Pimax 8k and 5K+ reviews are up. And it's looking good!

Creig

Gawd
Joined
Sep 24, 2004
Messages
785
Mixed Reality TV




SweViver






VoodooDE VR (German - activate subtitles in Youtube for a running translation)



Hi guys,

the NDA is finally over!
Of course I also uploaded a review video on my channel. As my channel is german, my comments will be in german, but I made complete english subtitles, so you just have to activate them on YouTube, here is the link to the video:
VoodooDE Pimax video review48

However I also want to write a text review, so here we go:

Design / Comfort / Weight
Everybody feels different about the design of course, but for me it’s the most beautiful headset with the cool blue “V” in the front. The plastics have the disadvantage that you see the fingerprints over time.
The headset is (although its very big) very light with only 560g including head strap. It sits very good on the head and there is not much light coming in. This is not the final version, because Pimax will also send a Deluxe Audio Strap later to the backers.
Pimax 8K M2 and Pimax 5K+ look exactly the same.

Installation / Setup
We need the “PiTool” for the Pimax, so we need to install it first. Pimax didn’t buy any licenses from Microsoft, so you will be confronted with messages that tell you, PiTool might harm your PC. Also the tool tells us to deactivate our virus-scanner… Not a good thing, they have to fix that!
You can do room setup, rendering quality settings, change FOV size, deactivate basestations (for gyroscope tracking), connect controllers, start SteamVR, update firmware.
It’s a pretty good software that everybody should be able to work with.
What I like is that fact that you can start Oculus games without ReVive! Great work!

Display - Text-Reading
Most people will think it’s much better to read small text with the Pimax headsets as the have a lot smaller SDE. That’s right, BUT you have to notice that you need a REALLY high resolution to do so and this is gonna be a problem for now as the graphics cards won’t have this performance on most games. On a medium resolution ( I mean rendering quality on 1.0 and SteamVR override to 100% for example) you will see it on the 5K+ as good as on the Vive Pro. It’s also very important that the Pimax 8K will need an even much higher resolution than the 5K+ to see small text clear. So in this case the Pimax 8K will be for future graphics cards only. That doesn’t mean the games are unplayable with the 8K, it just means you have to lower the ingame settings and resolution so it’s not really a big difference in small text readability than with the Vive Pro.

Display - Colours
I made some color tests with games and the VR FOV test tool. To be honest I don’t see much (or even no) difference here. Even though the Vive Pro has OLED, I can’t see a big difference to the Pimax LCDs here. So you shouldn’t worry about that. No difference between 5K+ and 8K.

Display - Black Values
As you may already have expected, this is the biggest disadvantage of the Pimax headsets. Areas that should be deep black are more grey/white on the Pimax LCDs and that doesn’t look very good on dark games like horror games or something like Elite Dangerous. You can play the games of course, but it kills the immersion a little bit. This is much better on the Vive Pro with its OLED displays.
However Pimax wants to implement an option to lower the display brightness, so perhaps this will get better than.

Display - Screen Door Effect
A huge difference to the old headsets! On the 5K+ you will still see the SDE when you play games or watching movies. On the 8K you really have to concentrate on it to see the SDE.
Both headsets are doing this MUCH (!) better than any older headset, so don’t worry about the SDE, its great on both headsets. Please keep in mind, that you need a very high resolution and a future graphics card to really take advantage of the small SDE.
It’s still much more fun than on old headsets.

Display - Hz-Value
The Pimax 5K+ has 90 Hz and the Pimax 8K has 80 Hz. I tried to see a difference, but there is none. People on the Berlin meetup also didn’t see any difference, so just dont worry about this.

Lenses - Field of View
This is the biggest advantage of the Pimax headsets and this really KILLS every other disadvantage mentioned here. It’s a total blast! Its so MUCH MORE immersive than any other headset, even with lower resolution and ingame settings. They made a very good work here and you will never won’t to go back to another headset, when you experienced the

Lenses - Glare / Godrays
GodRays or glare effects are as good as not visible, a really great work by Pimax. Much better than with Oculus Rift or Vive (Pro!). I tested this with the FOV test tool. No need to worry about that! Only very small Godrays visible!

