Discussion
I'm tempted to splurge some cash on PC-based VR. Looking at Oculus Rift. Lots of questions and lots of contradictory info out there, so hoping PH can help.
Theory is it might keep me out the pub!!! I used to enjoy gaming 20+ years ago but got along with keyboards, mice and joysticks have never mastered the modern controllers. Thinking VR might be different.
I have:
- a workstation that way exceeds the required specs apart from graphics card.
- Child 1 who has an Xbox and a PC and in the near future is going to want a much better gaming PC than the current one
- Child 2 with PS4 Pro
I am thinking along the lines of:
- OR for me/child 1, either using my PC or a new one
- no plans for PS4 VR at the moment unless it's a better option (certainly cheaper I guess). Are there any cross-platform multiplayer games?
Looks like I need:
- graphics card for me
- mobo/cpu/gfx/RAM bundle for child 1
So:
- is Oculus Rift the right buy or should I be looking at a different product?
- what graphics card and upgrade bundle should I be looking at to not be disappointed with the experience?
- Child 1 is a regular Xbox One gamer so his overall PC gaming experience needs to be a good or better.
Theory is it might keep me out the pub!!! I used to enjoy gaming 20+ years ago but got along with keyboards, mice and joysticks have never mastered the modern controllers. Thinking VR might be different.
I have:
- a workstation that way exceeds the required specs apart from graphics card.
- Child 1 who has an Xbox and a PC and in the near future is going to want a much better gaming PC than the current one
- Child 2 with PS4 Pro
I am thinking along the lines of:
- OR for me/child 1, either using my PC or a new one
- no plans for PS4 VR at the moment unless it's a better option (certainly cheaper I guess). Are there any cross-platform multiplayer games?
Looks like I need:
- graphics card for me
- mobo/cpu/gfx/RAM bundle for child 1
So:
- is Oculus Rift the right buy or should I be looking at a different product?
- what graphics card and upgrade bundle should I be looking at to not be disappointed with the experience?
- Child 1 is a regular Xbox One gamer so his overall PC gaming experience needs to be a good or better.
Oculus is one option. probably the most popular option.
There is also a load of windows mixed reality devices. They are slightly better resolution, I find a bit more comfortable and better field of view, Some people dont notice the difference much. Can generally pick up the windows headsets a fair bit cheaper. The controllers are not as good as oculus's though so its a trade off there.
Top dawg at the moment is the Pimax, But thats about double the price of the rift without the base stations, controllers etc.
VR isnt as demanding as most think but rather trying to push quality to AAA games on a nice fancy monitor is.
The resolution of VR isnt great at the moment and you do notice it but good games/experiences will distract you from it.
I noticed my CPU has been my most limiting factor. Unfortunately lots of games dont utilize multiple cores but rather a single core. Hence the fasted is better which is currently intel although the new AMD CPU rumours similar clock speed.
Graphics cards have finally came down abit in the mid range although top end prices are still nuts and the mid range cards now cost what yesteryear top end cards cost.
Memory fortunately is at least coming down. seen 16gb DDR 3000mhz for £90 the other day, I paid about £150 not too long ago.
There is also a load of windows mixed reality devices. They are slightly better resolution, I find a bit more comfortable and better field of view, Some people dont notice the difference much. Can generally pick up the windows headsets a fair bit cheaper. The controllers are not as good as oculus's though so its a trade off there.
Top dawg at the moment is the Pimax, But thats about double the price of the rift without the base stations, controllers etc.
VR isnt as demanding as most think but rather trying to push quality to AAA games on a nice fancy monitor is.
The resolution of VR isnt great at the moment and you do notice it but good games/experiences will distract you from it.
I noticed my CPU has been my most limiting factor. Unfortunately lots of games dont utilize multiple cores but rather a single core. Hence the fasted is better which is currently intel although the new AMD CPU rumours similar clock speed.
Graphics cards have finally came down abit in the mid range although top end prices are still nuts and the mid range cards now cost what yesteryear top end cards cost.
Memory fortunately is at least coming down. seen 16gb DDR 3000mhz for £90 the other day, I paid about £150 not too long ago.
For your general VR purpose games made specifically for VR arent too bad. Its mainly things like racing sims/flight sims and games that had VR added afterwords that are the hardest as they were obviously developed without VR in mind.
