Hardware & Technical Am I the only one unimpressed with Oculus DK2?

[Cmdr Snuffler]

Look how much the so called "DK1" changed from the "DK2" in such a relatively small space of time from using a gyroscope to using an ir solution combined, this means that anybody who bought a DK1 now has learned nothing about developing because the product has completely changed.

...

oculus are stringing you all along

• With all due respect this is your personal opinion that from what I have seen you are in an extreme minority.
• On the Oculus Rift web site it clearly states this is not for commercial use and only developers should purchase it. They couldn't have been more clearer.
• Some people bought the OR to dev with, some bought it so we can help FD polish their OR code, some bought it for the wow and toy factor and some bought it for a combination of those things.
• Hardware and software are very different things. New hardware can still generate the same API commands or raise the same events as old hardware. Code does not always have to change.
• During the lifetime of a project any code framework will change, which will require integrating devs to modify their UI code. This isn't new to OR...this is development and progress.
• OR DK1 was more of a proof of concept.
• Both ED and OR are in beta stages...things can, and will, change.
• Been had by Oculus? Rubbish.

Just like 99.99% of people who have used ED with the Dk2, and with the old DK1, I am blown away. I knew exactly what I was getting into and therefore only see the amazing positives.

 

[[VR] Mad Mike]

To anyone in this thread who are not enjoying the rift.

Before you get rid (which will net you a tidy profit so even then you have hardly been ripped off in some huge oculus ruse as 1 particularly vitriolic (non) user likes to claim.

however, before you get rid I suggest you try Senza Peso. This was updated to DK2 on the 3rd.

As it is made from the ground up for VR many of the issues with resolution/SDE are far less apparent. Assuming you have a VR capable machine it is incredible.

http://blog.kiteandlightning.la/senza-peso-vr-dk2-edition/

 

[Amadeus]

When did pixels become the bogy man?
You don't want to pixels? Wait at least a few generations because it's going to be a while before screens get good enough and your GPU strong enough to pipe content at that resolution.

For practical advice, make sure you have the thing set up right.
Native res, V-Sync etc. I can read txt just fine even without moving my head closer to the display.
My defaulted to 1280 x 960 which was the native res of my monitor.

Also your brain will filter it out, it's what brains do.

If you are still disappointed, fairy nuff, put it on fleabay and profit.

 

[WiseDuck]

Buying a dev kit and expecting quality? Palmer Luckey (co creator of the rift) has gone record saying that if you buy the DK2 expecting quality you will be disappointed.

 

[Dr Zachary Smith]

noobish

ahh not this guy again , hes never even used one but thinks he knows all because he got roped into buying one of those crazy priced non vr sony headsets......... let the people who have used it comment please!!

Yes this guy again, I've never used one because I am not naive enough to buy one after I used a DK1. I looked at the specs and knew it would be pixelated. Doesn't take a genius to figure that out it's a Samsung phone screen with some lenses in front. You need to realise the Sony HMZ delivers OUTSTANDING visual clarity in ghost free 3D in all my games. It is a consumer product not a DK, I played outlast with a gyro mouse attached to the top with velcro and it was the best gaming experience I ever had and I been gaming 30 years ..son, here's the thing, I can use it on any game or watch a blue ray in 3d just like being in the pictures it is an outstanding product unlike the DK2 just get over it.

I don't use the HMZ to play very often like I said sticking something on your head while gaming is just not fun, but when I use it with a track ir it is very immersive, zero ghosting and you can spot a fly on a wall from 30 yards, you cannot see any pixels at all.

Clearly you have caught the "fanboy virus"


Here is my advice to anyone thinking of buying a DK2 just use a HMZ T2 instead with a home made or bought trackir solution at least you will be able to play all your games and watch movies too without complaining about not being able to see stuff.

