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

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.
 
  • Deleted member 197115

With that said I have some old DOT and Snell M2000 approved full face helmet and the FOV is huge.
No surprise as per Snell this should be at least 210 degrees.

I am not the one to complain about 110 FOV on Odyssey, going from 40 degrees of "proper" FOV on 42" monitor is HUGE.
Bet going even higher will make it hard to go back.
 
Upvote 0
Worth to mention that Snell certification is voluntary, not a requirement, and not adopted by all manufacturers
https://www.smf.org/helmetfaq#aWhySnellHelmet
Right, but most sanctioning bodies in the USA require Snell SA certification, so manufacturers can choose not to be Snell certified, but you are highly unlikely to find those helmets in motorsports competition.

FIA certification is the next level up and requires that helmets must first have Snell certification before they're checked for penetration and head injury criterion (HIC).

Thus horizontal FOV is still going to meet Snell SA certification. There is no real world justification for VR helmets having FOV of 110-140 degrees in race sims.
 
Last edited:
Upvote 0
Hi guys,

[sorry for my English]

I bought a Pimax 5k+ this Week.. so i testing it and i have to say i'm very satisfied with it: it's a "game VR changer" if you had, like me, a HP WMR headset before)
So i asked myself a lot of question before this Week, i read a lot of things on performances, settings etc.. (thank you for this topic).. so, for the future buyers: this is my contribution to the Community!

This is some settings & results with a 6700k@4.5 | 16go ram | RTX2080ti. I also tried to make a video "through the lenses" and no, i will never win a price at Hollywood for that! :D

With this settings:

sol 1.1.1
Shader patch : 0.1.25-preview74
Drivers up to date

bcb835cf425a14c9d06e2def11d2f389.png

Steam VR:
43f61323a351c56f15bf51679f091431.png

pitool: do not activate the FFR with AC (20-30% fps loss) - normal FOV - 90hz
b6e6a28eba3edd2a23773a51a6876438.png

pitool set to 1
a94d66ef6ae869e3ccad336cc7bdbec9.png

The smart smoothing is actually very efficient.. but not activate for my testing sessions.

The benchmark with this settings in Content manager :
min fps: 52
avg fps: 72

in the worst scenario:
min fps: 45
avg fps: 61

That a WRONG technique (i will optimize it..) but through the lens: it's waaaay better with the headset on.. the dead. Very close to a normal "FHD" screen (?) from my point of view



:D
 
Upvote 0
  • Deleted member 197115

BTW, try shader patch 49, 74 has some performance issues.
 
Upvote 0
Based on that res in SteamVR your 2080ti should be CRUSHING 90hz constantly. I'm thinking SOL is destroying performance here. I get better results than that with a 1080ti but I don't run SOL. I do however pretty much run in game settings at nearly max AND I force extra AA through NCP, which nearly eliminates any 'crawling' in the image. Straight lines are horrible in VR and sim racing has plenty of them.
 
Upvote 0
happy to report that with the latest nvidia driver my 8k is finally tracking the lighthouse with no hiccups.
need to find a thicker and softer foam to keep the lenses out of range from the eyelashes and avoid marks on cheeks and nose.
visually is simply stunning, although I had to replace the 1080ti to get enough juice to handle ACC at 45 FPS.
 
Upvote 0
Interesting finding. The 3dof drift is heavily impacted by having my iPhone X in close proximity. I know it sounds like an old wives tale but it's true for my unit. The amount of drift I get is significant when the phone is on the desk next to the rig of if I have it somewhere in another room.

Overall, still loving the large fov and don't see a need to go back to normal. Since I don't run shader/sol/other mods, I can afford to large the larger fov with a high supersampling rate for a very clean image.

For me, any future VR headset upgrade would need to have the following:
- Somewhere between normal and large FOV
- Double the resolution
- Minimized distortion
- Foveated rendering with eye tracking

As disorganized as Pimax is, it's good to give credit where due. They seems to be improving their software quickly and their support is also coming along though at a slower pace than everyone would want. Once they can tighten up their QC a bit and get the accessories out, I'd have no problem recommending it.
 
Upvote 0
Until you mentioned the distortion, Rob, I'd actually forgotten about it. I never notice it. I know it's worse the higher FOV setting you use, but I remember the first time I put it on, it was very noticeable. Not sure what's changed but I forgot it was actually a thing. I never see it any more.
 
Upvote 0
Until you mentioned the distortion, Rob, I'd actually forgotten about it. I never notice it. I know it's worse the higher FOV setting you use, but I remember the first time I put it on, it was very noticeable. Not sure what's changed but I forgot it was actually a thing. I never see it any more.

It seem to be app dependent. When I'm in AC, it's not noticeable or I'd mention it. However, in SteamVR home, it's really bad along with objects popping in n out of peripheral. This makes me think it's a software issue in the long run.
 
Upvote 0
I've stopped running home so maybe that's why I fail to notice it. I think there is definitely something software related that they can look into for the popping objects. I have seen that in Home before, too. But it's never affected me where I need the thing to work the most, out on track. The Vive Kiwi cover that I bought (14mm and 6mm) makes the HMD super comfortable, too. I've got a tiny bit of tweaking to do with it still to really nail that sweet spot but comfort wise, it's probably even better than the Rift now. No sweat sponge anymore!
 
Upvote 0
Maybe new HMD "Valve Index" could be game changer, just we are still don't know the real specs. Let's wait until 1 of May. As I aware, the resolution and FOV will be smaller then Pimax 5+, but I hope it will be more comfortable and "client friendly", and cheaper as well.
 
Upvote 0
So these are my "final" settings for AC with the Pimax5k+ on PiTools version 1.0.1.121:

In game:
QyyEZDY.png


Pimax PiTools settings:
Fov = Large
FFR and smoothing = off
Hidden Mask = enabled
Frame rate = 72hz
brightness = -1
contrast = +2

SteamVR:
Supersampling = 130%

System:
9900k@ 5ghz
2080ti (stock)
C16 3600mhz RAM

nvidia control panel:
Texture quality: High Quality

I don't run any shader mod/sol/other graphical upgrades for AC so I can't comment on performance with a heavily modded AC. With the settings above, I get a rock solid 72fps with no issue whatsoever.
 
Upvote 0
Back
Top