My Amd Ryzen 1600 @ 3.8ghz manages most VR games ok but defintely bottlenecking the GPU. Especially racing sims etc.
The rift still is a good shout, I have tried both that and my current lenovo explorer. The rift I could definitely move my eyes off screen. As in look hard left or down and see blackness. The lenovo has that also but not as bad. The lenovo also has better resolution and less screen door effect where you can see the pattern of the pixels. A few people also commented the same in terms of quality.
The downside of the lenovo and other windows mixed reality headsets which all use the same 1440x1440 panels is it uses Windows mixed reality portal thing which is terrible. Its another thing to adjust/setup/settings. Then its steamVR then something else. The controllers are ok but nothing on the rifts touch controllers. Also has no integrated headphones but rather an audio jack on the headset to plug in your own. Which just means more wires around your head and stuff.
If its for the kids who want to do all the VR games the rift may still be the best option purely for simplicity.
My Amd Ryzen 1600 @ 3.8ghz manages most VR games ok but defintely bottlenecking the GPU. Especially racing sims etc.
The rift still is a good shout, I have tried both that and my current lenovo explorer. The rift I could definitely move my eyes off screen. As in look hard left or down and see blackness. The lenovo has that also but not as bad. The lenovo also has better resolution and less screen door effect where you can see the pattern of the pixels. A few people also commented the same in terms of quality.
The downside of the lenovo and other windows mixed reality headsets which all use the same 1440x1440 panels is it uses Windows mixed reality portal thing which is terrible. Its another thing to adjust/setup/settings. Then its steamVR then something else. The controllers are ok but nothing on the rifts touch controllers. Also has no integrated headphones but rather an audio jack on the headset to plug in your own. Which just means more wires around your head and stuff.
If its for the kids who want to do all the VR games the rift may still be the best option purely for simplicity.
ging84 said:
VR sucks, it sucked in the 80s, sucked in the 90s, and it still sucks now because nothing has significant been done to overcome some of its biggest problems.
Its nice as a curiosity, but once the novelty wears off most gamers go back to using a screen pretty quickly.
It very much depends on what you are using it for.Its nice as a curiosity, but once the novelty wears off most gamers go back to using a screen pretty quickly.
For racing sims I don't think I could go back to using using a monitor.
It's the same as once you buy a wheel it's very hard to go back to just using a controller.
ging84 said:
VR sucks, it sucked in the 80s, sucked in the 90s, and it still sucks now because nothing has significant been done to overcome some of its biggest problems.
Its nice as a curiosity, but once the novelty wears off most gamers go back to using a screen pretty quickly.
I think I have to agree with what you say.Its nice as a curiosity, but once the novelty wears off most gamers go back to using a screen pretty quickly.
I bought an Acer WMR headset and it's now sitting on my desk just gathering dust. And in the last couple of months I've upgraded from a GTX970 to a RTX2060 and I've not even bothered to see what the difference is.
It's just to much like hard work. I have to fanny around too much and I found I was constantly adjusting it. Yep, as you say, I've just returned to my big (32" UHD) monitor.
Rift here. Someone of the games are truly amazing.
Some last a few weeks , some ages. Games with legs are
Racing games . Iracing is transformed. Depth of vision and being able to look over your shoulder....
Elite dangerous - you really do escape to other worlds
Lots of games agree incredible, but a novelty.
I run max everything on a GTX970 to give you an idea (and that's oculus's min recommendation)
Rift is a bargain at the moment. I think a rift S is about to launch.
Resolution is good t's s screen door that you notice. The space between pixels. That's the thing everyone is struggling to overcome - because your eyes are so close to the screen. You soon ignore it though , and on cartoony style games you don't see it much at all.
Some last a few weeks , some ages. Games with legs are
Racing games . Iracing is transformed. Depth of vision and being able to look over your shoulder....
Elite dangerous - you really do escape to other worlds
Lots of games agree incredible, but a novelty.
I run max everything on a GTX970 to give you an idea (and that's oculus's min recommendation)
Rift is a bargain at the moment. I think a rift S is about to launch.
Resolution is good t's s screen door that you notice. The space between pixels. That's the thing everyone is struggling to overcome - because your eyes are so close to the screen. You soon ignore it though , and on cartoony style games you don't see it much at all.
