First VR headset acquisition (2023).... what to get?

[LucShep]

I'll start by saying that my use case for VR will be flight-sims (DCS primarily, but not only), maybe some ocasional sim-racing. Nothing more.
This will be more like a "let's see if I can get into it" purchase and, therefore, investing above a certain budget is completely out of question (400€ maximum).

I'm well aware, through a close friend (has Oculus Rift-S, which I already tested DCS with), that the tweaking is a constant, in pursuit of a performance/quality holy grail.
I'm not scared of that at all (no problem, I'm used to it) but I don't want to get into something that, in the end, just doesn't work okay (performance wise, bugs/issues wise, or comfort wise), and then all this was for nothing.

My PC specs are bellow on my sig.
I currently run DCS at 4K resolution (on 43'' inch screen, with head-tracking) at fairly high settings. I got it well tweaked, satisfied at the moment (but now wanna dive into VR!!).

Now,  took some reading, here and out there, watched videos (etc), it seems that I've got four choices for the VR Headset:

1. Pico 4 (brand new) - 400€
2. Quest 2 (brand new... or used with extras?) - 350€
3. Reverb G1 (used, no warranty) - there is none below 250€
4. Reverb G2 (used, no warranty) - over 350€ for G2 v1, over 500€ for G2 v2.
   
   ......any other equivalent VR headset recommendation(s) for 400€ maximum that I don't know about?

NOTE:  I'm in the E.U. (1€ = 1.10$USD = 0.85£) where the price on these things gets inflated like a balloon. I know this will be remarkably different for those in other countries/continents.

I read that the Reverb G1 and G2 are the only ones on my list with a DisplayPort cable (PCVR dedicated), so no compression (better clarity) and a bit less stress in the system as there's no processing part of encoding and decoding.
I know as well about the very tiny sweet spot and restricted FOV, though the image does seem the most praised of all I listed?  (Reverb G2)
The problem with the HP Reverb (G1 or G2) is that I can't buy them new, and even the 2nd hand prices are too high for a two+ year VR  headset (be it G1 or G2, or any other for that matter). Plus, I read about a lot of problems with cables on the Reverb G1 and the Reverb G2 v1 as well (seems okay in the G2 v2 model of 2021, it seems?), replacements being zero on the G1, and prohibitive on the G2.  Regardless, the Reverb G2 seem the most recommended. ....even if used?

That said, might as well buy a brand new out of the box PICO4 or QUEST 2 for that money and, with that, the guarantee that all is fine and well (plus warranty, etc). ...or is it?
Then, again... these are "Standalone VR", they don't use Display Port cable, but a USB instead (WiFi is "meh" at my place) and, with that compression story, the image quality is generally worse and performance is a bit impacted, because of all that encoding and decoding processing.
I also read that the QUEST2 is utterly uncomfortable, requires extras on top of the initial purchase (Elite strap, etc) and image comparos show some problems with colors.
The PICO4 seems the most capable all around for the money (for my budget) but I also read that it's a no-go for the ubber system it requires for a good experience.

errrrrr  hmmmmm 

I'd like to request your assistance, read your opinions and experiences with any of these (or with all, if you went through them all already!), or other VR headsets that you can recommend for my budget (400€).  Or even if I should go for it at all....

Sorry for the wall of text, and many thanks in advance for any help.
 

Edited August 2, 2023 by LucShep

[Nighthawk 117]

As a Quest 2 user i can say you can get good clarity and performance with a little tweaking however my advice would be wait a few months for the quest 3 as it will out perform the others plus poss better clarity 

[diego999]

Pico 4 seems to be kinda troublesome if you read what people are posting on the forum.

Quest 2 is ok, but, as @Nighthawk 117 says, I would wait until Quest 3 arrives to see what it offers.

[VR Flight Guy in PJ Pants]

For this time, wait for Q3 pun intended.

