MAThrasher

@CanopyCrack, thanks for sharing your experience. I was on the fence regarding getting the H3. After reading about your experience, I've decided to not purchase one.

I agree 100% also on Openkneeboard. The only time I use the built-in kneeboard is when I am using Vaicom.

I have been using the WinWing throttle for the past couple of years, and was ready to try a different throttle. I didn't have many complaints with the WinWing throttle, but the RAID/Flir button quit working and the screw in the idle detent worked it's way loose and fell down in the base. I could have replaced the screw, but never did. A couple of days ago, the FLIR button started working again, but I had already ordered the STECS. My list of gripes is very short. 1) The pointed hat on the TDC axis is annoying! It is hard to depress without inadvertent x and y movement. Fortunately, I have an old Gunfighter stick, so I switched the pointed hat for one that is concave. It is much easier to depress. I am surprised that VKB did not add hat alternatives for the TDC. They did provide several hats for the other buttons. 2) When the throttle is left around 25% or 75%, it will slowly drop down (like a hydraulic hinge). I added an afterburner detent at around 75%, so the high side is no issue now. It is probably rare that I will take my hand off the throttle at 25%. The same behavior is there even when I tightened resistance. As the throttle ages, this might go away. It is not bad enough to annoy me. There are many things I love about the throttle. 1) The movement of the throttle is very smooth. It feels very high quality. It feels every bit as nice as the WinWing. 2) It has many buttons. I will probably never use all of the buttons since I like using PointCtrl (in VR). PointCtrl adds to the immersion. If I were flying FC3 again, the buttons would be very nice! I would rather have too many buttons as opposed to not enough. 3) The detents are easy to use and very versatile. I usually fly the same jet, but it is a nice option. 4) The latch for connecting the left and right sides of the throttle is very easy to use. It was a chore with the WinWing. 5) The next thing is particular to my setup. I use the NLR Flight Seat Pro chair. With the WinWing, the throttle mounted too far back. It forced me to sit too far away from the flight stick. I could have put some effort into it and made it better. The STECS mounts further forward and the throttle grip is closer to the front of the base. I now have a perfect distance for both the throttle and the flight stick. 6) The last thing I like is now all of my gear is from the same manufacturer. I only have to worry about one piece of software for calibration, etc. I have no regrets with the STECS purchase. I will give feedback to VKB to spend the extra pennies to add hat alternatives for the TDC.

It has been a while since I did a Case III landing, but I did last week. I did all comms (Inbound/Established/Commencing/Checkin/Platform). I made two attempts and decided the lights were not coming on. I searched this forum and found this thread and realized that the lights are just VERY dim. Back a while ago, the lights were much brighter. I didn't even have to fly the needles and it was like a Case I landing since the lights were so bright. Now, I have to fly those needles very precisely because it is too late for alignment when the deck lights become visible. I don't mind this though because it helps me practice precise flying. I do have a Aero VR headset, so I guess it is possible that some of the settings have changed and this is making the lights dimmer.

@MAXsenna, I am not too familiar with export.lua. What order would I switch?

I did some additional testing with the autostart being set either on or off for DCR. If autostart is OFF, VAICOM works for multiple missions without any issues. It works regardless if DCR is not running or running by a manual start. If autostart is ON, autostart has to be executed while starting a mission or VAICOM will not work. I looked in the export.lua file in my Saved Games directory, and the code below shows how the file changes when selecting autostart ON/OFF in DCR. For now I will just do manual starts and avoid this issue. Autostart ON local vaicomlfs = require('lfs'); dofile(vaicomlfs.writedir()..[[Scripts\VAICOMPRO\VAICOMPRO.export.lua]]) --[[RKAPPS_REFERENCE]]dofile("C:\\Users\\drmar\\OneDrive\\Desktop\\DCRealistic/Plugins\\rkApps_Export.lua") --[[DCREALISTIC_AUTOSTART]]os.execute('start "" "C:\\Users\\drmar\\OneDrive\\Desktop\\DCRealistic\\DCRealistic.exe"') Autostart OFF local vaicomlfs = require('lfs'); dofile(vaicomlfs.writedir()..[[Scripts\VAICOMPRO\VAICOMPRO.export.lua]]) --[[RKAPPS_REFERENCE]]dofile("C:\\Users\\drmar\\OneDrive\\Desktop\\DCRealistic/Plugins\\rkApps_Export.lua")

Are Simhaptics and DCRealistic made by the same (rkApps)? I use Simshaker instead of SimHaptics, but I do use DCR. I will try turning off auto-start for DCRealistic and do a manual start.