What do you want to do with it?
Sims/seated stuff or roomscale? How much space do you have for room scale?
For roomscale stuff I'd suggest the Vive series is best, easier to set up and marginally better tracking, you have the choice of steam or Viveport for games and things are more open generally. Valve have opened up the ecosystem and other parties are making hardware and software (like Pimax). New Valve controllers "knuckles" are coming and are amazing by all reports so far.
Oculus is cheaper, and probably easier for seated and sim stuff. You need a lot of high speed usb ports and extra cameras for the same experience as Vive for the roomscale stuff out of the box. Some prefer the standard Oculus controllers.
WMR is cheaper and uses inside-out tracking as opposed to the outside-in of the two above. Some HMD's have better resolution. I have no direct experience of these.
PSVR is cheap but lower resolution, a good introduction but you need to pay Sony prices for games and have both the camera and move controllers.
All of them have their problems, image wise they all suffer screen door. Some more than others but this doesn't really matter much when you are immersed in a game. The biggest issue in my opinion is how they deal with locomotion, no-one has a good solution yet and this is unrelated to the hardware but a software/interaction issue.
I've lots of them. Oculus DK1, DK2, CV1, Vive, PSVR and now a Pimax 5k+
All require a high spec PC and lots of space for roomscale. GPU is critical, maintaining a high frame rate is essential, so I'd personally not go below a 1070. My personal preference is for the Vive/Valve/Steam choice over Oculus but there is really not much between the two main PC choices.
Happy to answer any questions.
Sims/seated stuff or roomscale? How much space do you have for room scale?
For roomscale stuff I'd suggest the Vive series is best, easier to set up and marginally better tracking, you have the choice of steam or Viveport for games and things are more open generally. Valve have opened up the ecosystem and other parties are making hardware and software (like Pimax). New Valve controllers "knuckles" are coming and are amazing by all reports so far.
Oculus is cheaper, and probably easier for seated and sim stuff. You need a lot of high speed usb ports and extra cameras for the same experience as Vive for the roomscale stuff out of the box. Some prefer the standard Oculus controllers.
WMR is cheaper and uses inside-out tracking as opposed to the outside-in of the two above. Some HMD's have better resolution. I have no direct experience of these.
PSVR is cheap but lower resolution, a good introduction but you need to pay Sony prices for games and have both the camera and move controllers.
All of them have their problems, image wise they all suffer screen door. Some more than others but this doesn't really matter much when you are immersed in a game. The biggest issue in my opinion is how they deal with locomotion, no-one has a good solution yet and this is unrelated to the hardware but a software/interaction issue.
I've lots of them. Oculus DK1, DK2, CV1, Vive, PSVR and now a Pimax 5k+
All require a high spec PC and lots of space for roomscale. GPU is critical, maintaining a high frame rate is essential, so I'd personally not go below a 1070. My personal preference is for the Vive/Valve/Steam choice over Oculus but there is really not much between the two main PC choices.
Happy to answer any questions.
You lot seem pretty serious about your VR. I don't know if any of you know of paymoneywubby but here's his take on VR: https://youtu.be/cup4bvCGgkI
You'll probably not want to watch it at work. There's nothing rude in it, your IT people might think you're either a lunatic or a legend.
You'll probably not want to watch it at work. There's nothing rude in it, your IT people might think you're either a lunatic or a legend.
OR user here...when I can get the damn thing to calibrate properly! Racing and flying games are great, Some games made for VR like Gorn, Beat Saber,and Vox Machine,are good.
There also crap games, some weird s
t, and a lot of sexually graphic stuff too! I suppose it's like VHS, and the internet...once porn uses it, it becomes mainstream.
There also crap games, some weird s
t, and a lot of sexually graphic stuff too! I suppose it's like VHS, and the internet...once porn uses it, it becomes mainstream.Why do you think on VR only in terms of entertainment? It can also enhance the effectiveness of knowledge providing and makes easier the problem-solving processes, so you can usefully offer it to your children) This is what guys from ServReality also provide. VR and AR has been created to bring the universe a little closer. With these technologies, experiential learning by simulating real-world environments made simple and real. You should also keep that in mind)
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