Samsung GearVR and Elite Dangerous

Kapow

Kapow
Hi Guys,

I've been searching on this forum for a thread that addressed how to use Gear VR from Samsung and Elite Dangerous and I didn't find much info, so I thought to put it into this one single thread as I got it working today.
This guide will work only with NVidia Graphcis cards which support Shield stream. If you don't have NVidia you can try IntuGamesVR or Trinus, but it won't use all the mod cons of the Gear VR headset.

The Setup is actually incredibly simple -

First you need to install - SideloadVR on your Samsung - http://sideloadvr.com/
Once you have it installed you will need to get the certificate and just follow the basic 4 steps on the app. Once you have that done all you need to install on your phone is Stream Theater from SideloadVR market.
Next step is to launch Stream Theater from your apps. When you launch it will tell you to be placed into Gear VR - do not click cancel or the app will close, but place into Gear VR - the app will start.
Once the app starts you will need to type in the PCs IP from which you are streaming - to do so - launch cmd - and type in ipconfig/all
You needs the IPV4 number and it will look something like this - 192.176.1.1XX. Type this number in your Stream Theater.
It will give you a code to type in on your PC once you are connected so just retype the 4 digit code into you Geforce Experience.

Easiest way to get the Head Tracking work in Elite and Stream Theater is to turn on Mouse for head Tracking in your ED settings.

Enjoy - you can now play it in 2D as a large cinema gameplay experience with Head Tracking or you can play it with 3d (Side by side) and just tweak your Theater Settings to your liking for your "VR" experience with head tracking.

As far as I understand the Stream Theater is being worked on to reach full VR experience and as far as I can tell I had no motion sickness or large latency - My latency was around 20ms and I'm using latency correction by Stream Theater and it makes it a superb experience.

massive thanks to the Guys at SideLoad VR and Stream Theater for making this possible. You can use this setup to run any other game as well :)

I hope this helps some of you.
 

Jypson

Jypson
Sounds like an interesting experiment. I can't imagine playing for too long though, the Gear VR is quite uncomfortable to wear after about 20 minutes. (for me anyway, hope the consumer grade HMD's coming out are more comfortable to wear!)
 

Kapow

Kapow
Jypson said:
Sounds like an interesting experiment. I can't imagine playing for too long though, the Gear VR is quite uncomfortable to wear after about 20 minutes. (for me anyway, hope the consumer grade HMD's coming out are more comfortable to wear!)
Click to expand...


Make sure your top back strap (going over your head) lifts the weight of the Gear VR, so you have no nose preasure or weight issue. Once I've set the straps right I can wear it for hours. I'm having more issues with overheating, but that might be my S6 being faulty or that it runs too much crap in the background. I'm still running tests as at the moment I can play for around 40-50 mins before I get overheat warning.

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Magicjosh said:
Can't wait to try this when I get home. I tried with trinus but it was incredibly slow and unresponsive.
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I've tried Trinus as well. Good idea on paper, but unless you use moonlight it is very unresponsive and if you run it through moonlight you can't recenter unless you use opentrack externally which is a bit of a pain to set up. I found the Streamtheater to be by far the most responsive and easy to use. Just make sure that you have fast enough WIFI if you plan to run it on Wifi - I have 5g ac and it works a treat with average latency just below 20ms making it very playable. Plus if I don't want the VR feel I can just use standard theater setting and have a giant screen with headtracking for my Elite session which is also cool and doesn't wear down the eyes as much as full VR with 3d
 

Magicjosh

Magicjosh
I would use it primarily for the VR. I have a 110" projector screen setup at home if I want to play on a big screen :) I also have an oculus DK1 but the quality isn't even worth it... Just a tease of vr is capable of. If this works even remotely as good as it sounds here I'm super excited to get home and give it a shot. My phone overheats in about the same too but even half that time in VR Elite would make my day!
 

daveylad

D
I shall give this a try when I get home. Good shout! Also my S6 overheats after a while especially if streaming stuff to my phone.
 
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SLeeC

S
Yes us VR people have our own little sand box to play in over here away from the others :) I hope these side loaded apps arnt loaded.. im flatout trusting vorpx!
 
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Kapow

Kapow
SLeeC said:
Yes us VR people have our own little sand box to play in over here away from the others :) I hope these side loaded apps arnt loaded.. im flatout trusting vortex!
Click to expand...

So far I can't see any issues. The overheating being the highest issue I had and it seems that I've resolved it with https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.qihoo.security&hl=en After you boost your device you can scroll down and you will see temperature control.I've run it and enabled it and just finished streaming Netflix for over an hour and still no overheat issue, on the other hand I needed a break as an hour and 40 or so min is a long VR session with the head set ;)

Overall I'm really impressed with the S6 and Gear VR. much more so then I've expected. Is it oculus Rift replacement? No, but it is great way to play games like Elite until Oculus and Vive cost reasonable amount as there is no way in hell that I will pay $600+ for a tracking device with screen and optics in. It just isn't going to happen. When they reach $300-$400 I'll happily jump on board and considering how the market works it might be around December this year when they announce second gen ;)
 
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Raist

Raist
Hi Kapow,

thanks for this.
I have followed your steps and managed to get the game running on the gearvr.