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/191313505404?ssPageName=STRK:MESELX:IT&_trksid=p3984.m1555.l2649

 

[jabokai]

blah blah blah

Whatever the HMZ is, it is not VR and that makes it an utter failure for gaming, for me, from the start. One of the best aspects of VR is the immersive experience - you don't have to rely on kit like TrackIR to do a half- job - you turn and look behind you and you see what's behind you - it's that simple. I've used TrackIR and from what I gather the HMZ would be like using TrackIR in a (low res) cinema - you're still playing on a screen - it just ain't VR or anything really to do with it. Fine if you like that as a solution but it's not really comparable IMHO.

 

[Cmdr Snuffler]

Here is my advice to anyone thinking of buying a DK2 just use a HMZ T2 instead with a home made or bought trackir solution at least you will be able to play all your games and watch movies too without complaining about not being able to see stuff.

OR is in Beta still
OR has a much greater field of view
OR has inbuilt tracking
OR is a lot cheaper than the HMZ T2.
OR DK2 can be sold for more than you paid for it

HMZ T2 is £999 new or roughly £500 second hand...plus £100 for track IR.
That's 3-4 times as expensive.

People are in it for the ride and to help FD.

If the HMZ works for you then great...but I wouldn't buy one even if I had £1100.

 

[Philip Coutts]

Isn't the clue in the title? It's a developers kit not the finished article. If you buy the full general release version (Crystal Cove? is that what it's called?) and still have issues then you have a real right to complain but complaining about what is essentially a prototype doesn't make much sense to me.

 

[Dr Zachary Smith]

low res

Whatever the HMZ is, it is not VR and that makes it an utter failure for gaming, for me, from the start. One of the best aspects of VR is the immersive experience - you don't have to rely on kit like TrackIR to do a half- job - you turn and look behind you and you see what's behind you - it's that simple. I've used TrackIR and from what I gather the HMZ would be like using TrackIR in a (low res) cinema - you're still playing on a screen - it just ain't VR or anything really to do with it. Fine if you like that as a solution but it's not really comparable IMHO.

My home made tracking solution works great thanks, yes I can see what's behind me lol, and watching a blueray on a HMZ is better than going to the Imax, I watched Avatar on both, it's better on a HMZ than in the pictures man I jest you not. Driving games are insane as the dash is real life size inside the HMZ as is the cockpit in ED.

You are still playing on a screen in an Oculus, the only thing that gives you fov is the lenses.

 

[Dr Zachary Smith]

OR is in Beta still
OR has a much greater field of view
OR has inbuilt tracking
OR is a lot cheaper than the HMZ T2.
OR DK2 can be sold for more than you paid for it

HMZ T2 is £999 new or roughly £500 second hand...plus £100 for track IR.
That's 3-4 times as expensive.

People are in it for the ride and to help FD.

If the HMZ works for you then great...but I wouldn't buy one even if I had £1100.

I agree that the HMZ may seem overpriced, but the image is extremely good and very big. You can make a home made trackir for about £10 if you have a spare webcam, mine works real smooth and doesn't glitch at all when I look round, does take some fiddling to get spot on though

 

[jabokai]

My home made tracking solution works great thanks, and watching a blueray on a HMZ is better than going to the Imax, I watched Avatar on both, it's better on a HMZ than in the pictures man I jest you not. Driving games are insane as the dash is real life size inside the HMZ as is the cockpit in ED.

You are still playing on a screen in an Oculus, the only thing that gives you fov is the lenses.

By "playing on a screen" I meant that you see the game on a screen (whether virtual or actual). It'd be like playing ED in the cinema app on the Rift and that would be a lesser overall experience, whether the resolution was what it is now or 16k!

"simulates a 750-inch screen seen at a 20-meter distance with dual 720p OLED panels" > IMAX? Yeah, okay!

And, it is still not VR.

 

[Cmdr Snuffler]

I agree that the HMZ may seem overpriced

bit of an understatement

The HMZ looks like it was designed for movies, but a side effect is you can play games in high res.
The OR is being designed as an out and out gaming device.

If you increase the FOV in the HMZ to be equal to that of the DK2 then I am sure you'll see screen door and pixels.

 

[amigacooke]

Congratulations to the OP as you provided a valued judgement with reasons for your opinion and avoided the all to prevalent extremes ('it's great', 'it's rubbish).