Lenses - Distortion
The problem here is, that everybody feels different about the distortion, I noticed that at the Berlin meetup. Some people didn’t love it and other people didn’t even notice any distortion.
So, I got the Pimax now for several month and I can tell you that I got totally used to it, so that I dont notice it anymore, even with big FOV settings!
Yes, it’s there, and if you really concentrate on that, you will notice it, but if you just play your game, you will forget about it in seconds, because the distortion only takes place at the very outer edges of the lenses. If you choose normal FOV, its nearly totally gone. Distortion is more noticeable in games where you turn and move fast like Pavlov, Onward and Skyrim. In games where you sit and don’t look to the side very much like racing simulation, you will not even notice the distortion. Also no difference between 5K+ and 8K for me. That’s because they have the same lenses.

Lenses - Sweet Spot
Also very great work here! You put the headset on and you already have the sweet spot, because its very big. That’s much better than with most other headsets. Of course you have to put the right IPD value first, but then if you tighten the straps, its perfect.

Tracking
As we got support for Lighthouse 1 and 2, the tracking is the same as with the Vive, so it’s nearly perfect with 2 basestations. However when you have a bad performance and los fps, it will have an impact on the tracking, so make sure you have good fps.

IPD Settings
The Pimax has a range of 59 to 72 and that pretty ok for most people. I have 60 myself and it’s no problem for me. When you use the IPD screw, the current value of IPD is displayed in the headset, that’s very good!

Performance - Settings
On the one hand this is a disadvantage, because its much handicraft work and every game need its own settings. So you have to play around with the PiTool Rendering scale and FOV (Large or normal) and with the SteamVR resolution override.
For example PiTool set to 1.0 and SteamVR to 100% runs great with Pavlov, but is impossible to play with Hellblade VR. Best thing is, you try around for yourself and write down the best settings for your games so that you don’t have to find out every time you start the game.
On the other hand its an advantage, because there are so many settings that prepare the Pimax for the future! Just try to set Skyrim VR to PiTool 2.0 and SteamVR 150%. It stutters like hell with about 10 fps, but it looks AWESOME! So in severals years with new graphics cards the real potential of the Pimax headsets will come out!

Performance - 5K+ vs 8K Benchmark
When you choose the exact same game-settings and same resolution for the Pimax 5K+ and the 8K, there is absolutely no performance difference, they have the exact same FPS in the games.
However you really have to notice that the Pimax 8K needs higher resolution for the games to look as good as a lower resolution on the 5K+! That’s why I would recommend for people that dont want to buy a 2080 Ti to switch to the 5K+.

Performance - Benchmarks
I made several Benchmarks with the fpsVR tool.
With every game there are 3 benchmarks: One with a very high resolution (Pimax), one with a normal resolution (Pimax) that you should choose and one with the suggested settings of the Vive Pro to compare it to the Pimax headsets.
My testing-system is a GTX 1080 Ti, 32GB Ram, 8700K, Windows 10 x64.
So here are the average FPS values of the benchmarks, for most games here I used medium ingame settings, you can of course lower them to get more FPS:

Arizona Sunshine 5K/8K Resolution 5443x2418 = 38 FPS (average)
Arizona Sunshine 5K/8K Resolution 2668x2418 = 72 FPS (average)
Arizona Sunshine Vive Pro Resolution 2351x2612 = 74 FPS (average)
(works pretty good on normal FOV with Pimax)

Assetto Corsa 5K/8K Resolution 5443x2418 = 48 FPS (average)
Assetto Corsa 5K/8K Resolution 2668x2418 = 75 FPS (average)
Assetto Corsa Vive Pro Resolution 2351x2612 = 77 FPS (average)
(works very good on normal FOV with Pimax)

CyubeVR 5K/8K Resolution 5443x2418 = 50 FPS (average)
CyubeVR 5K/8K Resolution 2668x2418 = 69 FPS (average)
CyubeVR Vive Pro Resolution 2351x2612 = 63 FPS (average)
(Is unplayable on the Pimax, because strange display errors occur)

