OpenXR Guide - Deprecated - This time for real (▀̿Ĺ̯▀̿ ̿)

[DeltaMike]

oh you're talking about the setting in wmr I think, the one that launches steam automatically.  Yeah that needs to be off

[Rosebud47]

Just had a look and made a screenshot:

 

It´s in German language, but what I´ve meant is the last row on the right side, where it says OpenXR-Laufzeitumgebung: Windows Mixed Reality. ( "Laufzeitumgebung" = runtime )

By clicking the large button below, which says "SteamVR als OpenXR-Laufzeitumgebung festlegen" you could switch between handling OpenXR by Windows Mixed Reality ( included in Windows ) or SteamVR. The line above says, which runtime is activated ( Windows Mixed Reality in this picture ).

I don´t know, if it may cause issues with the OpenXR mod if not set to Windows Mixed Reality, but people who have problems running the OpenXR mod, might have a look into this setting, which might could prevent SteamVR or SteamVR for Windows Mixed Reality from loading, when running the Mod.  ... I don´t fiddle around anymore, as I´m happy that everything is running nicely on my end at the moment.   

 

Edit: the purpose of this function obviously is, making OpenXR Apps and Games to run under SteamVR, in particular Valve Index user could run OpenXR games with the Index, if set the the OpenXR runtime to SteamVR insetad of Windows Mixed Reality ... well, that´s at least, what I think this function does... 

Edited April 18, 2022 by Rosebud47

[daemon1808]

Hi,

Thanks for the answers guys. In my case this option "current OpenXR runtime" is set to "WMR" (I din't knew that it exists, but it was this way from the start)

The weird thing is that:

When I install the mod and launch DCS from Steam options a) or b), SVR does not starts (that's good, I think).

But a new window is opened in my monitor (like the 2D steam mirror window) that remains black, and no DCS video is shown in my headset (it continue showing the WMR "standby" screen)

 

[Cythkato]

Thank you for this, it has given me great results and made DCS more enjoyable!

[unltd]

Tried resetting my nvidia control panel to default today and set all dcs specific settings to default.  Results were even smoother and sharper.  

[Dovivan]

hmm, a i played few days with OpenXR, but cant find smoother a betewr image like with G2 on 60 HZ and steamVR on 50%. Is really super smooth like 45Fps never cant be. 

and OpenXR has more Stuttering like SteamVR. It looks like sometime need CPU power and stuttering coms for five seconds. 

I really dont uderstund how you can have smooth image with 100% render on G2. It is imposible. Maybe you have starship machine with nuclear power or smooth image mean something diferent for me. I have 6900XT and 5800X.

For me still best results SteamVR on 50% nad 60Hz. I can fly over huge city and dont have stuttering or ghosting. IS smooth like real live and that is important for me in VR.

If you can check and help me i will be happy, bud i dont know what i can be wrong.  

[edmuss]

Using my 3070 I can run the G2 at 75% with 60Hz and still pull >60fps which results in perfectly smooth flight because it's above refresh rate.  I can run high/medium DCS settings without a problem and generally the only time it drops below 60fps is low over Syria cites where it will sometimes get as low as 50-55fps.

Trawl through Thud's VR4DCS guide and make sure you get your system clean and optimised first and foremost.  Start with the DCS vr preset, load a freeflight SP mission and tune the DCS settings till you're getting about 70fps consistently (assuming you're still on 60Hz) and you should be golden.

With your hardware you should be able to run 100% with high DCS settings and still get above the 60Hz refresh rate.  @nikoel has a 6900xt as well and has mentioned about needing to force it to run at full power/clock speed to keep it smooth.

[Werewolf_fs]

After first test whithout a good result, i tried again and having it clear... I have seen the light... and I am left with OpenXR for a long time. The advantages for me are two above all:

- Stop using WMR for SteamVR. The interconnection between SteamVR and WMR that is poorly tuned and loses a lot of performance between them,  specific, lost of  a lot VRAM and performance.

- On the other hand, the operation of the reproduction of openXR is better!!*. Unfortunately and even at 90fps (if it is possible to achieve it in DCS), in DCS you need if or if reprojection for a smooth and bearable experience, and in this WMR to openXR has an advantage over steamVR, it has 3 playback levels!!! vs One in steamVR.