In my experience nothing is totally without fault or merit, therefore I tend to ignore opinion that is unable to take a balanced view of some sort.

 

[Jezzah]

I don't own one but I tried out for few days after borrowing get my mates dk2.

It's like another poster says .. you'll be blown away but disappointed at same time. Yes incredible immersion but ever so pixellated and fuzzy.

This might be a viable purchase for me after consumer version comes out maybe several iterations of that version. But ill be trying before buying. There are a lot of comments on the net that really don't seem to track at all with my experience.

 

[jabokai]

There are a lot of fan boy comments on the net that really don't seem to track at all with my experience.

Sigh, no need for the "fan boy" pejorative here... it's all just about the differing personal requirements and experience.

Personally the loss of resolution, the hassle of setting it up, the cable tethering it to your PC, the fact I can't see my keyboard - all that is outweighed by the fact I'm actually in the game when I play. That experience easily outweighs the negatives... already. Ideally it would be higher res, wireless, pass-through button/slider for seeing the real world, etc, etc, but all that will come in time. For a lot of us though, it's simply already the best way to play the game... doesn't make us fan boys any more than you could be negatively referred to as a Luddite refusenik.

I've said it before - for me this was the biggest thing to ever happen in gaming. Everything else, from Pong to ED, has been evolutionary... but we've always just been playing on a screen even if they got flatter, sharper and bigger. With VR you're really in the game... to me it really is revolutionary.

 

[Viajero]

I may revert back to playing on a big screen TV for crisper imagery and forego the VR experience until CV1 comes out.

Can I have your DK2?!

 

[MajorEpeen]

Was CV1 rumoured to have 2560x1440? Will need a very capable machine to run that. Not sure if that is even enough to negate the visible pixels.

 

[gibonez]

this is why I am waiting for a 1440p version of the rift to come out.

Seeing any screen door is not acceptable for me. DPi has to be really good.

 

[TheDoctor]

I'm surprised at some of the rude responses to my post in this thread - I mean, name-calling - really? What on earth is happening to this forum?!

Well my ignore list is getting so long that it's going to need to be upgraded to 64 bit due to all the trolls on here now.

As for the Oculous there seems to be a very vocal fanboy community that cannot see that the way that the company is acting isnt' going to get them their CV1 anytime soon.

They have plenty of software support but no named hardware designer or partner manufaturer and being insulted on forums wont' make that issue go away.

 

[Alric]

TL;DR Agreed there are significant issues. It's not what some built it up to be. It's not a life-changing experience. But it is what OVR said it would be, and it is the most immersive way to play E : D.

I was not disappointed in it, because it is what it said it would be.
The disappointment would be that it's not what a lot of others said it would be. People who had tried the prototypes, or who were just dreaming, were very excited about how DK2 would fix the resolution problems, no more screen door, and this mythical sense of 'presence'.

Well, the resolution is still a long way short of where it needs to be, the screen door effect is still much too noticeable, and I don't magically feel like I'm in another place.

That said, the resolution is improved enough to where I can read the text and play a game like E : D without need to remove the headset. It does have positional tracking, and that works very well. It does have really nice deep black, good colour and no noticeable blur. These were the things DK2 was supposed to bring, and it did.

Furthermore, it is far more immersive than any monitor setup. There are no distractions, things have depth and scale. So many details like the landing areas, and the interior of your ship, are just brought to another level in VR.

I think the idea that it's a development kit so nobody should have negative opinions on it is nonsensical. Aside from the fact that none of this would even happen without the buzz around DK1, it is a proof of concept for VR as much as it's a development kit. It's a platform for the people who develop the content for CV1 to get cracking with, and its quality affects what you feel like you can and can't do with the medium. We can see the possibilities, we can get a fair idea of how much improvement there needs to be to eliminate the major problems, and we can see that it's highly unlikely CV1 will be at that level. So these are issues that will still be there, to some degree, in the first wave of consumer VR. There's no point denying that - we have to work with it.