My only problem, is that it's always displayed on a 2d screen in front of me.
Can you help with the last few steps for proper vr setup.

thanks
 
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Jon flint

Jon flint
Really want to try this but I'm not sure my old galaxy note 4 will work with the gear vr. All the specs list minimum of s6 upwards :(
 
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Magicjosh

Magicjosh
i got this all up and running, but for some reason Elite doesnt show up on the list of games in my Gear VR. I see all the other games detected by the Nvidia app, but no Elite at all. is there a way to manually add games, or is it supposed to show up automatically
 

Kapow

Kapow
Magicjosh said:
i got this all up and running, but for some reason Elite doesnt show up on the list of games in my Gear VR. I see all the other games detected by the Nvidia app, but no Elite at all. is there a way to manually add games, or is it supposed to show up automatically
Click to expand...

In GeForce Experience - click on the Preferences Tab and then on Shield and add Elite Dangerous Launcher. That should add it to your games.

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Jon flint said:
Really want to try this but I'm not sure my old galaxy note 4 will work with the gear vr. All the specs list minimum of s6 upwards :(
Click to expand...

Yeah the new Gear VR is only for S6 models or Note5. You can probably find the old compatible GearVR online on Ebay or somewhere second hand though

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Raist said:
Hi Kapow,

thanks for this.
I have followed your steps and managed to get the game running on the gearvr.

My only problem, is that it's always displayed on a 2d screen in front of me.
Can you help with the last few steps for proper vr setup.

thanks
Click to expand...

Make sure you use the StreamVR (or what ever the name is) and follow these settings in the video below (Make sure your Mouse sensitivity and Head Look sensitivity in ED are set to minimum or you will feel sick from the speed of motion as well as turning the Side by side 3d on in Elite Dangerous - Keep in mind that your systems specs will play a big part in how well the game runs on your PC from there onwards) Also make sure that you are streaming in 1080p 60fps if at all possible (shows in the video where it is)

Video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYbgym9uu8w

There is also a known bug which is rather random. I usually set Vertical and Horizontal scale to 6 and distance to around 0.75-0.85 and the use the back button until it starts to work. In general I got the VR mode working everytime, but there is a bug which makes it use the screen at all times. It is a really annoying bug and is being worked as far as I know, but if you are experiencing the bug and Back button doesn't help, then you might have to wait for the fix.

I hope this helps
 

Kapow

Kapow
Lastly the overheat issue - The only way I've managed to resolve it so it really doesn't overheat regardless of the room temperature or use was to install a small (laptop) fan on the shield cover of GearVR you can take off. It is powered by USB and I have it on full blast. as it is a fan from my very old macbook which was dead for years it is still rather quite even on full blast and keeps the phone at reasonable temps even after a very long session - I was remapping some of my settings to take Head Tracking into consideration and it works a treat now without any overheat issue I'm strapping a small USB battery to the back of the head strap to provide a gentle counter weight to the weight introduced by the front fan (fan was few grams, but it is still few grams I want to counter), so I remain wireless but get to enjoy my Gear VR for hours on end or until battery dies - around 4 hours if in constant use
 
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Raist

Raist
Kapow said:
In GeForce Experience - click on the Preferences Tab and then on Shield and add Elite Dangerous Launcher. That should add it to your games.

- - - - - Additional Content Posted / Auto Merge - - - - -


Yeah the new Gear VR is only for S6 models or Note5. You can probably find the old compatible GearVR online on Ebay or somewhere second hand though

- - - - - Additional Content Posted / Auto Merge - - - - -



Make sure you use the StreamVR (or what ever the name is) and follow these settings in the video below (Make sure your Mouse sensitivity and Head Look sensitivity in ED are set to minimum or you will feel sick from the speed of motion as well as turning the Side by side 3d on in Elite Dangerous - Keep in mind that your systems specs will play a big part in how well the game runs on your PC from there onwards) Also make sure that you are streaming in 1080p 60fps if at all possible (shows in the video where it is)

Video - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vYbgym9uu8w

There is also a known bug which is rather random. I usually set Vertical and Horizontal scale to 6 and distance to around 0.75-0.85 and the use the back button until it starts to work. In general I got the VR mode working everytime, but there is a bug which makes it use the screen at all times. It is a really annoying bug and is being worked as far as I know, but if you are experiencing the bug and Back button doesn't help, then you might have to wait for the fix.

I hope this helps
Click to expand...



Thanks for your help but unfortunately I can't get anything but a 2d theatre screen.

Hopefully the fix for this showstopper of a bug gets sorted soon.

Edit: found this

https://www.reddit.com/r/StreamTheater/comments/40lmpt/vr_full_screen/

and this

https://www.reddit.com/r/StreamTheater/comments/3zanrp/lock_in_vr_theatre_not_working_anymore/
 
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