[Qcumber]

I have a rift s and Pico 4. The rift is a bit easier to set up and less demanding. It's an old headset but still produces great results, especially if you supersample to about 2160 pixels. The Pico 4 is overall better with a very good resolution. However it is very demanding on your GPU as it is high res and needs extra power for encoding and decoding. I have an rtx 4070 and can run a Pico 4 on godlike with FSR 130% in openxr toolkit which gives me a steady 72fps in most situations. You can run this on medium or high with acceptable results allowing virtual desktop to upscale to ultra (about 2800 pixels) via the headset. If you don't mind playing around with settings (a lot) and spending a few weeks optimising everything, then I would recommend the Pico 4. If you do go for this option, make sure you have a WiFi 6 router and cat 6 cable for ethernet connection to your pc. Also consider an ethernet-usb adaptor so that you can directly connect your headset to the router. My router cost £40 and the ethernet adaptor cost £20. With this I get 400 Mbps with h264+ so any compression artifacts are not noticeable to me (when compared to the rift s). The base faceplate is not very comfortable so you might want to get the AMVR version for about £20-30. So overall factor in a total cost of about £400 for a Pico 4 with accessories. 

You might also consider waiting for a quest 3. Although this is reported to be about £/$500 (50% more than a Pico 4) it will have a more powerful processor which could mean better compression and higher bitrates. More future proofing but it is still not designed for PCVR. You still need to factor in a router and possibly a usb ethernet adaptor to use virtual desktop effectively. 

I hope this helps.

[Mr_sukebe]

I didn’t get on with the Pico4.  Good visuals, but their software drove me nuts.

I recently moved from a Rift S to a Quest Pro.

Much better visuals and it’s eye tracking has allowed the use of dynamic foveated rendering, which is like having a GPU upgrade.

The cons are:

- crap audio.  My solution is a pair of Koss KSC75s

- really really uncomfortable by default.  Again, I have a solution, ie a pack of 4 Zeltauto elasticated cinch straps (£11 in the UK).  I use three of them side to side and it changes it from truly awful to “what headset”?

 

 

[dureiken]

2 hours ago, Mr_sukebe said:

I didn’t get on with the Pico4.  Good visuals, but their software drove me nuts.

I recently moved from a Rift S to a Quest Pro.

Much better visuals and it’s eye tracking has allowed the use of dynamic foveated rendering, which is like having a GPU upgrade.

The cons are:

- crap audio.  My solution is a pair of Koss KSC75s

- really really uncomfortable by default.  Again, I have a solution, ie a pack of 4 Zeltauto elasticated cinch straps (£11 in the UK).  I use three of them side to side and it changes it from truly awful to “what headset”?

 

 

really interesting ! could you show us ? thanks

[Mr_sukebe]

Sure:

https://imgur.com/a/mqg4t9U

 

 

 

Edited July 29, 2023 by Mr_sukebe

[Tomcat388th]

I have a quest 2 and a reverb g2 ver 1.  I mainly use the quest now, I feel that their latest updates have put it on par with my reverb for performance and clarity.  I have used their customer support a couple of time when I had questions and they were quick  getting back to me. 

 

[Nodak]

I'm waiting to see what the new XR capable headsets can do, they're just around the corner, Samsung's Galaxy XRVR edition should bring something to that table, hopefully at least specs are given this year if not actual production.  I want to be able to read a physical kneeboard in hi-def color, along with certain controllers in my pit.  Currently nothing I'm willing to cast the G-2 aside for that's a big enough leap, its still competitive.   

[Hippo]

Quest 2 with elite strap, vr cover facial interface and link (or 3rd party) cable.  2nd hand (ebay).

Edited July 29, 2023 by Hippo

[LucShep]

Thanks for the advice, please keep it coming guys.

Got to say, I'm a little surprised noone recommending the used Reverb G2 v1/v2.... are they really that prone to issues?

[dburne]

1 hour ago, LucShep said:

Thanks for the advice, please keep it coming guys.

Got to say, I'm a little surprised noone recommending the used Reverb G2 v1/v2.... are they really that prone to issues?

Reverb G2 was an awesome  headset for me back when I was running it. Never had any problem with it.

[firefox121]

hace 2 horas, LucShep dijo:

Thanks for the advice, please keep it coming guys.

Got to say, I'm a little surprised noone recommending the used Reverb G2 v1/v2.... are they really that prone to issues?

