Bit the bullet Rift CV1

[[HJ]-RedRaven]

Heya guys - I bit the bullet and ordered a Rift CV1 yesterday. My shipping date is a ways off in July according to the website.

At only 43, I've had to have cataract surgery on both eyes. My vision is now fixed focus; I'm a little long sighted (I wear +2.5 glasses to read) - a biiiig difference to my natural eyes which were -11 and -13.5 dioptres (Very short sighted but great for tabletop game miniature painting!)

With a bit of luck I'll be able to use my reading glasses (their dimensions fit inside that recommended for the CV1)
I've read that the DK2 lenses are set for an apparent focal length of about 1.3metres; my own eyes are sharp from about 6-feet / 1.8m so I may actually be able to get away without glasses at all. It all depends on the text.

I've pored over a lot of DK2 stuff/unboxing/the Oculus website looking for glasses-related opinions/experiences.
I'll admit to being a bit apprehensive although I've been a fairly early adopter of hardware many times before.

Still looking forward to it - my PC is "VR-capable" (i7 3770K @ 3.5GHz, SSD and 12GB of RAM), but I will most likely need to upgrade my 780GTX.

 

[cmdr awesome]

Welcome!

I'd hang fire on the gpu upgrade. The 780 will most likely be fine in space but will probably struggle on planets, but the next gen of graphics will probably hit the market in the autumn. I ran a 770 with my DK2 until horizons came out, and the latest drivers have just improved things no end.

 

[Lestenio]

Awesome. You won't regret it

 

[gapper4]

Best of luck. I've gamed for over 30 years and ED with the DK2 has been the most immersive experience I've ever had. I wish you the same !

 

[[HJ]-RedRaven]

Welcome!

I'd hang fire on the gpu upgrade. The 780 will most likely be fine in space but will probably struggle on planets, but the next gen of graphics will probably hit the market in the autumn. I ran a 770 with my DK2 until horizons came out, and the latest drivers have just improved things no end.

Yeah, I'm hoping the next generation of cards will be out, or at least coming soon by the time I get my Rift.
I'll be expecting to drop the detail settings quite a lot to get to the 90fps zone - I might drop v-sync and see what my 780GTX is actually capable of rendering in space and on-planet at 1280x1024 - a similar pixel count to 1200x1080. If I can get it to 150fps, then I should get around DK2 (75fps) performance, and it might be just doable to tide me over until the new 3D cards arrive.

I'm glad to see the latest drivers have made a visible difference (hopefully this hasn't come at the cost of image quality - I'm used to looking at 1920x1200 in 2D and dropping to 1080x1200 hopefully won't feel like too much of a backwards step...)

I play mostly in space (exploring now) and could switch to (horror) 2D monitor mode for collecting resources on planets if I need to.

 

[Tetsuko]

Congratulations on a great move and welcome to true immersion

The good news is, you probably won't need glasses at all to use the Rift if you are long sighted. I (due to age, my vision used to be 20:20 grrrrr) cannot read a damn thing without glasses now, but I can see everything perfectly in the DK2 without them. I think you would only need glasses if you were short sighted, since the image in the Rift is focussed at infinity.

The new drivers and runtime have worked wonders with the DK2, can't wait to see how the CV1 is.

 

[Frank]

Yeah, I'm hoping the next generation of cards will be out, or at least coming soon by the time I get my Rift.
I'll be expecting to drop the detail settings quite a lot to get to the 90fps zone - I might drop v-sync and see what my 780GTX is actually capable of rendering in space and on-planet at 1280x1024 - a similar pixel count to 1200x1080. If I can get it to 150fps, then I should get around DK2 (75fps) performance, and it might be just doable to tide me over until the new 3D cards arrive.

I'm glad to see the latest drivers have made a visible difference (hopefully this hasn't come at the cost of image quality - I'm used to looking at 1920x1200 in 2D and dropping to 1080x1200 hopefully won't feel like too much of a backwards step...)

I play mostly in space (exploring now) and could switch to (horror) 2D monitor mode for collecting resources on planets if I need to.

I know what you mean. The quality of the 1.3 drivers is very tempting. It's possible that the Oculus will become the cheaper option not just because of the initial cost, but because it runs on cheaper hardware.

I know I should really wait for both headsets to be out before I make my decision, but I'm finding it harder and harder to resist the temptation.

 

[Beavis Tingleball]

the 1.3 runtime seems..no, has worked wonders for performance in ED. I was running 2 GTX670's in sli and found that disabling SLi boosted performance even more. I can now fly ANYWHERE without so much as a hiccup..that goes for driving on planets too. I would assume that a GTX 780 would do it even better. I've already viewed/played all the free apps on the oculus store and performance is the same there as well. keep in mind i'm using a DK2 but still..planets were a disaster using 0.6 runtime on low settings. Now I run "VR high" without a hitch..still can't believe how well it's performing.

 

[[HJ]-RedRaven]

I know what you mean. The quality of the 1.3 drivers is very tempting. It's possible that the Oculus will become the cheaper option not just because of the initial cost, but because it runs on cheaper hardware.

I know I should really wait for both headsets to be out before I make my decision, but I'm finding it harder and harder to resist the temptation.

I think both headsets would be pretty similar - driver support and squeezing every last millisecond of input latency will make the difference. The specs for the Vive and Rift consumer versions are pretty similar, although eveywhere I've read the Oculus is a bit better ergonomically. I'll play mostly seated VR games like ED etc so I'm willing to let the touch controllers slide for now. They will likely see more improvement than the headsets, in hardware and how its implemented in games.