YES!!! activate in the wmr development options for openXR, the reprojection is always active, it is similar to the automatic mode of steamVR, if everything goes well and it gives 90 then it goes to 90FPS, if you cannot, activate reprojection at 45 fps, if the load exceeds this, it automatically switches to replay at 30 fps (and me don't use <profanity> 60 Hz!!!), and even if it doesn't give enough, replay is activated at 20 fps!!!... even though it (20 fps) has a lot of glitches and scratches.

Recommended, activate the reprojection in always active in the wmr development options for openXR.

This is a great advantage!!!, without needing to force anything at 60 hz !!. Also from the openXR tools, (latest beta 1.0.5), you can apply reshase and adjust the colors, contrast and brightness with what that you save on reshade.

About this, if you use the latest version of the wmr runtime for openXR (7007) it is not compatible with the reshade mod, it is only compatible with the previous version (23003), so if you want to use the ext reshade and not by openXR tools, use the previous version by disabling the option to use the latest version of the runtime in the development app of wmr for openXR

Another thing to add is that at the same resolution or SS % in openXR it seems that the image has better quality for me than in steamVR, even if you compare one with more SS with another with less (for example openXR at 75 and steamVR at 90) it looks better in openXR!!!.

I was also able to carry out the openXR at 100% SS, at 30fps on repro, yes… and it is totally playable!!, something impossible for me before in steamVR. Although I have a better experience with openXR SS at 75%, which is more than I had before in stemVR (60%).

For me, this mod is a game changer in DCS!!.

*But... it also has problems, the main issue, the glitches and deformities that helicopter rotors and warbird get.

 

[Rosebud47]

I´m not sure if the 60Hz mode should be considered as a general advise for setting up the HMD. Not arguing against individual perception and happyness, 60Hz aren´t better in terms of image quality compared to 90Hz or more. Setting to 60Hz is all about performance gain ( the graphic system has to render 30 frames with reprojection instead of 45 frames with reprojection for 90Hz HMDs ). Quality wise the higher Hz setting always results in a more solid and clear image quality.
Like it could be seen on flat TVs or monitors. Modern flatscreens have meanwhile reached 200Hz or even 400Hz, or some VR headsets ( Valve Index or Pimax ) have got 120Hz- or 144Hz-modes, which results in noticable smoother and better image quality ( as long as the high frequency could be maintained by the VR headsets ) - I would say, how the image quality perceived with VR headset escalates the perception of higher frequencies. 

But there is also a human factor to it, like every individual is different, means the inertia of the eyes is different from person to person and with that, the sensitivity to notice the difference in frequency of moving images from screens.  

Meanwhile in my "feeling" some stutters in DCS VR, might not only result of synchronizing frames to frequency for the HMD, but also from CPU bottleneck or memory/ V-ram usage or thermal throtteling.

Tried also OpenXR without Motion Reprojection, which results in even better image quality, but my system only could reach around 57 FPS, which is far off of 90FPS for a synchronized and  smooth VR experience without reprojection in DCS at 90Hz HMD mode for me, so I´ll leave it at locked 45Hz with reprojection.

  

[Werewolf_fs]

60hz, at it says, depends on the tolerance of each one, in particular on how sensitive your eyes are to that rate of hz, for me it is hopeless... I see every flicker of the screen and  lose my head.

in openXR I would recommend that you leave the development option always active so that the reprojection is automatic and in the openXR tools do not limit it

Edited April 19, 2022 by Werewolf_fs

[Rosebud47]

@Werewolf_fs totally agree with you! ... These deformities are also visible in some text lines ( luckily not so much on the MFDs in the cockpit ) - it´s quite a bit annoying. Let´s see if developers could fix it with newer OpenXR version implementations.

[Cythkato]

Lately been playing at 100 to 115 % resolution (depending on map, aircraft, to maintain over 60 fps with margin) in OpenXR at 60 hz on G2, motion reprojection off.  OpenXR Toolkit fixed foveated rendering at high quality preset.  DCS Textures and Terrain Textures both set High, Anisotropic Filtering 16x, but most other DCS settings low/off.  Using 3dmigoto mod for Apache rotor removal, haze removal, crater fps fix, and sharpening (lately set to around 2.2)  Getting lots of shimmer, but I've kind of gotten used to it, and am addicted to the level of detail - seeing numerous details I'd never seen before!