AFAIK, and with your  rig CPU/GPU , you will not have issues with PICO4 or OCULUS compression issues (none of them have display port), so .... go for the pico4 (better lenses) or wait to meta quest 3....

I Junmped from a firs first gen pico HMD to Rift, later Rift S, and now Reberb G2.... this one is for me the sharpest HMD, only his little sweet spot will force you to move the head more than usual, but if you can live with it is a good start point, and cheapest point .....

I am using the reverb G2 since they went to market, and never har issues with them , so far to trying to achieve best graphics with smooth movements.

With my 3080ti and my i9-10850k I must use framerate reprojection, but DCS goes smooth as silk and no need to use x2 or x4 FSAA. 

See my post here .

 

 

[freehand]

The G1 with out question and I have owned the G2, find one cheap as possible best bang for your money but that is just my opinion   

[oakdown]

I'm a reverb g2 v1 owner since being on pre order in canada, before it dropped, on original cable.  I honestly never understood all the issues people were having with the cable... I figure most problems must have arose from those that jump about the room beat sabering, or lots of family member headset swapping.  Playing seated (sims) and carefully stowing the headset has worked to this point for me. 

As for you, I would recommend waiting for quest 3, release in the fall, save a couple more pounds until then.... 

[MADLOU1]

8 hours ago, LucShep said:

Thanks for the advice, please keep it coming guys.

Got to say, I'm a little surprised noone recommending the used Reverb G2 v1/v2.... are they really that prone to issues?

I got a one (a Reverb G2, v2)  about 8 months ago after using a Quest 2 .  I thought and still think its a substantial improvement over my Quest 2 for sim games.  I got a refurbished one on Ebay for around $300 with a one-year Allstate warranty Ebay provided.  

Haven't had any issues with it yet.  But with my luck all the problems will come after the warranty expires LOL!

Edited July 30, 2023 by MADLOU1

[Aitch5]

I have a Ryzen 7 5700 32gb with RX6800XT gpu.  I have a Pico 4 - lovely headset, good sweetspot, nice lenses but its a pig to get working with DCS and there seemed to be conflicts with Virtual Desktop and drivers for the gpu.  Performance was not great, a fair bit of latency (even with a dedicated access point) and not a particularly good framerate.  Your rig may handle it a bit better.

Because of all the issues with the Pico, I got a 2nd hand Reverb G2 (v1).  The sweetspot is poor but it connects and runs without some of the issues I had with the Pico.  Runs quite smoothly, just wish sweetspot was better.  This was improved a smidgen with a VRCover facial interface.  Not had issues with v1 cable (yet) but have bought a spare V2 cable in case the V1 fails.

Another point to consider is accessories - Pico accessories are cheap (prescription lenses £10 for the Pico, £60 for the G2).

If you think your rig can handle it - Pico 4.  Although in the "giving up on Pico 4" thread someone with AMD 5800X3D, 3080Ti, 64GB Ram system wasn't happy with the performance.  The Pico 4 price occasionally drops to £320 on Amazon and very occasionally to £300.

I should also add that I started with  Quest 2 for a couple of weeks but wasn't impressed so bought the Pico thinking my system could handle it.

Edited July 30, 2023 by Aitch5

[Marshallman]

My first forage into VR this year resulted in buying a 2nd hand Quest 2. I upgraded my GPU first to a 4090.....But after a couple of hours in the Quest 2 I do get tired eyes...just my 20Cents
I will deffo move  up next. Maybe Quest 3 or pro...but no Fresnell lenses please!

 

 

Edited July 30, 2023 by Marshallman

[diego999]

28 minutes ago, Marshallman said:

My first forage into VR this year resulted in buying a 2nd hand Quest 2. I upgraded my GPU first to a 4090.....But after a couple of hours in the Quest 2 I do get tired eyes...just my 20Cents
I will deffo move  up next. Maybe Quest 3 or pro...but no Fresnell lenses please!

 

Totally. That monster 4090 deserves a better headset.

 

[Lange_666]

4 hours ago, Aitch5 said:

Although in the "giving up on Pico 4" thread someone with AMD 5800X3D, 3080Ti, 64GB Ram system wasn't happy with the performance.

