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Hi gents, I am a Linux enthusiast (no pro, though) and long time Windows opponent. IMO it actually got worse with every Windows version. As such I am quite pleased with the way gaming under Linux evolved in recent history thanks to all the effort Valve put into Proton. Unfortunately DCS was always one of the games that still caused trouble for me, esp as I only play it in VR. Once you tasted VR you cannot go back! So I invested some time to get it working under Linux in VR. There are some useful howtows out there, but none really was up to date or usable for my setup. This is why I'd like to share my knowledge on how I got DCS standalone no Steam with Lutris with VR to work. It was heavily helped by https://github.com/TheZoq2/dcs_on_linux/issues/26#issuecomment-1528227256 but needed some tweaks, as this post is 2 years old by now. My system: AMD 5600X AMD 6900XT Arch Linux HP Reverb G2 Software we will be using: Lutris Monado (OpenXR runtime) Proton GE 10-10 I will assume you know your way around your Linux system, like installing software with the package manager of your distro and also how to install packages from source (like the Arch AUR) if your distro does not provide everything out of the box. 1. Install Lutris 2. Get Proton GE For me Proton GE 10-10 worked well. Anything newer causes an error which I have not put any effort into investigating. It is a decently new version and zou can get it here https://github.com/GloriousEggroll/proton-ge-custom/releases/tag/GE-Proton10-10. The page has installation instructions. If you have steam installed you can install this Proton GE version for Steam and Lutris will find it as well. If you don't have Steam install it into your Lutris Wine runners directory, which should be /home/<username>/.local/share/lutris/runners/wine. Alternatively you can use a tool like protonup-qt to manage your Proton (GE) and Wine installations. 3. Select Runner A Runner in Lutris lingo is what runtime should run your game/app. We set it to the freshly installed Proton GE 10-10 by clicking the round play button right of "Wine" on the left panel. Then we selct "GE Proton 10-10" as the Wine version and save on the top right. 4. Install DCS Get the standalone installer from the ED homepage. Open Lutris, select "Games" and on the top right click the hamburger menu > ADD Games. Select "Install a Windows Game from an executable". Name it "DCS" > Install > Select "Wine Setup file" > Install > choose and installation location > Continue > Select the DCS Installer .exe by clicking "..." > Install. 5. Go to sleep and let DCS download and install its massive amount of data At least at my place it takes a while to download everything 6. Configure Proton/Lutris We need to make some changes to variables and stuff to be able to run DCS. Right click on your freshly installed DCS in Lutris > Configure. 6.1 Game Options Under the game options tab change the "Executable" to the path to the dcs.exe in your installation directory. It should be at <installation dir>/drive_c/DCS World/bin-mt/DCS.exe if you want to use the multithreading version of DCS. As "Arguments" put "--no-launcher --force_enable_VR --force_OpenXR" As "Working Directory" put "<installation dir>/drive_c/DCS World". Not sure if this is really required but for sure it is cleaner. 6.2 Runner Options In the Runner Options tab add a new "DLL override" with name "wbemprox" and value "n". Select "Output logging info" as "Inherit from environment". 6.3 System options Add a few "Environment variables", "PRESSURE_VESSEL_IMPORT_OPENXR_1_RUNTIMES" with value "1", "PRESSURE_VESSEL_LOG_INFO" with value "1", "WINEDEBUG" with value "+openxr,+loaddll,+debugstr", "XR_LOADER_DEBUG" with value "all". Only the first one is important to get DCS to work in VR, but the others help to find the cause in case you have an issue. You can remove those once everything is running satisfactorily. 