Jump to content

My comparison of Oculus CV1, Vive, PiMax 4k w/NoloVR


TripRodriguez

Recommended Posts

Note that these tests were largely subjective, though I consider myself to be a fairly objective person.

 

This past week I had on hand for direct comparison. Keep in mind I've been using Rift CV1 for over a year since that may affect my viewpoint.

 

Oculus Rift CV1

HTC Vive (consumer version)

PiMax 4K + NoloVR

 

 

Because it becomes important later on, let it be known that my IPD is 67.5mm, which is above average by a decent margin, and I have a larger than average nose.

 

I switched between these various headsets multiple times over the course of about a week to compare, Using DCS world almost exclusively.

 

Rift CV1 is my recommendation, as it is basically everyone else's.

 

 

Rift CV1:

Screen: Second best screen clarity, behind only Pimax 4K. Individual pixels look much smaller to me than Vive and pixel fill is much better. When there is a dark object on a light background and you turn your head fast a dark purplish shadow follows it. This did not seem to happen on Vive.

 

Lenses: Definitely the best lenses. The God-Rays are really annoying in dark scenes with high contrast, but are very minor in most daytime scenes which overall are more common. Even in the dark space of Elite Dangerous I found that though Rift god-rays were more obtrusive looking than Vive's they actually caused less trouble.

 

Comfort: Rift is most comfortable once you get it adjusted right. Vive now has a similar rigid strap system with headphones available as an accessory.

 

Performance: Oculus ASW definitely gives an edge in terms of smooth looking gameplay when the framerate is low.

 

Overall Visibility: It's better than you think, even if you have been using it a lot yourself I think you likely underestimate it compared to the competition.

 

Head Tracking: For cockpit type games Rift's head tracking is the clear winner, though it does take more USB ports and using extensions can cause problems.

 

Moral dilemma: Oculus (Facebook) is evil and their efforts to lock other VR headsets out of as much content as possible is awful. For me (motion sim) their refusal to allow the community to make plugins for the driver is also a major negative.

 

 

HTC Vive:

 

Screen: I'm surprised to say I find the Vive to be MUCH worse than Rift. The pixels are significantly larger looking with bigger gaps. Objects and scenery more than a couple yards away are significantly less detailed and clear looking.

 

Lenses: Vive's lenses smaller sweet spot means a lot more effort goes into adjusting the headset and even then anything off center is less clear. The god-rays seem better since they are concentric circles instead of big smears but they tend to occur a lot more near the center of the image which meant they were obscuring what you are actually looking at more often. Also Rift seems to have a lot less of this in daylight scenes than Vive.

 

Comfort: Vive's comfort isn't really bad, but Rift is better. The new rigid Vive headstrap accessory probably solves this mostly, though Vive is still heavier. My large nose got a tiny bit irritated by Vive where it does not in Rift CV1.

 

Performance: Low frame rates were noticeably more annoying than in Rift, probably because Vive does not have an equivalent to Asynchronous Space Warp yet. This is probably only a temporary disadvantage and likely to be solved soon.

 

Overall visibility: Vive gives a less clear and detailed image than CV1 all around, but especially at longer distances.

 

Head Tracking: I love the lighthouse system. It's easy to set up and super flexible. It takes n o additional USB ports and there is no messing with USB extensions. It's open sourced so third parties can make awesome tracked accessories like guns and gloves. Overall it's fantastic but it does seem to be a little less perfect for the seated experience.

 

Moral High Ground: Valve is a company I don't feel at all bad about giving money to. The open source policy means lots of great plugins and also lots of great third party accessories coming!

 

PiMax 4K with NoloVR:

 

My experience with PiMax 4K may be much worse than others due to my IPD being high (67.5mm) and the fixed physical IPD of the lenses in PiMax apparently being below average, at 63mm.

 

Screen: Immediately visible difference, but honestly not as much as I expected. I could still clearly see the individual pixels, though there was nothing I'd call screen door effect. Nevertheless I'd kill for this screen in my Rift, but oddly in the end it made me feel better about the Rift screen than I did before I saw a (split in half) 4K screen in VR. Something in the motion blur type category is apparently an issue with the screen because it's not OLED, but for DCS I didn't notice anything like this. I'm not that picky though, so take that with a grain of salt.

