Vive Pro tested: Is it enough?

[HiFlyer 9,343]

By Alec Meer on February 24th, 2018 at 1:00 pm https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2018/02/24/vive-pro-tested/

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A short while ago, I got to stick my sweaty face into HTC’s second generation PC VR headset, the Vive Pro, which was on show in the UK for the first time. The headset boasts a higher resolution and OLED displays, among other upgrades, and so the question is whether or not this can overcome VR’s visual shortcomings and give the medium a much-needed second wind.

Well, it’s definitely a big improvement – but that’s also something of a double-edged sword.

I tested the Vive Pro with the suitably atmospheric undersea exploration game Operation Apex, made by UK developer Curiscope in partnership with Vive Studios. It was released last December, but has just released a big update which includes an appealing free-roam mode. Though it’s just dandy on the original Vive, its grand seascapes and looming (but non-aggressive) sharks made a fine demo for this new version of the hardware.

The Vive Pro’s resolution has jumped to 2880×1600 from the regular Vive’s 2160 x 1200, which is a 78% increase in total pixel count which is, well, just a bunch of big numbers that aren’t a terribly useful way of describing the difference in the flesh. I’ll go with this: the Vive Pro, from a visual clarity and fidelity point of view, is pretty much what we all expected VR to be like back in 2015 or so, before the deflating reality of screen door effects and barely-legible text made itself known.

To put it another way, it’s now pretty close to having your head encircled by 1080p monitors. Sure, it’s not the blinding sharpness of a 1440p or 4K monitor, but my sense was that it was fit for purpose in a way that the gen.1 Vive and Ocuus Rift wasn’t, not quite. No screen door. Eminently readable text. A problem solved.

The other big thing in terms of the raised resolution is something that doesn’t happen in the headset. While waiting my turn to use the Vive Pro, I realised with a start after watching their in-game view on a nearby monitor for 10 minutes that I had been watching their in-game view on a nearby monitor for 10 minutes.

Which is to say, it was perfectly clear and watchable fullscreen on a 1080p display, where on a non-Pro Vive or Rift the traditional mirrored-screen experience is of either a uselessly tiny window or a smeary, blocky blur when made fullscreen. Outside of laughing at people swatting at imaginary flies, VR has not hitherto been much of a spectator sport. If the Vive Pro means that second-screen observation is now that much more feasible, that could change.

Of course, this may only heighten the growing sense that VR might only really make sense in public social situations. I had a ball with Operation Apex on the Vive Pro (and it was also the rare full analogue movement VR game that didn’t leave me feeling at all queasy, as they’ve done smart things with the camera and controls) but I was playing at a roomscale in a bar. I simply don’t have the space to do the same at home, at least not without burning most of my furniture. Same goes for the having an audience element.

That said, within moments of putting the Vive Pro on, my thoughts immediately turned to American Truck Simulator and Elite Dangerous. Though these are not thoroughbred VR games, they are the games that I’ve most often used a headset for, as both excel in their own way at atmosphere and vast spaces. The idea of getting to do that with far sharper vistas and much more legible text is deeply, deeply appealing, even though regular readers of the site will know that I’ve been suffering from a certain degree of VR ennui for some time.

With that in mind, I am very conscious that my mind was blown the first time I tried an original Vive, also in a large, public space with other people around, only to later find that the sense of awe soon wore off and the sense of disappointment about the visual fidelity mounted once I had one in my home.

 

 

[jimh 23]

Hi,

It's very tempting to leave screen door effect behind with a Vive Pro, but I've already turned down my P3D settings as far as I would like to just to get a smooth experience with my Rift.  That's with a system broadly similar to yours.

Will the Vive Pro require coffee lake and two 1080ti cards in sli?  I'd really like a peek behind the scene at how foveate rendering is progressing.  I'm no longer young enough to wait for long-term developement.  I'm getting forgetful already.......

 

Jim

 

[HiFlyer 9,343]

17 hours ago, jimh said:

Will the Vive Pro require coffee lake and two 1080ti cards in sli?

Not really, and for a couple of reasons. Both P3D and X-Plane have switched to single pass 3D rendering, something that Aerofly FS2 always had, and which significantly increases the available polygon budget without adding much if any additional strain.

Secondly, the higher native resolution of the new headset decreases the need for additional supersampling, which can also reduce the workload.

The upshot is that, you probably don't need tons of additional computing power to run the new headsets.

But!

If you are still worried, fear not! The new 2080 series supercards are on the way! 

 

[jimh 23]

17 minutes ago, HiFlyer said:

Both P3D and X-Plane have switched to single pass 3D rendering,

I've only just heard of single pass rendering.  I use FlyInside for VR.  Is SPR something only available while using native VR?

 

Jim

[HiFlyer 9,343]

I haven't really kept track of what's going on with flyinside so I don't know, you'd probably have to ask them on their forums.

[Murmur 3,941]

1 hour ago, HiFlyer said:

Both P3D and X-Plane have switched to single pass 3D rendering

I suspect XP is not using single pass rendering:

https://developer.x-plane.com/2018/02/x-plane-desktop-vr2-preview-released/#comment-25464

[HiFlyer 9,343]

1 hour ago, Murmur said:

I suspect XP is not using single pass rendering:

https://developer.x-plane.com/2018/02/x-plane-desktop-vr2-preview-released/#comment-25464

I stand corrected. Maybe they are relying on Vulkan to get their speed up then, but they better do something.

[whitav8 98]

HiFlyer said " The new 2080 series supercards are on the way! "  - and I think that's how much ($2080) they will cost us what with the crypto miners!

Hiflyer - thanks for always keeping us aware of the "bleeding edge". I'm actually starting to revisit P3D since the single pass on v4.2. I have Paulo Ricardo's terrific scenery for Rio de Janiero and it just performs so well in VR - no apparent artifacts      (what's with the problems many are having??)

Dave

[guit32 7]

yes single pass rendering is very promising but it is not really good at the moment because of the artifact with add ons airport, but I a am very confident that this is the future, we just have to wait for the next version