7. Add stuff to Proton We need to install some other versions of libraries Proton is using and other stuff. Select DCS in Lutris, then click on the up arrow next to the wine glass at the bottom > Winetricks. A window will pop-up. Select "Select the default wine prefix" > OK > "Install a Windows DLL or component" > OK. Select "d3dcompiler_47" and "xact" > OK. Once done go back and this time select "Install a font" > "corefonts" > OK. Once done > Cancel until the window closes. Then go again to the up arrow next to the wine glass > Wine regisrty. You will most likely need to create a folder named "VR" under "HKEY_CURRENT_USER/Software/Wine". In this VR folder right click > add > DWORD. give it the name "state" with value "1". Add two other DWORDS with names "openxr_vulkan_device_vid" and "openxr_vulkan_device_pid" and two strings with names "openxr_vulkan_device_extensions" and "openxr_vulkan_instance_extensions". Don't worry about their values yet, we will set those at a later stage. 8. Try out DCS in 2D mode Select it in Lutris and press the "Play" button at the bottom. After a short while it should ask you for your credentials. As every system is different a lot of different issues can occur at this point. You can right click on DCS in Lutris > "show logs" to figure out what the issue might be, the debug settings we set earlier should help getting a good picture. You can ignore issues related to XR-LOADER and openxr in general at this point. This is the next item we will tackle. From here on onwards I assume your DCS is working in 2D. I would have suggested you relax with a round of Combined Arms, but sadly it is hopelessly neglected by ED 9. Get VR working I will not go into much detail about this as this is very much dependent on the distro and VR hardware you use. What you need to do is get the OpenXR runtime Monado working. Under Arch, the distro I am using, this is a semi easy task. It is not part of the official package repository so I could not simply install it. But it is available in the Arch User Repository (AUR). Also, Monado has a lot of dependencies which can all be installed either via AUR packages or the offcial pacman packages. There are some tools that make self compiling and installation from the AUR easier, like yay or paru. I did it all by hand via makepgk. Other distros offer Monado as part of their general package database, like Debian or Ubuntu. I any case, from here on onwards I assume you have VR working with Monado and can run the test app hello_xr. 10. Set registry data In 7. we added some registry entries, now we need to populate them. In my experience it did not matter what I put into openxr_vulkan_device_vid/pid. However I used the vendor and product id of my GPU, that seemed the most sensible choice and who knows what happens in the future. Maybe it is used in case you have more than one GPU (onboard vs dedicated), I don't know. In any case, start monado-service in a console and look for "INFO [vk_print_device_info] Device info:", it will say "vendor:" and "product:" a few lines below. These are the values I used for openxr_vulkan_device_vid/pid in the registry. Next run "hello_xr -v -g Vulkan2" in a terminal. You can close it right away, because we are only interested in its console output. You will find something that looks like this: LOG in xrCreateVulkanInstanceKHR: Creation of VkInstance: result: VK_SUCCESS vulkanInstance: 0x55aac8967360 extensions: VK_KHR_external_fence_capabilities VK_KHR_external_memory_capabilities VK_KHR_external_semaphore_capabilities VK_KHR_get_physical_device_properties2 VK_EXT_debug_utils This is a list of INSTANCE extensions. Write all the listed extensions, separated my a space, into the "openxr_vulkan_instance_extensions" key. Similarly, a bit further down, is the following output: LOG in xrGetVulkanGraphicsDeviceKHR: Creation of VkDevice: result: VK_SUCCESS vulkanDevice: 0x55aac8a11ee0 vulkanInstance: 0x55aac8967360 external_fence_fd: true external_semaphore_fd: true timelineSemaphore: true extensions: VK_KHR_dedicated_allocation VK_KHR_external_fence VK_KHR_external_memory VK_KHR_external_semaphore VK_KHR_get_memory_requirements2 VK_KHR_external_memory_fd VK_KHR_external_semaphore_fd VK_KHR_external_fence_fd VK_KHR_image_format_list VK_KHR_timeline_semaphore This is a list of DEVICE extensions. Do the same thing, add all listed extensions to the "openxr_vulkan_device_extensions" key. If my memory serves me correctly these should be all the steps needed to get DCS running. So, plugin your headset, start the monado-service and then click Play in Lutris with DCS selected. Useful tips: