1 is very easy and convenient to use. I tried the Samsung Odyssey+ and returned it after a couple of weeks, mostly due to various WMR issues and it being a bit awkward and clunky compared to the Rift. The audio quality was also quite inferior imo. The best thing about the Odyssey was the reduced SDE.

Having tried the Odyssey+, it really reinforced the need to wait for further advancements in VR-HMD progress and I'm wanting a FOV increase in addition to improved image quality.

 

[RobertR1]

Glad to hear it all worked out well in the end @Steve D The pimax is a couple of gens ahead of the rift for sim racing purposes.

 

[anton_Chez]

Found something interesting tonight in AC relating to Post Processing. I'm currently experimenting with the 64hz mode to try and avoid smoothing. I had a feeling that the latest PiTool messed with the way smoothing was handled and my theory was sort of confirmed by the forums. People have been asking for the smoothing to return to the previous version while maintaining the brightness and contrast options of the latest tool. Anyway, this has caused me to look at alternatives to get around the weird blurring I am experiencing with smoothing lately.

While running 64hz I've been in AC trying to push the SteamVR slider as high as it can go before dropping below. I manage 130% approximately before you start to see signs of frame drops. I don't enable the global slider at all so the numbers may vary from person to person when comparing %'s. I normally run PP at minimum as the V8Corsa mod has a very odd behaviour with PP turned off. I did it anyway just using stock content and found that by turning PP off I was able to push the slider up to 200%, roughly 15M pixels per eye. That's a massive increase while maintaining 64hz. I turned it back on at the same 200% and my frames were in the low 40's, even at minimum. This might explain why Robert is using Large FOV with barely any noticeable loss in performance, as he doesn't run post processing at all. It's about a 30% frame rate loss, which incidently is about how much Large FOV costs over Normal, if memory serves.

So yeah something I didn't really expect. It should also be noted that to me, at Red Bull Ring, pushing up from 130 to 200% didn't give a huge increase in image quality, not as much as I'd expect and also not as much as I've previously experienced. Maybe it was just the circuit, it already looked fantastic at 130% and the smooth 64hz made it even better, at Normal FOV it's a fantastic experience. RBR is a really pretty circuit and the Pimax makes it look superb.

I'll have to do a bit more testing (aren't I always?) as I would like to find what the 'wall' is in regards to the SteamVR slider when considering image quality vs performance. With the Rift it was generally accepted that anything over 1.4x pixel density was a bit of a waste of performance as the results did not warrant losing any more frames. I personally always ran at 1.4 or less. I think with the Pimax there's more to it because of things such as the various hz modes, parallel projections requirements and also the different sims in general. I've seen some really nice image quality up around the 13M pixels per eye with 45hz smoothing and anything above this you start to lose the stable frame rate. Funny that at 15M pixels with post process off in AC, I didn't find a big boost. Maybe 13M is that magic number. The screens might not benefit from jamming any more pixels in. Maybe the best use of any left over performance (let's be honest, no one has left over performance running the Pimax at 13M pixels per eye anyway) is better spent in FOV increase or running at a higher hz.

One more thing I noticed is that if you set the slider at 100% (or any number you choose) and you have your hz on 64, if you change to 90 in PiTool and then go back to SteamVR, look at the slider. The value stays at 100% but it automatically changes the resolution to match the new frame rate. It knocks off around 30% of the pixels to account for the roughly 30% higher frame rate target. Again I don't run the global slider enabled at all in the VIDEO section of SteamVR so my experience might be different to someone that does set that slider. I use the APPLICATION tab and set the value per title. I used to run the global but found this a bit easier to modulate.

Try it and report back if the same thing happens to you. Also similar thing happens when changing FOV values.

 

[RobertR1]

I can’t find much visual improvements past 150% large fov and 72hz.

Turned reflections down to static to pull the additional resources. Smoke is off also.

 

[Steve D]

Just given that a whirl Anton.

RBR GP - Z4 GT3 / 16 AI
CM - PP enabled (low quality) / Sol enabled plus I'm running the stereoscopic mirrors mod in high quality.
Pitool: Normal FOV, 64hz, Smoothing Off
SteamVR: Video - custom res disabled but sets at a recommended 94% if enabled / Application - 130%

Achieved a rock solid 64fps throughout and didn't notice any visual hit compared to 72hz. Does look very nice!

 

[anton_Chez]

I am amazed that the 64hz mode is working as well as it does. There was a massive uproar when Pimax announced that they were having bandwidth issues resulting in not being able to achieve the heralded 90hz on the 8K in earlier testing. This ended up remaining true as the 8K has a maximum refresh rate of 80, while the 5K (without the added scaler chip) is able to hit 90. If we knew then what we know now, I'm not sure anyone would have bat an eyelid. The fact that no one has had these options (as far as I know, certainly not in the Rift, perhaps some WMR devices do?) to try out until now meant that everyone thought they were going to get a sub par experience or be throwing up everywhere because of the low refresh. How wrong we were.

I still want to go back to test the previous PiTool. I feel the smoothing was better on that one. It was supposed to be improved, however I think with them adding the additional 1 or 2 frames to the smoothing it has affected the image quality too much for me to want to use it. I tend to rely on 45hz smoothing when doing V8 league races. The server we use absolutely smashes frame rates to the point that where turning the SS way down doesn't even make a difference. I can't believe how bad it is. Combined with the unrefined V8Corsa mod and people are driving in the 30's and 40's even on screens. It's crazy.