I recently had an issue in which VAICOM would work for the first mission I flew after starting DCS. On the second mission, the configuration tool would show "None Detected" insteald of the F-18C. This was very repeatable, so I started turning on/off everything else I run (Simshaker, Razer, DCRealistic, etc.). I finally figured out how to reproduce the bug and how to work around it. When a mission starts, DCRealistic autostarts. If I don't close DCRealistic after ending a mission, it doesn't autostart on the next mission. If I close DCRealistic after each mission, it will autostart on the next mission and VAICOM works fine. I just have to remember to close DCR after every mission I fly. I'm just putting this out there in case there is somebody else having the same issue. I think I have the latest versions of VAICOM and DCRealistic.

Welcome to the club! . Flying VR is not cheap, but it is worth it for the experience!

@Supmua, how is the FOV compared to the Aero?

The good In general, my system is performing fairly well. I have a stutter about every 2 minutes of flying. Not super bad, but enough that I want to improve it. I had decided the best thing for me is to upgrade the CPU. I want to go from a 12700k to a 14700k. Before doing this, I decided to overclock just to see what would happen. I bumped the p-cores to 5.1 and the e-cores to 4.0. While doing this, I also noticed that my XMP was not enabled. It must have been disabled when I did my last memory upgrade. Making these changes improved things such that I now have a stutter every 8-10 minutes. I am happy with that! The bad To monitor hardware temps, I downloaded a couple pieces of software to watch temps. One of these was from a less than reputable source and had a virus. I'm usually careful about where I download software, but I made a mistake this time. I got a virus that was masquerading as McAfee. It was constantly popping up and interrupting DCS. I removed the hardware monitoring software, and the virus remained. I reinstalled Windows (not a clean install) and the virus remained. I then decided to pay $20 for Norton Utilities and see if it would remove it. It indeed found the virus. It was "Heur.AdvML.B". Finding and removing this virus saved me many, many hours of rebuilding my system!!

When I saw a video last week, I was discouraged with the progress. I thought they would be further along than they are. I am no expert, but I would be shocked if anything is shipped from production before the middle of next year. Unless there is a HMD coming that I don't know about, I will continue being happy with the Aero for the next several months.

Speaking from my experience, it was very plug and play. I went to the Varjo website and followed their setup guide. Everything worked on the very first try and it is still working without any issues. The Steam base stations also worked on the first try after plugging them in. Perhaps I was just unusually lucky! The documentation (Varjo.com -> Support -> Getting started) is very nice and easy to follow.

I believe the HTC Vive base station 2 is the exact same one Varjo sells. When you search for that on Amazon, the sale price is $149. The one that I received from Varjo included the wall mount. I am not sure about the one on Amazon. If it doesn't have a wall mount, that is an extra $12.99. That is still much cheaper!

When I bought my Aero, I bought the base stations from them also. I later realized that I could get them quite a bit cheaper on Amazon. I bought two and they do a great job of tracking. I have read that one station is enough, but I have always used two. You definitely don't need the hand controllers. I used a mouse for all of the setup. All of the needed accessories are included with the headset purchase. I think the only other thing is the adapter if you have a laptop. Hope this helps!

I'm guessing you should have it by Thanksgiving for sure. I ordered mine and received it in about 2 weeks. When it was at Customs, they emailed me some paperwork to sign. I just checked some dates when I ordered mine. I received an email confirming my payment was successful on 5/17/23. My order shipped on 5/22/23. The Docusign for the import was on 5/24/23. Not long after that I received my Varjo.

I don't have any controllers, and my mouse works great for everything. The only thing I use the Aero for is DCS.

I don't know what is going on...it is really strange. All of the links at the top are inactive. I have not tried to login, but I could not if I wanted too since the login button is inactive also. I entered all of the information for the 5 fields in the reserve section and pressed the button, but nothing happens.

I would like to put myself on the reservation list for the Somnium VR1, but I can't. When I go to somniumspace.com, the menus and login button are grayed out. When I try to register my email for the reservation, nothing happens after clicking the button. It is like i am locked out somehow. Anyone else have this issue?

I was stunned to see the price cut in half! I was hoping also for an announcement of an Aero 2.

The price of the Aero just dropped to $990!! I saw their webinar.

@Hempstead I will buy your pointctrl if you are interested in selling it.

I just ordered the comfort strap mentioned above. I have never noticed much discomfort while flying, but I will see if the strap improves things.

After the initial time to setup the Aero, flying now is just a matter of powering on the headset. I have a dedicated PC for flight simming, so I just always leave Varjo Base, Voice Ataack/Vaicom, and simshaker running. When I'm ready to fly, I just power on the headset and fire up DCS. It never fails or causes any issues.

The G2 has 9.3 million pixels because of both eyes. I used the G2 with a 3070Ti and had a great experience. For the bang for the buck, this is a really good headset!