Some graphics settings questions for new VR guy

[encrypted]

Instead of opening a new thread, I'll just ask here as a new VR guy (Black Friday $349 Rift S, yay!).

1) Any way to minimize that crazy flies effect in stations / in vr cockpit near ... how to say.. aliasing places like small details, rails, etc.? I don't feel it's ED specific issue, but in ED it's somewhat noticeable and unpleasant.
2) As I've read basically playing with VR presets (VR ultra) + HMD setting is all that's needed to be done. Any other recommendations?
3) Resolution - set up to highest possible? I.e. 2550 or something like that for the Rift S?
4) How do I see FPS in VR? In regular pancake version it's CTRL+F but in VR I can't see it.

5) Non-ED question: Can't figure out how to watch 3D videos (360 vids) from browser, i.e. youtube and such on headset. A lot of misleading info online nothing worked so far.

 

[Alec Turner]

1) Any way to minimize that crazy flies effect in stations / in vr cockpit near ... how to say.. aliasing places like small details, rails, etc.? I don't feel it's ED specific issue, but in ED it's somewhat noticeable and unpleasant.

I made a couple of suggestions in post #21. See also follow-up posts from @jojon and @aXeL with alternative suggestions.

3) Resolution - set up to highest possible? I.e. 2550 or something like that for the Rift S?

You can't actually change the resolution of VR. The resolution settings which ED offers you in graphics settings are for what's being shown on the screen while you're in VR. Unless you want to grab screenies or video then you may as well leave these low - no point asking your PC to do more work than is necessary.

4) How do I see FPS in VR? In regular pancake version it's CTRL+F but in VR I can't see it.

I think you can use the Oculus Debug tool to get this. There's also a nice 3rd party utility called the Oculus Tray Tool which has a lot of features including framerate display I believe.

 

[Arioch]

...You can't actually change the resolution of VR. The resolution settings which ED offers you in graphics settings are for what's being shown on the screen while you're in VR. Unless you want to grab screenies or video then you may as well leave these low - no point asking your PC to do more work than is necessary...

Just on this point, there is a setting for the Rift S for “performance” or “quality” mode (if I remember the names correctly in one of the hardware menus) - when I tried the “performance” setting it looked like the rendered resolution had been decreased.

That was almost me the day I bought my OG Rift...

Aye, when I peeled the too-tightly adjusted Rift from my head to answer the urgent call, I looked in the bathroom mirror at the red line around my eyes and thought “Jack. Me. Back. In”

 

[Old Duck]

You can't actually change the resolution of VR. The resolution settings which ED offers you in graphics settings are for what's being shown on the screen while you're in VR. Unless you want to grab screenies or video then you may as well leave these low - no point asking your PC to do more work than is necessary.

Is there any way to turn off this mirroring completely?

 

[Arioch]

Is there any way to turn off this mirroring completely?

As far as I know, no, but the computational savings you’d make are apparently minimal. I remember reading a Dev comment (not FDev) about how much extra power it took to mirror the image from one eye to the monitor, and it was so low that it was a “might as well do it” thing.

No matter what monitor resolution setting you make for Elite, it will reset the next time you start the game to the default 1280x720 - I’ve tried making the settings file read-only but the game still does it. In the past I’ve dropped the monitor mirror res down to DOS-o-vision and didn’t see any noticeable fps improvement using the Oculus on-screen monitors.

 

[Old Duck]

On this topic of monitors vs VR, I changed my refresh back to 144hz, uncapped framerate and turned off vsync. I think this has increased my VR performance, but I've changed so many things that maybe it wasn't this. My thought was not to limit the signal being set to VR based on monitor settings. I'm not noticing any screen tearing or anything like that, so I'm guessing VR is a very different beast when it comes to things like vsync.

 

[Rat Catcher]

On this topic of monitors vs VR, I changed my refresh back to 144hz, uncapped framerate and turned off vsync. I think this has increased my VR performance, but I've changed so many things that maybe it wasn't this. My thought was not to limit the signal being set to VR based on monitor settings. I'm not noticing any screen tearing or anything like that, so I'm guessing VR is a very different beast when it comes to things like vsync.

The Oculus driver should limit the framerate to your HMD, but switching off vsync may have given you some processing overhead to benefit from, pure guesswork on my part.

How are you getting on with VR generally?

 

[Oztig]

I had PSVR for a month, and I had mixed feelings about it. Most of my gripes (low resolution, low-quality graphics) will likely be addressed by the Rift S. I absolutely LOVED playing Skyrim in VR, and I just bought the PC version at 70% Steam sale. I also grabbed Subnautica, a train simulator for VR, and I'll be downloading DCS when my 2nd hard drive arrives. I'm still on the fence about X-plane for VR, as it's a bit more expensive... I'll probably spend the next couple of days browsing Steam's VR catalog, as my headset won't arrive until the middle of next week.

If you happen to like puzzle games, then I can recommend 'The Talos Principle' - A simple premise, but a great game IMO - and very nice graphics

Cheers,
Nick

 

[Rat Catcher]

If you happen to like puzzle games, then I can recommend 'The Talos Principle' - A simple premise, but a great game IMO - and very nice graphics

Cheers,
Nick

Seconded!
(Later levels are mind-twistingly fun )

 

[Old Duck]

How are you getting on with VR generally?

First Impressions of ED in VR

Things I like: Headlook – Probably my favorite feature of VR is being able to look around! I’ve been missing the gyroscopic headlook available on PS4, but true headlook (you see where head is pointing) is extremely immersive. I told my wife that VR will be much better for my neck since I’ll be...

forums.frontier.co.uk

Also, I'm really impressed with IL-2. Every nut and bolt in the cockpit is modeled in glorious 3D, and the world is surprisingly photorealistic at altitude. I love effects like rain drops on the windows as I pass through clouds, and the wind rushing through my ears as I stick my head out the window. This is a game that I just have to play in VR, because the ability to look around is so crucial to me. I haven't done any combat yet, as I fear I may barf (I'm still getting used to VR motion), but it was worth it just for the experience of flight alone!