Changing some setting of Monado might make for a better experience. Adding EUROC_HMD=0 as an environment variable when launching monado-service helped make my headtracking stutter less. I also added WMR_HANDTRACKING=0 since I don't use any sort of handtracking when playing DCS. So my Monado command line looks like this, "EUROC_HMD=0 WMR_HANDTRACKING=0 monado-service". For a somewhat better performance you can grant higher priviledges to Monado by running sudo setcap 'cap_sys_nice=eip' $(which monado-service). This is required only once. In case you experience issues with running DCS in VR or not even staring, look at the lockfile Lutris provides by right-clicking on Lutris' DCS entry and then selecting "Show logs". A.1: Proton uses a sandbox to run programs, meaning it provides of mix of system libraries and its own libraries as an environment where programs run in that is detached from your real system. Knowing this is particularly important if Proton is complaining about missing libraries or files in general. This happened to me with libcjson.so. It is installed under /usr/lib, but Proton cannot find it because the sandbox, which is automatically provided by a runtime tool called "pressure-vessel", recreates its own "/usr" path with a predefined set of libraries. A somewhat clunky way around this is manually adding the missing library by copying it into the base folder pressure-vessel uses to build its /usr sandbox and adding it as well to its "directrory"-file named usr-mtree.txt.gz. It is located at /home/<username>/.local/share/umu/steamrt3/sniper_platform_3.0.20250929.168600/. So, first copy the missing file to the sandbox preparation folder, cp /usr/lib/libcjson.so.1.7.19 /home/<username>/.local/share/umu/steamrt3/sniper_platform_3.0.20250929.168600/files/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/ then add the file itself and a link to a generic, non-versioned name to that file as well to the usr-mtree.txt.gz file, gunzip usr-mtree.txt.gz add the following lines: ./lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libcjson.so.1.7.19 type=file ./lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libcjson.so type=link link=libcjson.so.1.7.19 and the re-zip the file gzip usr-mtree.txt.gz With this method you can introduce a file that is missing in the sandbox. There might be better ways, but I was happy to at least figure this one out, as there maybe are some docs on this pressure-vessel sandbox, but I did not find any that really explained how to extend the file collection of the sandbox. You can add PRESSURE_VESSEL_SHELL=instead as an environment variable to DCS in Lutris in the System Options tab. This will open a terminal instead of DCS when you hit Play. In this terminal you can expolore the folders and files of the sandbox the game will run in. There you should also find libcjson.so under /usr/share/x86_64-linux-gnu. When in this terminal you can start DCS by typing "$@". IMPORTANT: The XR_RUNTIME_JSON environment variable can be used to configure which OpenXR runtime should be used. If this variable is not present the config active_runtime.json in /etc/xdg/openxr/1/ is used. In my experience setting XR_RUNTIME_JSON, in Lutris or otherwise, caused a problem with the very important "PRESSURE_VESSEL_IMPORT_OPENXR_1_RUNTIMES" we set earlier, leading to pressure-vessel not poperly including the local files needed for VR into the sandbox. So, don't use XR_RUNTIME_JSON and make sure your /etc/xdg/openxr/1/active_runtime.json points to the correct runtime. It has been a while since I did all of this, so I hope I did not forget anything. An honest word on performance: It is not good. Single player should be doable, under Win10 I had 60fps, under Linux I have very inconsistent 45fps. Multiplayer however is impossible for me, I literally get 7 fps. I am not sure if this is a Monado, Vulkan, or Proton thing. I still decided to write this guide in the hopes you have more luck and also spread the word. Maybe someone smarter than me figures out a way to get more performance and to to further push the good cause of Linux gaming and Windows independence. Now is a good time to move to Linux and be the boss of your own PC again! Also got a new mechanical keyboard, so I enjoy a bit of typing atm Cheers!