 

Lenses: I'd have to say "bad". They are not Fresnel, which meant no god-rays at all, but everything far from center I kinda saw double and it took conscious effort to change my focus from one object to another. Serious eye-strain, but this may be much better if you have a lower IPD. The other thing was there was a definite fish-bowl effect when you turn your head. I had a friend try the headset and he noticed it too.

 

Comfort: PiMax 4K is nice and light, and the DK2 style head strap isn't terrible. The foam face interface felt rougher against my skin and my nose was against plastic and got sore quick. This was the case (albeit to a lesser extent) with DK1 and DK2 as well but not at all with CV1 and mostly not with Vive.

 

Performance: PiMax also lacks ASW, though again this might soon be solved by SteamVR. I don't want to comment otherwise, as I'd likely say something wrong here. :D

 

Overall Visibility: As expected it's the best in terms of detail and clarity, but this really only benefits you in terms of directly where you are looking due to the lenses being lousy. I found I actually could see less detail in a distant treeline than CV1 because of the lenses, and also I think that "motion blur" type thing came info effect just from the slight involuntary movement of my head.

 

Head Tracking: VIA NoloVR- I think my Nolo had some issues/defect so I won't say a lot but there two things I learned that I'm sure will apply to any NoloVR unit.

 

NoloVR:

NoloVR seems to be extremely similar to Lighthouse. So much so, that having both the NoloVR and Lighthouse base stations on meant that either type of tracking I tried to use was a disaster. I had to power down the Lighthouses to use Nolo and vice versa.

 

NoloVR base station runs on a rechargeable battery. Hopefully this doesn't limit gameplay sessions.

 

 

PiMax4K conclusion:

If you have an IPD of ~65mm or less PiMax might be a great option for you. I did not have a pair of 65mm or lower eyes to test it with, so I'm not really sure! If you order one expect it to feel like a cheaper product, and don't be surprised by it's being inferior to Vive and CV1 in every way expect the screen.

 

I hope this helps someone out! If I said anything incorrect here set me straight, my lack of technical knowledge opens me up to such mistakes.

 

Trip

  • Like 3

[sIGPIC][/sIGPIC]

Demo of my 6DOF Motion VR Sim:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Good writeup, thanks :thumbup:

Hardware: VPForce Rhino, FSSB R3 Ultra, Virpil T-50CM, Hotas Warthog, Winwing F15EX, Slaw Rudder, GVL224 Trio Throttle, Thrustmaster MFDs, Saitek Trim wheel, Trackir 5, Quest Pro

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That's an excellent comparison there, thanks for taking the time to write it all up. There are very few direct back to back comparisons out there that include the PiMax, and it is really helpful to see the features measured against each other.

As you say, the best of all would be dropping the PiMax screens into a CV1, but I guess we'll have to wait for CV2 for that.

 

 

One thing I have wondered about, is the framerates between them, as the PiMax can probably do without supersampling, so even though it is a higher res screen, you aren't really having to draw any more pixels on screen. Any thoughts on that?

i7-7700K/Gigabyte RTX2080/Win10 64bit/32Gb RAM/Asus Xonar DX+Sennheiser HD380pro headphones/LG 34" UM65 @2560x1080/TM Warthog+VKB MkIV Rudder pedals/Rift CV1

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Trip I remember now posible solution for your headtracking using motion platform problem.

 

Your problem is actualy VR using Gyro sensors for directional tracking and LED/laser for positional tracking. TrackIR probably working but limited FOV and motion.

You should try Aruco with camera fixed on motion platform. Opentrack is using Aruco as well. Point is it is 6DoF tracked only visualy with camera same as TrackIR so if it is fixed on platform it is not register platform movement in tracking.

Even VR developers was using it in developing stage for VR prototypes.

 

Check this videos to get some idea even if it not on english and guy realy talk to much but you will figuring out just watching the video what is all about.

 

 

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

And now lets go back to this review.

 

To clarify some aspects. Today with more realistic price CV1 is even competitive with so called cheaper VR so money is not an issue any more.

 

Pimax definitely have some advantages, actually only one and that is native resolution and PPI which effecting on picture quality no SDE.

Basically there is no review which focus on major thing for flight sim like DCS for example. VR is compromise between picture quality and 3D immersion so there is no perfect solution and it is completely different need in different titles.