 

[Mascot]

I am amazed that the 64hz mode is working as well as it does. There was a massive uproar when Pimax announced that they were having bandwidth issues resulting in not being able to achieve the heralded 90hz on the 8K in earlier testing. This ended up remaining true as the 8K has a maximum refresh rate of 80, while the 5K (without the added scaler chip) is able to hit 90. If we knew then what we know now, I'm not sure anyone would have bat an eyelid. The fact that no one has had these options (as far as I know, certainly not in the Rift, perhaps some WMR devices do?) to try out until now meant that everyone thought they were going to get a sub par experience or be throwing up everywhere because of the low refresh. How wrong we were.

I still want to go back to test the previous PiTool. I feel the smoothing was better on that one. It was supposed to be improved, however I think with them adding the additional 1 or 2 frames to the smoothing it has affected the image quality too much for me to want to use it. I tend to rely on 45hz smoothing when doing V8 league races. The server we use absolutely smashes frame rates to the point that where turning the SS way down doesn't even make a difference. I can't believe how bad it is. Combined with the unrefined V8Corsa mod and people are driving in the 30's and 40's even on screens. It's crazy.

I'm guessing this magic 90hz figure originally came from Oculus after focus group testing on a wide variety of VR games where you're flailing your arms around and jerking your head about all over the place as if you're having a seizure. For seated sim racing I've always thought that a solid 60fps would do me just fine in VR, and I can achieve that quite comfortably. The problem is, the Rift will ASW that up to 90fps with artifacts or drop it to an unacceptable 45fps if ASW is disabled. I'd love it if Oculus patched the Rift to run at an optional 60fps, but the displays probably don't support it.

 

[Deleted member 197115]

WMR can do 60 hz, and it's bad, like really bad, lag, and the most annoying, micro flickering.
Not sure how 64hz makes difference for you guys, may these extra 4hz matter.

EDIT: We should be more careful not to confuse FPS with refresh rate (Hz).
ASW is 45 fps for instance, but it's still 90Hz.
Not sure how Pimax does that, is that really refresh rate?

 

[anton_Chez]

Yeah, another reason why I am so stoked at all the options PiTool offers. I just ran another handful of laps at RBR, testing the post process on / off. I am up to 19M pixels per eye at 64hz before I start to see any drop in frame rate. This number is staggering to me. It's like I can't put it high enough, AC just refuses to drop frames with PP off. I also tested 90hz and I am getting around 13-14M pixels with no drops AT ALL. FWIW, the 90hz IS the smoothest of the bunch, it's so nice. Tracking is perfect, there is ZERO stutter, just perfect. The other hz options are fantastic and you only really notice the different if you're testing them side by side very quickly. I went between 64 and 90 though. Going 72 to 90 and you probably couldn't tell the difference.

With rF2 needing parallel projection enabled which hinders performance, the real test will be going back to Raceroom. I'd like to see how my post process OFF pixel count stacks up in Raceroom. The problem I have with it however is that if I set too high a resolution (it's not THAT high, but the game thinks it is, it's like 120% or so) then the game boots into this tiny window and SteamVR has a hissy fit. Probably the reason why I've never really pushed it to test the upper limits of performance. I wonder if it's been fixed recently? I've not spent much time in it as of late.

 

[anton_Chez]

The hz modes are like Vsync, so they are running native frame rate (64hz for 64 FPS) without having it go over should there be available headroom. The smoothing works like ASW, so 45 FPS but smoothed to 90hz. I still get confused by the two. But the hz modes are different to smoothing. They are legit 64, 72 and 90hz modes. Even when frames drop, you barely notice in this thing. I am seriously amazed by it. NO WAY I could tolerate dropped frames in the Rift. I could drive with dropped frames for a whole race and nearly forget it's happening. I could even run at 72hz mode, have say 65 FPS average and barely notice. You have to try it to believe it.

 

[Stevie_007]

The hz modes are like Vsync, so they are running native frame rate (64hz for 64 FPS) without having it go over should there be available headroom. The smoothing works like ASW, so 45 FPS but smoothed to 90hz. I still get confused by the two. But the hz modes are different to smoothing. They are legit 64, 72 and 90hz modes. Even when frames drop, you barely notice in this thing. I am seriously amazed by it. NO WAY I could tolerate dropped frames in the Rift. I could drive with dropped frames for a whole race and nearly forget it's happening. I could even run at 72hz mode, have say 65 FPS average and barely notice. You have to try it to believe it.

anton, are you on the beta v1.0.0.121 . my 5k arrived today, hasvent turned it on yet have a few htc lighthouses coming, god it only took a week from ordering to arrive, impressed at that

 

[Tim Palmgren]

anton, are you on the beta v1.0.0.121 . my 5k arrived today, hasvent turned it on yet have a few htc lighthouses coming, god it only took a week from ordering to arrive, impressed at that

Yeah the 121 beta is what most people are on. Google earth doesn't work but other than that it is pretty solid all around and I found it more stable than the other ones I tried as well.