What I find extreeemly annoying (and bends my brain when trying to fly and adjust comms at the same time): The dials for radio frequency on the UHF are inverted. Scrolling the mouse wheel up actually decreases the number.

Will there be a stream with commentary available? For all those of us who are still learning to survive in a PVP environment...

wow, that got quite a discussion going. Thx everyone for contributing.

I all, I am confused about the fuze settings in free fall bombs. The manual does not say a lot about the meaning of the settings and it certainly does not say when to use what. Mfuze: You have a choice of nose, tail, and nose+tail. What does that mean? The fuze is basically what causes the explosives within te bomb to explode, right? So I assume there are two fuzes inside a bomb, nose and tail, but which option to use? Do all bombs have two fuzes? A nose fuze makes perfect sense to me, 'cause that's what the bomb will touch the ground with. What is a tail fuze good for? And why not simply always go with nose+tail, just to make double sure the bomb explodes? Unless it is not "nose OR tail" but "nose AND tail"... Efuze: Do all bombs have an efuze? I saw several people dropping bombs without setting the efuze. Will it still explode? If it does, why is there an INST setting? I thought INST means it will explode as soon as it hits the target (in contrast to DLY1/2). I guess DLY means it will not explode right away but a little later. But what do I need that for? Also, what does VT do? Thanx, Asset

^^ what he said! :thumbup: Wofür hat man denn nen Co-Piloten? In echt könnte man sich auch die Arbeitslast teilen wenn einer fliegt und der andere auf die Karte schaut. Oder der Pilot hovered während der Gunner nach Zielen sucht. Finde die "Autopilotfunktion" beim Huey (aka "Dave") super sinnvoll. Bei der Mi8 frage ich mich immer, wieso "Sergeiy" nicht mal kurz das Steuer übernehmen kann während ich die Toilette besuche.

This. I rather spend my precious processing power on real pixels than some virtual ones that help a bit but cost exceptional. If you want resolution nothing beats real resolution.

two weeks...

+1 SEAD, ich komme! :pilotfly:

I am surprised how you guys jump the bashing train. He's just a dude (literally) making a video while running a little hot. I could not care less. If you know what's in the M2K just don't listen to him. If you are unhappy with his comments make a video yourselves showing how great you find the Mirage.

Well, this is a Rift user speaking here. Let me be clear: the immersion is amazing. It cannot be described, this feelinf of actually sitting in a plane, with plane all around you. It raised my helo flying skills to a new dimension as you can judge its movement so much better. However, I am also in a squadron that takes flying seriously and I do have the feeling that I am hindered in my performance by the current VR sets. Resolution is low, I have to use the zoom constantly, I have trouble reading the course of the HSI or my wingmens' altitude off the TAD or the currently selected radio preset. So I am experimenting going back to TrackIR and use a second touch screen monitor for displaying gauges and MFCDs/CDU. And VR is very power hungry. I have 4GHz i7 and a GTX1060. 130fps in 2D, 45 in VR, hmmm. My advice would be to ask yourself what you want to get out of your flying. Roam around and have a bit of fun: go VR. When doing it a bit more serious going the non-VR route seems a good route as well. It's pretty difficult to take notes with a VR set on. If you fly planes VR does less for you then with helos. I don't know your monitor specs, but if they are 120Hz compatible you could try 3D glasses like NVidia 3d Vision 2. Maybe this can be a good compromise and only set you back $200.

Trying to revive this old thread as I have several questions regarding this technology. I have a CV1 and the immersion is perfect. But resolution and performance with the new 2.1 sucks. When I fly in my squadron we take it seriously and I feel like I have trouble performing in finding enemies or reading gauges/pushing buttons. I basically can only do it using zoom. Also the image looks like its two images not perfectly aligned, making moving objects blurry. I usually have 45 frames in the Rift in DCS 1.5. The new 2.1 killed my frames, now down to 25-28 on the ground at Nellis, where in 2D I have >100fps. However I do not want to miss 3D, as it is so much better, especially for helos, my secret love. Also with the Rift you cannot see the outside world. What is great for immersion is not so great in a real scenario with my squadron, as I have to check several papers (kneeboard res still a bit low sometimes) So now to my questions: - is the depth perception with Nvidia as good as with the CV1? - The fps with Nvidia 3d will always be half of what I have in 2d? - Do I need a special monitor? What are the requirements? Why does it have to be a 144Hz monitor? If my PC setup is only capable of 100fps in 2d I will get 50fps in 3d, so why would I need a 144Hz monitor? -I would like to do a two monitor setup, with my 23' touchscreen as the cockpit, running SDA software for most buttons, MFDs, CDU,... . This screen is not 144Hz, so will this setup be possible? Headtracking: I have a TrackIR5 which I use with the track clip that you have to attach to a baseball hat. I do not own the click that gets attached to the side of a headset. I wind the tracking not to be as precise I which. I feels shaky. Even when I up the smoothness I always feel like I cannot aim my view precisely. And I am limited in how far up I can look, because it loses track. Can anyone who has tried both tracking clips give an opinion on which is better. Thank you

EGI needs 4 minutes to align, if you do it properly. But then I don't know if that impacts precision of JDAMs.