Congratulations on a great move and welcome to true immersion

The good news is, you probably won't need glasses at all to use the Rift if you are long sighted. I (due to age, my vision used to be 20:20 grrrrr) cannot read a damn thing without glasses now, but I can see everything perfectly in the DK2 without them. I think you would only need glasses if you were short sighted, since the image in the Rift is focussed at infinity.

The new drivers and runtime have worked wonders with the DK2, can't wait to see how the CV1 is.

Wow, well that's encouraging, good stuff. I think the minimum specs for the Rift and Vive are both above what is really necessary - of course they don't want ANYONE getting motion sickness, having a below-par (or worse) experience and then blathering all over the internet about how VR is terrible etc. Not good for business.

I'm happy to trade detail for the higher frame-rate, even on the 780GTX. The capacity for stomach-churning queasiness is higher than many new Rift owners are likely to realise, even those who have never been sick before.

I have occasionally been motion sick on aircraft (I fly quite a bit on smaller planes, 8-30 seaters and the like) and the odd car - never when I'm driving or where I can see out... oh wait there was that one time doing my pilot's licence - stall training in a 2-seat Cessna (777Driver will know that one )... ugh. The instructor was like "that was fun, let's do that again 10 more times!". My pre-flight coffee thought otherwise after stall 4.

 

[Tetsuko]

I guess I'm lucky in that I've never been motion sick in anything, and I've done a lot of flying in all sizes of aircraft mostly as a passenger but also as a one-time glider pilot. Aerobatics in small planes and gliders with over enthusiastic instructors included. The Rift didn't make me sick but did make me feel a little uncomfortable at first, mostly due to the occasional judders and jitters which are thankfully gone now with 1.3, unless you have a very weak rig to run it on.

I think if you are prone to motion sickness then some applications in the Rift may accentuate the problem, but, as in the real world, if you are the "pilot" and not the "passenger" all should be fine with some acclimatisation. Starting your Rift career with a 6 hour ED marathon would be a bad idea....

There are two parts of ED that do affect me. One is the SRV, I can only stand a certain amount of bouncing around rough terrain before I really, really want to get back in my ship again. The other is the outfitting screen, which gives me vertigo. I get the same thing in real life on ladders and scaffold towers so I guess that's expected.

 

[[HJ]-RedRaven]

I guess I'm lucky in that I've never been motion sick in anything, and I've done a lot of flying in all sizes of aircraft mostly as a passenger but also as a one-time glider pilot. Aerobatics in small planes and gliders with over enthusiastic instructors included. The Rift didn't make me sick but did make me feel a little uncomfortable at first, mostly due to the occasional judders and jitters which are thankfully gone now with 1.3, unless you have a very weak rig to run it on.

I think if you are prone to motion sickness then some applications in the Rift may accentuate the problem, but, as in the real world, if you are the "pilot" and not the "passenger" all should be fine with some acclimatisation. Starting your Rift career with a 6 hour ED marathon would be a bad idea....

There are two parts of ED that do affect me. One is the SRV, I can only stand a certain amount of bouncing around rough terrain before I really, really want to get back in my ship again. The other is the outfitting screen, which gives me vertigo. I get the same thing in real life on ladders and scaffold towers so I guess that's expected.

I'm continually surprised to hear that the immersion is so great that you get the feelings of vertigo/motion etc. It really does seem to overcome the fact that you're sitting safely in your seat. I look forward to it! I have overcome bad plane flights etc on willpower alone. The rift will be no different (and this time I'm definitely in control)

My rig has a weak-for-VR video card, a 780GTX - it appears it will be okay in space with the occasional judder;

Last night I switched to 1280x1024 for similar pixel count to the CV1 (1080x1200 per eye) on all ultra settings, 1.0 super-sampling and v-sync off to see what the card was really able to pull The 780GTX was pulling around 220fps in quiet space. Near planets 180-200fps. Switching SS to 2.0 halved the framerate almost eactly, so most of the time I "should" be in the 75-100fps range when using the rift. Not ideal, but do-able.

I'm a long way from the bubble so I can't test in a combat zone or even a station landing pad, but that will only reduce the possible fps...it will be borderline to begin with.

 

[Beavis Tingleball]

I'm continually surprised to hear that the immersion is so great that you get the feelings of vertigo/motion etc. It really does seem to overcome the fact that you're sitting safely in your seat. I look forward to it! I have overcome bad plane flights etc on willpower alone. The rift will be no different (and this time I'm definitely in control)

My rig has a weak-for-VR video card, a 780GTX - it appears it will be okay in space with the occasional judder;

Last night I switched to 1280x1024 for similar pixel count to the CV1 (1080x1200 per eye) on all ultra settings, 1.0 super-sampling and v-sync off to see what the card was really able to pull The 780GTX was pulling around 220fps in quiet space. Near planets 180-200fps. Switching SS to 2.0 halved the framerate almost eactly, so most of the time I "should" be in the 75-100fps range when using the rift. Not ideal, but do-able.

I'm a long way from the bubble so I can't test in a combat zone or even a station landing pad, but that will only reduce the possible fps...it will be borderline to begin with.

Based on my experience with the new runtime and an even older card (gtx670) I think you'll be just amazed.