 

In my opinion, this plays to some of the G2 strengths, and allows the potential sharpness of its displays/optics to be realized without artifacts or judder.  It does entail Oculus Dev Kit 1-like 60 Hz with flicker, but I've gotten used to the flicker after playing this way for awhile.  Seems to me like there's not a very great antialiasing solution for DCS VR yet, so for now I've embraced the shimmer.  3090, 5950x, 64GB, Windows 10.

[Werewolf_fs]

hace 10 minutos, Rosebud47 dijo:

@Werewolf_fs ¡totalmente de acuerdo contigo! ... Estas deformidades también son visibles en algunas líneas de texto (afortunadamente no tanto en los MFD de la cabina), es bastante molesto. Veamos si los desarrolladores pueden arreglarlo con implementaciones de versiones más nuevas de OpenXR.

With the reprojection in the development api of wmr for openXR in always active and WITHOUT LIMITING it in openxr tools you will have a better result

[Rosebud47]

vor 27 Minuten schrieb Werewolf_fs:

With the reprojection in the development api of wmr for openXR in always active and WITHOUT LIMITING it in openxr tools you will have a better result

It depends, I would say. Locking at 45Hz is the only function I use with the OXR Toolkit to prevent the reprojection from stepping down from 45 to 30 rendered images and adding 2 fake images at 30Hz instead of 1 fake image at 45Hz ... once I´ve tried, I got eye strain after half an hour of flying.

The problem for me with 30Hz reprojection is, that it switches too quick, when the system dips only 1 or 2 frames below 45FPS ( which isn´t such noticable while being busy in the game ) it instantly reduces to 30Hz mode ( which is much more noticable ),even 43 or 44 FPS occasionally are still fine to fly.

@Cythkato your way of setup is interesting by using fixed foveated rendering. I´va saw Youtube Videos for MSFS 2020, in which people always use fix foveated rendering to make MSFS2020 running smoothly. The performance gain by FFR must be massive. But I´m happy how good DCS is running with the OpenXR mod so far, even I have to dispense so much eye candy at the moment to get there.

Coming back to 30Hz or less with reprojection, I assume it might translate much better to VR games like ´Beat Saber´ or VR stuff with much more less 3D geometrical- and texture detail than DCS got.  In terms of details to render for VR DCS is massive ( MSFS 2020 even more massive ) ...

[falcon_120]

I you  put all the 3 files in the bin folder, you must do two things
1st . Disable WMR from start steam vr Mr when WMR starts
2nd. Make a Shortcut in your computer with DCS Open Beta game folder bin, then put in it "Your game path folder\bin\DCS.exe" --force_enable_VR with the semicolons included
This must start DSC without starting steam VR

Sorry if already mentioned in any of the pages, used the search function with no luck.

For step 1, I cannot find how to turn off SteamVR, basically when opening the windows mixed reality settings, I only see 4 tabs (environment, audio&speech, headset display and uninstall ) but not the Startup & desktop, none of them let me turn off the SteamVR option. Is there any other way to turn of SteamVR from launching when using DCS?

Enviado desde mi ELE-L29 mediante Tapatalk

[DeltaMike]

3 hours ago, Dovivan said:

hmm, a i played few days with OpenXR, but cant find smoother a betewr image like with G2 on 60 HZ and steamVR on 50%. Is really super smooth like 45Fps never cant be. 

and OpenXR has more Stuttering like SteamVR. It looks like sometime need CPU power and stuttering coms for five seconds. 

I really dont uderstund how you can have smooth image with 100% render on G2. It is imposible. Maybe you have starship machine with nuclear power or smooth image mean something diferent for me. I have 6900XT and 5800X.

For me still best results SteamVR on 50% nad 60Hz. I can fly over huge city and dont have stuttering or ghosting. IS smooth like real live and that is important for me in VR.

If you can check and help me i will be happy, bud i dont know what i can be wrong.  

If you're using motion reprojection, I would agree, SVR is smoother.  Without it, I feel OXR is smoother. 

Two main things I like about OXR, one is the quality of the image. Among other thins, quite a bit less shimmering.   The other is simplicity.  Way fewer moving parts no matter how you cut it.  

The only thing that's more work in OXR is, I think you have to be a little more careful with your FPS target.  So if you want to run 60fps your frame times have to be consistently 16ms or less, but not too much less.  Otherwise you'll run into synchronization problems that can get really annoying.  