Not if modeled correctly. Hovering requires full power. For that the engines get cooled with water and it only lasts so long. The Harrier cannot hover for more than 90 seconds.

The idea would be not to do it on you own, so not 8 trips by only one pilot. And a FARP would be something that lasts till the endt of the round, so potentially saving time for following attacks and other players.

As a player who predominantly flies choppers, I find it quite tedious to get to some places across the mountains. It takes 25minutes just to fly there which will get quite boring after you have done this 4 times, since the map is not progressing. Proposal: How about introducing a mobile FARP? I mean, that's what they are meant for, to be quickly established at forward positions. Just make it in a way that it takes a bit of effort, like 4 crates in total to set one up. You have to place four crates to set up a FARP in a one location to create it and the FARP does not count as a objective so it is not captureable. Once all units are destroyed the FARP will just disappear. And limit the numbers to just one ore two.

Ciribob, first of all my sincere thanks for your piece of art. I use SRS nearly every day when I am on the BlueFlag server and it adds a great amount of immersion for me. I do come across two quality of life topics though when using it. First, there are always people who get their mic gain messed up, blowing everyones ears off and it takes them several attempts go get a correct setting. Would it be possible to add a test mode, like a LED bar of an equalizer, where people can see how much volume they produce when talking? Second, the sound quality degrades noticeably when there is communication on multiple radios simultaneously. This is actually the one reason why my squadron uses Universe Radio. I had a very talkative GCI today, which is good, but that caused trouble understanding my wingman, which is not so good. Thank you and keep up the good work! :thumbup:

Traitor! ;) Last time I tried Red they were all sitting in a squadron specific channel. That's what kept me away, giving me the impression they want to stay on their own. Is it ok to join?

I tried the inverted flight just now. I managed to get inverted at my very first try but not again afterwards. Beginners luck I guess. However the one time I got inverted I could hold it stable all right for several seconds before I decided to roll out again. So yeah, it is possible with the current DCS 1.5 stable version and I doubt it is possible with the real Gazelle. Did not check on the asymmetric loads.

As a pilot on Blue Side, unfortunately, I agree with you. I am always amazed, that with such imbalance we not simply roll over red. And I am always amazed how fast CAP support disappears :cry: But for me it is quite simple why I pick Blue: no SRS on Red. And SRS is a big bit of "flavor" for me.

You don't need a mod for the Mi8, you can set the cockpit language in the options menu.

All versions are modeled and textured. There’s just the coding left.Hui, das hört sich zum einen gut an. Zum anderen aber eben auch nicht. Denn es gibt nur Pat als Programmierer, Pat teilt sich die Zeit mit PolyChop und Pat hat schon das FM der Gazelle verbaselt (?). Verdammt, ich freue mich eigentlich auf die Bo. Die Gazelle habe ich mir nur als Vorbereitung geholt (wer will schon ne französische Kopie wenn er das einheimische Original haben kann ;)). Aber bei den beschränkten Ressourcen...

That was exactly what I was pointing at. I've seen real life videos of Bo105s doing a roll, but I have never seen a Gazelle doing it. When I say "stable" inversion I mean the flight displays some people posted here from DCS where they fly their Gazelle inverted for 10+ seconds. I know of no manned helicopter that can do that. My bottom line was always: Real life Bo105 can do more acrobatics than Gazelle and no real helo on earth can do what is possible in DCS.

Then go download 1.5 and fly all over the Caucasus?

I confess I am surprised to see this. I actually had a look at some real Gazelle flight displays on Youtube to see if the professionals get it inverted. Didn't see any. But this picture does not tell us if this is a stable inversion or "just" a short roll. The DCS videos here show Gazelles doing entire approaches while inverted and I doubt that this is possible with a real one.