Speaking of VR acclimation, I sent myself into a VR hangover last night by driving my SRV around in ED :bleck:

 

[Arioch]

...Speaking of VR acclimation, I sent myself into a VR hangover last night by driving my SRV around in ED :bleck:

Have you got “maintain vehicle horizon” comfort setting enabled?

I don’t drive without it!

 

[Rat Catcher]

Have you got “maintain vehicle horizon” comfort setting enabled?

I don’t drive without it!

It took playing Lone Echo through before I could SRV in comfort without fixed horizon, great suggestion

 

[VR Morgan Grimes]

Also, I'm really impressed with IL-2. Every nut and bolt in the cockpit is modeled in glorious 3D, and the world is surprisingly photorealistic at altitude. I love effects like rain drops on the windows as I pass through clouds, and the wind rushing through my ears as I stick my head out the window. This is a game that I just have to play in VR, because the ability to look around is so crucial to me. I haven't done any combat yet, as I fear I may barf (I'm still getting used to VR motion), but it was worth it just for the experience of flight alone!

Speaking of VR acclimation, I sent myself into a VR hangover last night by driving my SRV around in ED :bleck:

I've just started getting back into IL2 myself, the VR in it is excellent, next time you have an oil leak stick your head out of the canopy

 

[Old Duck]

Have you got “maintain vehicle horizon” comfort setting enabled?

I do, and it definitely helps, but I think I was just driving too fast around lots of stuff.

 

[jojon]

My thought was not to limit the signal being set to VR based on monitor settings.

I have heard of some VR games that have for some peculiar reason capped themselves to the one's primary monitor frame rate -- not Elite Dangerous, though, but I have encountered it spastically kicking in- and out of frame synthesis (new frames being faked by modifying the last displayed one, whenever one's computer can't keep up with refresh rate - two flavours of which are called "ATW" and "ASW" in Oculus parlance), whether needed or not... I could imagine (no more than imagining) the engine going into unnecessary idle states, on top of that...

Like Ratkatcher said: The VR runtime demands a certain frame rate out of the game, so vblank should be default and not something the user can affect, but what the game then actually does, is only up to itself... :7

Not only is vblank default and enforced, but HMDs do not typically do rolling updates; They fill the whole screen up with image data without actually displaying it, and then flashes the entire picture all at once, for only a fraction of the duration of the frame. This is to minimise the view being dragged along with your head, so to speak, when you look around, which would come across as uncomfortable smearing, ghosting and juddering effects (EDIT: It is the "low persistence" feature you may have seen mentioned).

 

[Old Duck]

Is there any way to control the brightness of the Rift's LCD backlight? I'm not talking about gamma, but actual emitted light, like the brightness control for my monitor. While I don't have serious problems with the dark space in ED, the dungeons of Skyrim look washed out / smudgy due to the lens glare, something I think could easily be fixed by dialing back the LCD brightness. This lens flare / glare / fog / Fresnel effect is probably my biggest complaint about the Rift S.

 

[Rat Catcher]

Is there any way to control the brightness of the Rift's LCD backlight? I'm not talking about gamma, but actual emitted light, like the brightness control for my monitor. While I don't have serious problems with the dark space in ED, the dungeons of Skyrim look washed out / smudgy due to the lens glare, something I think could easily be fixed by dialing back the LCD brightness. This lens flare / glare / fog / Fresnel effect is probably my biggest complaint about the Rift S.

Have you tried the brightness setting in options - I had to turn it down to about 20% after getting the S - set to minimum can also be quite atmospheric.
(the flare is commonly called "God Rays" and is more noticable when bright, normally white, is displayed over a dark background)

 

[Old Duck]

Have you tried the brightness setting in options - I had to turn it down to about 20% after getting the S - set to minimum can also be quite atmospheric.
(the flare is commonly called "God Rays" and is more noticable when bright, normally white, is displayed over a dark background)

Define "options" - game options, Oculus app options, some other options? Turning down game brightness in Skyrim made things worse, because the backlight is still blasting at 100%. So for right now I actually turned UP brightness in Skyrim to reduce "god ray" (smeared glasses) effect, but that detracts from the atmospheric feel.

 

[Rat Catcher]

Define "options" - game options, Oculus app options, some other options? Turning down game brightness in Skyrim made things worse, because the backlight is still blasting at 100%. So for right now I actually turned UP brightness in Skyrim to reduce "god ray" (smeared glasses) effect, but that detracts from the atmospheric feel.

Sorry - imprecise...

It was the in-game brightness options I referred to - I dropped into SkyrimVR before posting the suggestion and played with the brightness slider. In-game it is night and the changes were noticable, and very dark at minimum.
I'll check if I have any other settings modified elsewhere...

 

[Lordxenu]

If you'

I had PSVR for a month, and I had mixed feelings about it. Most of my gripes (low resolution, low-quality graphics) will likely be addressed by the Rift S. I absolutely LOVED playing Skyrim in VR, and I just bought the PC version at 70% Steam sale. I also grabbed Subnautica, a train simulator for VR, and I'll be downloading DCS when my 2nd hard drive arrives. I'm still on the fence about X-plane for VR, as it's a bit more expensive... I'll probably spend the next couple of days browsing Steam's VR catalog, as my headset won't arrive until the middle of next week.

re into skyrim VR I whole heartedly recommend getting Asgard's wrath from the oculus store its basically Skyrim if it was built from the ground up to be VR and is absolutely amazing.