In terms of settings, I can run at full res but I only get to crank up one of these: MSAA, shadows, or clouds.  If I want two I would have to undersample.  My settings are here, and that gets me right at 46fps near the ground on the Syria map.  That whole thread is worth reading.  

 

 

[markturner1960]

Over the weekend I did some tweaking. Running at 60Hz it still looks great to me and the flicker is barely noticeable, does not bother me at all. This eliminates the slight stutter I was getting when I looked sideways 3 / 9 when running at 90Hz. Its super smooth now, the clarity is simply amazing......I have Motion reprojection set at always on and running at 150% in Open XR render scale. I may need to dial down the openXR settings in big missions, but for me , in single player, its absolutely fine so far......

I am getting a fantastic experience with the above settings, just the best thing to hit DCS for VR ever......thanks Nikoel.......

Edited April 19, 2022 by markturner1960

[Baldrick33]

2 hours ago, Rosebud47 said:

Coming back to 30Hz or less with reprojection, I assume it might translate much better to VR games like ´Beat Saber´ or VR stuff with much more less 3D geometrical- and texture detail than DCS got.  In terms of details to render for VR DCS is massive ( MSFS 2020 even more massive ) ...

It is curious how we see things so differently. It has been stated several times by different people that we see 30fps reprojection using OpenXR as the new 45. i.e. where 45 was the target before with SteamVR to ensure smoothness (using motion reprojection), that 30 seems just as good. I don't feel the switch between 30 and 45 and realised I was chasing 45 purely by the fps counter. Once I turned that off I have been happy with OpenXR and don't know if it 30 or 45.

I dislike it when it drops below 45 using SteamVR and know instantly when it does. I can't run with 60Hz either.

Dropping from 30 to 22 using OpenXR is very noticeable for me. So 30 is my lower limit. We just seem to be wired differently!

[speed-of-heat]

18 minutes ago, Baldrick33 said:

I dislike it when it drops below 45 using SteamVR and know instantly when it does. I can't run with 60Hz either.

Dropping from 30 to 22 using OpenXR is very noticeable for me. So 30 is my lower limit. We just seem to be wired differently!

so of course with SVR when it drops below 45, it is out of motion smoothing/reprojection and yo are instant slide show/juddering etc... whereas in OXR it drops to 30 so you sort of get the best of both worlds, until you get down to 22 and it all gets kind of horrid again. 

My hope (uninformed by any reality ) is   that we get a 90, 60, 45, 30, 22.5 stepping as well with MR just picking up every third frame, rather than every other frame. Overall this mod gives a nice balance and i hope it starts to deal with FSR a little better too,

There are some concerns for the future, noticeable Vulcan support, which I understand is not something that works currently... but ... last month i was extoling the virtues of VRPerfKit etc...  so who knows what will be next.

[Baldrick33]

29 minutes ago, speed-of-heat said:

so of course with SVR when it drops below 45, it is out of motion smoothing/reprojection and yo are instant slide show/juddering etc... whereas in OXR it drops to 30 so you sort of get the best of both worlds, until you get down to 22 and it all gets kind of horrid again.

My comment about dropping below 45 in SVR is that like you, I notice it straight away whereas Rosebud47 doesn't seem to mind it when it drops below a little:

3 hours ago, Rosebud47 said:

The problem for me with 30Hz reprojection is, that it switches too quick, when the system dips only 1 or 2 frames below 45FPS ( which isn´t such noticable while being busy in the game ) it instantly reduces to 30Hz mode ( which is much more noticable ),even 43 or 44 FPS occasionally are still fine to fly.

 

[edmuss]

The OXR MR won't ever do a 60Hz step as it's not a whole fraction of 90

In my experience, 90-45 bracket should still be your target for MR as you have a variation of 45fps (minus overheads) to play with before dropping down to the next bracket; targeting the 45-30 bracket only gives you a 15fps (minus overheads) window to keep within.  For reference I have seen MR overheads (comprised within the postGPU) of between 4-8ms; this is enough to almost eliminate the 30fps bracket entirely.

For me the 45-30 bracket is an emergency bailout so you should still be tuning resolution/DCS to achieve over 45fps + MR overhead, realistically for me it drops down to the 45-30 bracket once my appGPU time is much above 18ms (18ms + 4ms MR overhead = 22ms = 45fps = step down to the next bracket).

edit: This may be why some people have experienced framerates plummeting with MR enabled because the overhead is swallowing up the next bracket and it just gets locked down to the lowest bracket in a spiralling vicious circle.

