My HP Reverb G2 helmet is broken. I'm choosing a new one.

[DeckerSolo]

I’m a HP Reverb G2 user and bought a Meta Quest 3 here’s what I think, please don’t hate me.

Simply because I can, and have been very curious about the Q3 I decided to buy one and see how it compared to my G2 (in ED only, no other games have been tested and I’m not taking into consideration the Q3’s standalone capabilities, which by the way are really fun). I’ve worked on the principal...

forums.frontier.co.uk

 

[aXeL]

What is the difference between the image in VR mode in the Reverb G2 helmet and in the Pico 4 Ultra helmet?

The Reverb G2 helmet has a better image in the center for two reasons:
1) Due to the uncompressed image being used via a DisplayPort cable.
2) Because the field of view (FOV) is smaller: - with the same number of pixels, there will be more pixels by one degree.

However, the Reverb G2 has Fresnel lenses. Therefore, to the left, right, top and bottom of the image center is the image it stops being sharp and is inferior to Pancake lenses (such as the Pico 4 Ultra helmet and the Quest 3 helmet).

If the graphics card is not too powerful, then both advantages will be insignificant due to the poor image from the games, as there will be no "WOW" effect from either DisplayPort or Pancake lenses.

And the image can be bad because of a bad wireless router that has a low speed over Wi-Fi (you have to set a low bitrate and a low resolution).

I'm going to respectfully challenge a bit of this:
To my eyes, which are probably just different to yours, I think the centre view of the P4U is superior to the G2, however they're very close for quality - maybe it's just a preference thing for us?

Re. the graphics card. WMR cannot offload post processing like CAS or upscaling to the G2 whereas the P4U does, and will unless you stop it, so the P4U requires less GPU horsepower than for the G2 as you can render it at a lower resolution on the GPU, with no CAS and let the P4U do all this for you whilst the GPU gets on with the next frame. What difference that makes in practice, would need some proper testing.

'And the image will be bad because of the wireless router'. Might I ask why we are comparing Displayport to wireless rather than Displayport to USB-C? The USB-C cable is already thinner and lighter and less stiff than the G2 DP cable. The P4U natively supports USB-C.

The one negative about the P4U streaming is that, if I use a really high upscale resolution and set the streaming bit rate to <200Mbit ( pointless from what I can see but hey ), then I can get a 2-3ms hit on frame times because of the encode overhead on the PC GPU.

 

[Meresiga]

Might I ask why we are comparing Displayport to wireless rather than Displayport to USB-C? The USB-C cable is already thinner and lighter and less stiff than the G2 DP cable. The P4U natively supports USB-C.

This is because not every Type-C cable can support the USB 3.0 standard, as there are many such cables that only support USB2.0.

 

[amcb10]

I just got the Crystal Light and to be honest is night and day to my G2 but that is just my opinion and the tracking works great.

 

[Outrunner85]

Get another g2 used, or a quest 3 with a link cable. Then wait to see what comes in the next year for PC VR offerings.

 

[rootsrat]

There is a light in the tunnel, at least for nvidia card owners, a community made WMR driver for SteamVR that works without the WMR portal in win11

https://www.reddit.com/r/WindowsMR/s/xfjq2PBACl

 

[Helmut Grokenberger]

There is a light in the tunnel, at least for nvidia card owners, a community made WMR driver for SteamVR that works without the SMR portal in win11

https://www.reddit.com/r/WindowsMR/s/xfjq2PBACl

Say what now??? If this holds true, it's a godsend.

 

[rootsrat]

Say what now??? If this holds true, it's a godsend.

Very much so! It would mean I can reclaim one of my SSD's which currently hosts a Windows 10 build

 

[Helmut Grokenberger]

Very much so! It would mean I can reclaim one of my SSD's which currently hosts a Windows 10 build

(as I am typing this: Danger, old man rant incoming)

I've been actually thinking about this a lot. I am still running 10 for gaming, but I've dabbled into moving to Linux for general gaming and was quite a bit shocked how well even newer AAA games work now. Being an informed shill for a moment, seems like Valve has once more come to the rescue for gaming .

But for VR, I was getting quite angsty. Other than OS support, I have neither need nor motivation to replace my headset, and I wouldn't really know with what either. The G2 hardware is just a pretty good all-in-one package - other headsets like the popular Crystal Lite and similar scare me off with going back to mediocre headband audio or just no audio and all, for example. Is it perfect? No. Is it getting old? For sure. But one thing clearly isn't going to happen for me: Getting a Meta headset, or any other that is gated behind online functionality or being able to scan my face with a proprietary phone.

So while part of me was mentally preparing to either saying goodbye to VR, and therefore ED, or risking running a completely out of date OS (which probably would be fine for a whlle), the option to look into moving to 11 seems a bit more feasable. Meaning though that now I have to educate myself if and how it is possible to get a good compromise of a feeling of privacy on 11. Oh well.

Anyway, that's great news!

 

[rilanglin]

I was in a similar situation not long ago. If Elite Dangerous is your main priority, I'd say both the Crystal Light and Pico4U seem to be getting good feedback recently. Just make sure to check for compatibility and support updates, especially around tracking and controllers. Things change quickly in this space.