Digital Combat Simulator 5K/8K Resolution 5443x2418 = 31 FPS (average)
Digital Combat Simulator 5K/8K Resolution 2668x2418 = 46 FPS (average)
Digital Combat Simulator Vive Pro Resolution 2351x2612 = Tool error (locked to 45 FPS)
(needs much performance, but this game is also playable with only 45 FPS)

Elite Dangerous 5K/8K Resolution 5443x2418 = 31 FPS (average)
Elite Dangerous 5K/8K Resolution 2668x2418 = 51 FPS (average)
Elite Dangerous Vive Pro Resolution 2351x2612 = Tool error (locked to 45 FPS)
(needs much performance, doesn’t run very good, you have to lower ingame settings)

Fallout 4 VR 5K/8K Resolution 5443x2418 = 29 FPS (average)
Fallout 4 VR 5K/8K Resolution 2668x2418 = 61 FPS (average)
Fallout 4 VR Vive Pro Resolution 2351x2612 = Tool error (locked to 45 FPS)
(bad engine, runs bad on nearly every headset, not much fun)

Hellblade VR 5K/8K Resolution 5443x2418 = Unreal Engine error
Hellblade VR 5K/8K Resolution 2668x2418 = 38 FPS (average)
Hellblade VR Vive Pro Resolution 2351x2612 = 84 FPS (average)
(needs to much performance for Pimax headsets, nearly unplayable)

Lone Echo 5K/8K Resolution 5443x2418 = 45 FPS (average)
Lone Echo 5K/8K Resolution 2668x2418 = 55 FPS (average)
Lone Echo Vive Pro Resolution 2351x2612 = 67 FPS (average)
(works pretty good on normal FOV and medium settings on Pimax and even without having to installed ReVive! Great Work!)

Onward 5K/8K Resolution 5443x2418 = 72 FPS (average)
Onward 5K/8K Resolution 2668x2418 = 78 FPS (average)
Onward Vive Pro Resolution 2351x2612 = 90 FPS (average)
(works perfect on Pimax, even with high resolutions and large FOV!)

OrbusVR 5K/8K Resolution 5443x2418 = 39 FPS (average)
OrbusVR 5K/8K Resolution 2668x2418 = 44 FPS (average)
OrbusVR Vive Pro Resolution 2351x2612 = 71 FPS (average)
(works bad on Pimax, needs much performance, you have to set low quality ingame)

Paranormal Activity 5K/8K Resolution 5443x2418 = 48 FPS (average)
Paranormal Activity 5K/8K Resolution 2668x2418 = 77 FPS (average)
Paranormal Activity Vive Pro Resolution 2351x2612 = 81 FPS (average)
(works good on Pimax with normal resolution and normal fov)

Pavlov VR 5K/8K, Resolution 5443x2418 = 74 FPS (average)
Pavlov VR 5K/8K Resolution 2668x2418 = 79 FPS (average)
Pavlov VR Vive Pro Resolution 2351x2612 = 89 FPS (average)
(this game works absolutely perfect on Pimax with even high resolutions, maximum in game settings and large fov!)

Project Cars 1 5K/8K Resolution 5443x2418 = 29 FPS (average)
Project Cars 1 5K/8K Resolution 2668x2418 = 42 FPS (average)
Project Cars 1 Vive Pro Resolution 2351x2612 = Tool error (locked to 45 FPS)
(needs much performance, doesn’t work very good on Pimax, lower the ingame settings!)

Skyrim VR 5K/8K Resolution 5443x2418 = 55 FPS (average)
Skyrim VR 5K/8K Resolution 2668x2418 = 70 FPS (average)
Skyrim VR Vive Pro Resolution 2351x2612 = 88 FPS (average)
(works very good on Pimax with normal resolution and normal fov)

VorpX Kingdome Come 5K/8K Resolution 5443x2418 = 40 FPS (average)
VorpX Kingdome Come 5K/8K Resolution 2668x2418 = 45 FPS (average)
VorpX Kingdome Come Vive Pro Resolution 2351x2612 = 88 FPS (average)
(VorpX games are totally unplayable, because they need to much performance on the Pimax, this is for future use only I think)

Glasses
For now it’s a big problem with glasses, because the lenses will touch the glasses in most cases. However Pimax will ship a special glasses face cushion, so that will be fixed in the future.