Edited April 19, 2022 by edmuss

[Rosebud47]

@Baldrick33 my eyes are 48 years old and saw a lot of <profanity>, so maybe they are a little bit more worn out than the eyes of the younger fellows .

I could totally follow up @edmuss prefering the 60Hz mode of the G2, without reprojection the 60Hz mode, while holding 60fps, should be a better image quality than 45Hz with 45fps through reprojection. The synchronization and the smoothness with it might be hard to distinguish between 60Hz/fps without reprojection and 45Hz/fps with reprojection.

But I would consider it as a general fact, that 90Hz is better than 60Hz with regard to the perception of moving images the frequency makes the frames reach the eyes. But that´s theroetically- after all we´re dealing most of the time with performance issues, which forces to find alternatives from the optimum ( solid and constant 90Hz without reprojection ).

@speed-of-heat the 60Hz mode of Windows Mixed Reality headsets is different from the reprojection modes. 60Hz need to be set up in windows -->windows mixed reality configuration. It lowers the LCD display frequency generally. I didn´t tried it yet, so I´m also uninformed by reality, but it would be interesting if OpenXR reprojection adopts to the 60Hz mode by adding only 1 fake image, when reprojection puts it in 30fps mode, while in windows mixed reality 90hz mode and reprojection puts the FPS to 30, two fake images should be added.
This could be easily testet by just observing the FPS while in 60Hz WMR mode with reprojection, the fps should settle at 30. The perfomance gain the is 1/3 compared to 90Hz WMR mode.

@Baldrick33 did some test flights with different modules on different maps and the break even when turning smooth movements into a stutterfest was always around 39 FPS ( @90Hz mode with reprojection locked at 45Hz ). I think SteamVR was more forgiving when dipping approx 5 fps below 45 withn reprojection. 

 

 

[edmuss]

3 minutes ago, Rosebud47 said:

This could be easily testet by just observing the FPS while in 60Hz WMR mode with reprojection, the fps should settle at 30. The perfomance gain the is 1/3 compared to 90Hz WMR mode.

60Hz with reprojection is a super fast death spiral because the gaps between the refresh rate fraction brackets are so small you can turn an MFD on and drop a bracket

90Hz only if you're using MR.

I'm not sure how much overhead SVR MR costs but it always worked out as needing a minimum of 55% of the refresh rate in fps to stay in reprojection i.e: 20ms/50fps for 90Hz and 30ms/33fps for 60Hz.  Below these values it become a stutterfest.

[Rosebud47]

What holds me back running the G2 in 60Hz mode, might be that some long time ago I´ve tested the 60Hz mode with the Samsung Odyssey+ under SteamVR for WMR.. which was awful.

But also yesterday I´ve switched the reprojection off in 90Hz mode and could only reach around 57fps with my system, so no overhead for 60hz mode without reprojection.

So far the OpenXR mod with the usual setting with 90Hz mode and reprojection locked at 45Hz gives me the best VR experience ever had in DCS, such that I don´t want to touch those setting anymore .  

[edmuss]

1 minute ago, Rosebud47 said:

What holds me back running the G2 in 60Hz mode, might be that some long time ago I´ve tested the 60Hz mode with the Samsung Odyssey+ under SteamVR for WMR.. which was awful.

But also yesterday I´ve switched the reprojection off in 90Hz mode and could only reach around 57fps with my system, so no overhead for 60hz mode without reprojection.

So far the OpenXR mod with the usual setting with 90Hz mode and reprojection locked at 45Hz gives me the best VR experience ever had in DCS, such that I don´t want to touch those setting anymore .  

If you haven't already, try setting the OXRDT resolution to auto.  If I do so then I'm pulling 75-100 fps @ 90Hz and it really doesn't look that bad on the whole, the worst bit is the HUD and MFD text gets fuzzy but still readable.

The auto resolution is calculated as a function of the three framebuffers, antialiased with MSAAx4 should be <10% of available VRAM; my 8gb 3070 defaults to about 2650x2650 which is approximately 62%.

I can run 90Hz 100% and still get a nominal 60fps on Caucasus but it does occasionally drop to the mid 50s; I seem to be fairly immune to the stutter though and can live with it.  If I run 60Hz then I can enjoy the benefit of refresh rate smoothness for the majority of the time.