In DCS there is some major need for VR to be good in it. First of all reading instruments how good and easy it is?

Other is how good is spotting targets on ground or in the air in distance. It is very important especially to be competitive in MP. If you have problem with spotting targets in distance you have handicap to your opponent.

 

Could you be more detailed in this aspect of comparison this 3 major VR HND pleas Trip? Thanks.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Note that these tests were largely subjective, though I consider myself to be a fairly objective person.

 

I think You summed up very well the benefits and differences of those two that I have as well owned and tested same time (with similar opinions).

 

Rift CV1 is my recommendation, as it is basically everyone else's.

 

Totally agree, reason why I sold the Vive....

 

Comfort: Vive's comfort isn't really bad, but Rift is better. The new rigid Vive headstrap accessory probably solves this mostly, though Vive is still heavier. My large nose got a tiny bit irritated by Vive where it does not in Rift CV1.

 

Need to as well remember that 100€ extra for the strap and to get the better headphones is putting Vive over 2x more pricier than Rift is now. And that strap is fairly weak by locking so you can accidentally easily detach it from HMD and drop the Vive. As well it adds more weight, ain't so sturdy (harder plastic etc) and can cause problems as it is pulling Vive even more tightly to your face.

 

Head Tracking: I love the lighthouse system. It's easy to set up and super flexible. It takes n o additional USB ports and there is no messing with USB extensions. It's open sourced so third parties can make awesome tracked accessories like guns and gloves. Overall it's fantastic but it does seem to be a little less perfect for the seated experience.

 

This is what I think is that divides all the opinions. Like how the Vive is so much easier to "build" etc. Yet only a newer houses has a power sockets at every wall in every room, while older houses can have just 1-2 sockets per room. Meaning instead just pulling USB cable, you are extending the power cables and they are far more ugly than USB cables.

 

As well when talking about two point of view:

1) Gamers are usually lazy and comfort seekers like typical people, so full room experience gaming gets bored/tiring after some time and this puts VR more enjoyable in the seated systems and this is the place for Driving and Flying simulations (or just FPS gaming).

 

2) Room VR can be easily setup with Rift, as you can just keep two cameras on table, turn them parallel or position as you need and then place the third camera on stand behind. And it makes it super easy to setup the Rift in different tasks (seated/standing/room) without difficulties, unlike the Vive if you decide to mount them to walls or other more difficult locations (as you might need to move the other laser transmitter to another location to get it visible).

 

And then comes this interesting difference about approach differences between Valve and Oculus.

Oculus uses external IR cameras as sensors so the resolution is camera sensor dependent (so on the distance dependent) meaning further you are, less pixels is reading the Rift IR LED. But this allows easy third party device building as you need to get a IR leds to work as needed and then "Program" the Rift software to know what is the axis and center of the device.... If the Rift drivers etc would be open!

 

And how the Valve Lighthouse system works is like this:

 

Moral High Ground: Valve is a company I don't feel at all bad about giving money to. The open source policy means lots of great plugins and also lots of great third party accessories coming!

 

But the requirement have the controllers communicate with the HMD is the problem just like with the Oculus drivers. And every device you want to get to be tracked, needs to have the sensors and computing power and signalling to get their position and sensor data to computer.

 

This is what makes actually Rift better as all that you basically should need is enough IR leds around the device and then "teach" the Oculus software to look for it.

 

Like if we could get own "drivers" injected to Oculus software, we could make any HOTAS system virtual one or even make own gloves or something, as long we can teach the system to track specific IR LED as something. And the Oculus implementation is more power friendly as you just need to power IR LED instead CPU and all other transmitters. Why Oculus Touch controllers work for months with single AA battery, while Vive controller just couple hours.

i7-8700k, 32GB 2666Mhz DDR4, 2x 2080S SLI 8GB, Oculus Rift S.

i7-8700k, 16GB 2666Mhz DDR4, 1080Ti 11GB, 27" 4K, 65" HDR 4K.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

[Pimax] Lenses: I'd have to say "bad". They are not Fresnel, which meant no god-rays at all, but everything far from center I kinda saw double and it took conscious effort to change my focus from one object to another. Serious eye-strain, but this may be much better if you have a lower IPD. The other thing was there was a definite fish-bowl effect when you turn your head. I had a friend try the headset and he noticed it too.