Guess that was me. Performance (on Ethernet-USB-C adapter cable to get a full stable stream) is only good when you can achive FPS at native headset refresh (72 or 90Hz so 72 or 90 FPS). But that was only possible with lower settings on less demanding maps and with not much going on. When not FPS would drop below the freshrate resulting in stutter (i still don't understand how people manage to get their headsets working stutterfree with a variable FPS).
Forcing ASW removes the stutter but introduced a lot of ghosting on distance objects when looking at it sideways. My Rift-S doesn't have that and Oculus ASW works far better then that of the Pico 4. I tried everything i could find but never found a solution so the Pico went back to the store.
+ on a lot of tube video's about the Pico 4 they say that it's a good headset "if" you have the system to run it with an FPS at native refresh rate. My 5800X3D + 3080ti couldn't do that in DCS, at least not for the visuals i wanted.

[Qcumber]

1 hour ago, Lange_666 said:

Pico 4 they say that it's a good headset "if" you have the system to run it with an FPS at native refresh rate

I would support this. With an rx 6700 I could not get the Pico 4 to produce anything decent. With an rtx 4070 I get a pretty comfortable 72fps with the planes a regularly fly (bf109, p-47, p-51, spitfire, mig-21) and the maps I use (Caucasus, Normandy 2, Sinai, Channel). These are outside of the major cities. I get a drop when low over London, Paris, Cairo etc. but not much. There is slight stuttering when I look 90 degrees left/right when below 72hz but I expect this. I don't get any ghosting unless frame rate is below 72 fps.

DCS open beta (latest), high textures, low shadows, water and clouds, FSAA X2; VD godlike, h264+ (400 Mbps, usb-ethernet). OXRTK FSR 130%; FFR quality/balanced. SP only. 

[Nodak]

12 hours ago, oakdown said:

I'm a reverb g2 v1 owner since being on pre order in canada, before it dropped, on original cable.  I honestly never understood all the issues people were having with the cable... I figure most problems must have arose from those that jump about the room beat sabering, or lots of family member headset swapping.  Playing seated (sims) and carefully stowing the headset has worked to this point for me. 

As for you, I would recommend waiting for quest 3, release in the fall, save a couple more pounds until then.... 

The original series cords with the offset from center cord on the connecting power box was inadequate for pushing signal, so they corrected the cable set by putting a signal booster in the later series centered wire cords.  Mine, an original early G-2 corded, lasted until I connected a 4090, the cable instantly blew out, headset gone dark.  Fortunately it lasted long enough where the G-2 is no longer top of the line and cord supplies are plentiful and run less than half what they used to.  

Edited July 30, 2023 by Nodak

[Dodge]

18 hours ago, dburne said:

Reverb G2 was an awesome  headset for me back when I was running it. Never had any problem with it.

I have both the Quest 2 and Reverb G2 and use the G2 100% of the time for DCS. I just became extremely frustrated with the constant tinkering of settings to try and get a stable experience. One session/day it may work fine, and another it wouldn't. Especially after Q2 software updates. The image quality isn't as good as the G2 either (although for the price point it's good). With the G2, once the settings were configured to my liking I've never had to change a setting since.

As other's have indicated, if you are set on the Q2 it might be prudent to wait for the Q3 (if anything, it should lower the cost of the Q2).

Edited July 30, 2023 by Dodge

[mrsylvestre]

FWIW, Pico 4 provides performance that is acceptable (to me, with ~medium DCS settings) with a 5800X3D and 6950XT, using Virtual Desktop as streamer, with VD's retroprojection (45 FPS), capping the resolution around 2840x2840 per eye and 85% FSR using MBucchia OpenXR toolkit. A good connection with the PC is essential, either through an USB-Ethernet adapter or with a dedicated WIFI router. As mentioned above by QCumber, getting the settings right is quite an endeavour, but to me the compromises I have to make to be "in the sim" rather than "watching the sim on the screen" are worth it. And there lies trouble: I can't go back to the flat screen but I have to live with those compromises until 4090 performance becomes (more) affordable with the next gen GPUs, hopefully.