 

I also have experience with both Pimax and the Oculus CV1 and can confirm both the difficulty in focusing and the fish-bowl effect.

 

Another thing I noticed is that the screen, while sharp, is much duller and has less vibrant colors.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Good review. As a Vive owner I have said a few times if you want to get VR just for DCS... I'd probably go with a rift. Now if you want to play other games and want to check out really good roomscale, then the vive is the way to go.

 

Overall though, to most people I would suggest waiting until the next generation. It's cool now, but for VR headsets to replace monitors the resolution needs to get better, imho anyway.

5900X - 32 GB 3600 RAM - 1080TI

My Twitch Channel

~Moo

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Yeah, same...as a vive user i usually recommend the rift for dcs! Roomscale is another world, but just for dcs the rift is, especially after the pricedrop, unbeatable atm...

i7 6700k @ 4,5 Ghz | MSI 1080ti Aero | 32 GB RAM 2133 | 500 GB SSD | TM Warthog | MFG Crosswind | HTC Vive |:pilotfly:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Now with price drop and with some more realistic review which don't favoring any VR and its based on facts and real specs.

There is no perfect VR for now but VR experience is combine experience of all aspect together not just SDE or tracking.

Now when Oculus is close to promise given after DK2 that CV1 will cost no more than 400$ even I could now prefere CV1 in front of any other VR because now is best buy option definitely.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Fair enough hardware comparison. The moral dilemma crap really gets old though.

I5 6600K @4.5, Gigabyte GA-Z170XP mobo, GMMAXX GTE Cooler, MSI GTX 1080 ti Gaming X gpu (factory OC), SoundBlaster X-F1 sound card, 16 gig Corsair Vengeance ddr4 ram @ 3200 , 3 ssd hds, EVGA 650 Gold Power supply, Saitek X52 Hotas and rudders, 2 AuraSound AST-2B-4 Pro Bass Shakers, Pimax 5K+

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just wanted to add my 2 cents on the Pimax. Resolution is definitively better. Rift has better colours. About lenses, my eye distance may be in the fortunate range, so i can get rid of the fish bowl to a certain extent.

Overall, current generation VR has great wow/immersion effect, but it wears off after a while for me.

Next gen headsets has to offer a leap in terms of performance for me to buy one, but even a flip up visor has real merit. Taking off the headset to find a button on the keyboard or looking at the checklist is cumbersome, so mine is back in the box. I will try it again if they bring a good VR update post 2.1.

Intel Core i7­6700K, 32GB DDR4, 512GB PCIe SSD + 2TB HDD, GeForce GTX 1080 8GB, Pimax 5k+

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Good review. As a Vive owner I have said a few times if you want to get VR just for DCS... I'd probably go with a rift. Now if you want to play other games and want to check out really good roomscale, then the vive is the way to go.

 

Actually at this point the Rift is as good in room scale as is the Vive with a three sensors. And rarely people has larger than 3x3m size areas (so many even has difficulties to get the required 2x1.5m area!).

 

And then the Vive problem is that it doesn't officially have access to the best VR games, that are exclusive to Rift. The Steam is as well full of third grade VR games, that isn't so big benefit for Vive as quality is on Oculus side. And it is sad, because there really ain't so many good VR games.

 

Yet if wanted to get DCS + some other titles, Rift is the best choice. Just a few months ago it was opposite because Touch Controllers weren't out and rest VR games weren't so great on Vive because XBOX controller.

 

Overall though, to most people I would suggest waiting until the next generation. It's cool now, but for VR headsets to replace monitors the resolution needs to get better, imho anyway.

 

That is the main problem at the moment. In normal VR games like a Robo Recall the screen resolution ain't problem at all. You will get the immersion and the feeling totally fine. And you will forget the pixels and the ghosting etc in couple minutes and that is the thing.

 

But DCS ain't average VR game, it is far from the target that VR system is targeted. DCS is about military combat and this way totally different from a normal virtual piloting like the X-Plane or MSFS is targeting. And that means there is mainly tiny elements that needs to be spotted, looked at and viewed.

 

All the cauges, buttons, switches and even a HUD are totally different with VR than it is with the 2D display. Where with 2D display you can just glance the value, with VR you need to move forward to close range to get an idea what there is reading if you are not already very familiar what it is for and where it should be. This means that even a basic learning to fly with VR is impossible as you can't read the cockpit well (and I talk about pixel density range 1.0-2.0).

 

Then comes the other main problem that is the target spotting. Either it is "on your face" like huge model enlargement setting, so air targets pop-up in the air as big blobs from 30-40km distance. Or then it is subtle, but you can't still even recognize a A-10 from other aircraft when it is flying 1km under you just against sea.

 

Ground units can be such problem that it renders A-10 cannon runs useless as you can't spot a vehicle on field until you are about 0.5nm (1km) from it before it suddenly just pop-up or you are just dead.

 

 

The lack of clarity, subtle fine details and contrast are that are totally missing from VR in a DCS. And that is the immersion killer as you can't fly the aircraft well, and you can't even combat well.

The immersion is there if wanted to "feel" the tight cockpit or the layout and most importantly the feeling to turn head and look at the correct direction etc.

 

But compromises are way too high with VR to even consider a MP or anyways enjoy from the details the 3D modelers and VFX artists are putting to DCS as you can't enjoy from them.

 

Then the lack of good VR content (just a handful of good titles!) is real killer, as there is nothing else to really play and enjoy then outside of DCS.

 

And it just means that VR is already easily dead at the current fifth generation, before it really get to have a new change.

i7-8700k, 32GB 2666Mhz DDR4, 2x 2080S SLI 8GB, Oculus Rift S.

i7-8700k, 16GB 2666Mhz DDR4, 1080Ti 11GB, 27" 4K, 65" HDR 4K.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Just wanted to add my 2 cents on the Pimax. Resolution is definitively better. Rift has better colours. About lenses, my eye distance may be in the fortunate range, so i can get rid of the fish bowl to a certain extent.

Overall, current generation VR has great wow/immersion effect, but it wears off after a while for me.

Next gen headsets has to offer a leap in terms of performance for me to buy one, but even a flip up visor has real merit. Taking off the headset to find a button on the keyboard or looking at the checklist is cumbersome, so mine is back in the box. I will try it again if they bring a good VR update post 2.1.

 

That might be a thing that never gets fixed. The best solution would be to add a hinge and split the HMD to two so the strap and the face part stays on your face while you can flip up the frontal part that has the lenses and display and you could see normally.

 

When a 6K display (2x 4K) becomes available and we can get higher resolution per eye and get the FOV to be real 110 degree instead current 55-60 degree that Rift and Vive offers, we can start to talk more about it (but more likely at that point we need already a 10K display so both can get the 8K for eyes).

 

DCS is just an game that just can't use the VR because its requirements and limitations.

Like years we wanted to be able spot a target further than 1-2km, and when we start to see those, then we want VR that just throws as back to a Flanker 2.0 era in the details.

 

WOW yeah for the immersion of "space" but total wash out by the possibilities you can do in the sim after that.

i7-8700k, 32GB 2666Mhz DDR4, 2x 2080S SLI 8GB, Oculus Rift S.

i7-8700k, 16GB 2666Mhz DDR4, 1080Ti 11GB, 27" 4K, 65" HDR 4K.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Maybe it's a generational thing. I'm a one button joystick generation. A la Atari. Some of you started with a 6 button joystick a la Xbox/PS3.

 

So all the limitations of DCS with VR doesn't bother me in the least. Not to say it's not important to others, it's clearly important to Fri13. So "DCS is just an game that just can't use the VR because its requirements and limitations." may be spot on for Fri13, but to me, the sense of flight is more important. Getting kills is not as important for me as it is the sense of flight.

 

I was wowed by wire frame F15 Strike Eagle, Polygon mountains if Gunship, and Falcon 3's Padlock view were all phenomenal advances. Then Rift happened and I never looked back. The future certainly looks good for VR.

 

Oh, in the F18 thread, a real life aviator confirmed that you can identify planes if you see the ideal cross section of the plane. I know there was a discussion about that and a glider pilot (Fri13?) said it could be done.

hsb

HW Spec in Spoiler

---

 

i7-10700K Direct-To-Die/OC'ed to 5.1GHz, MSI Z490 MB, 32GB DDR4 3200MHz, EVGA 2080 Ti FTW3, NVMe+SSD, Win 10 x64 Pro, MFG, Warthog, TM MFDs, Komodo Huey set, Rverbe G1

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...