Heat
With the fact that your eyes are nearly touching the lenses, everything will heat up pretty much under the headset. I tried some really exhausting Beat Saber and Audioshield sessions and I really sweated very much and the sweat even ran down the lenses.

Cleaning
The Pimax headsets are very good to clean! You can remove the whole face inset and clean it under flowing water and then dry it! Good work!

Face-inset remove
The face foam and the complete face inset can be completely removed.

Cable-Length and extension
Cable is 5M and can at least be extended to 7m.

Connections
You got two USB-C slots, one audio jack and the slot for the headset cable.

Bow- and arrow games
As the Pimax headsets are very big, it will happen, that you hit your headset with the controllers or hands in games where you grab behind your back, for example in Bow- and arrow games. However you can train it and get used to it.

Vive Tracker Support
Vive Tracker can be connected without a problem and are shown in SteamVR as intended. However every full body tracking game crashed at the start. Seems this has to be fixed by the game developers themselves.

Hand Tracking
The hand tracking module, that is attached under the Pimax headset, works like a charm and feels very good! I really hope there will be some games coming out that support the hand tracking, because for now there are only demos.

Motion Sickness
There was no difference for me between Vive Pro, Oculus Rift and Pimax with motion sickness. When you get motion sick with other headsets, you will also get with Pimax and when motion sickness is no problem for you, it won’t be on the Pimax either.

Packaging
Packaging is nothing special, blue/black design, but everything is protected very well!

Sound and microphone
For now I can’t tell you much about the sound, because you need your own headphones until the Pimax deluxe audio strap will arrive.
However I tested the integrated microphone and its one of the best ever in the VR headsets!

Should you change to 5K+?
If your REALLY (!) hate to see any SDE, if that is the most important thing for you, then you should keep the Pimax 8K.
For everybody else I would switch to the Pimax 5K+, because you need a lower resolution to look equal than with the 8K and so have more performance for the games. I don’t see any big difference in color, distortion, black values or other things between the 5K+ and the 8K.
If you really want to keep the 8K, please keep in mind that your really need a high-end-pc and should definitely preorder the 2080 Ti in my opinion!

Conclusion
All in all I want to say, that Pimax did a very good job! The big FOV is the absolute blast and kills every other consumer headset on the market (We don’t talk about the ultra expensive StarVR one or XTAL here). The Vive Pro is totally killed in my opinion, nobody needs it anymore!
Even with the bad black values and the need for a high-end-pc, its so much more immersive and just feels great! If you played with the Pimax for some hours, you will never ever want to go back to an older headset, it’s so bad to see this very ugly small fov again.
If the Pimax 8K will have the same price than Vive Pro or perhaps some more dollars only, it will be absolutely worth it! Pimax 5K+ should be 100 to 150 dollars cheaper than the Vive Pro, than it would be perfect!
It is even prepared for the future. In two or three graphics card generations it will even look much better, so you can even see more Pimax Power in the future.
Absolutely great work by Pimax all in all, but it was also the work of us testers that Pimax could release such a good headset, I hope you will appreciate it!
For me the Pimax 5K+ and 8K are VR 2.0, next gen!

I’d love to hear what you think about my review and you should also watch my video as there are manual created and very good english subtitles. I also would appreciate a thumbs up here and on my video review as well as a sub

Thanks
Thomas (VoodooDE)
 
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The massively increased FOV is probably the biggest draw that the Pimax brings to the table over current gen HMDs. After watching these reviews, to me at least, the Pimax 5K+ @ 90Hz seems to offer a clearer image and is the better choice over the more expensive Pimax 8K @ 80Hz. Since they are both fed 1440p input signals, the Pimax 8K seems a waste in that it is having to up-scale the 1440p signal. Since it doesn't have any more signal data to work with, it results in a somewhat softer/less focused image on its 4K panels. Yes, this seems to eliminate the SDE better, but at the cost of a somewhat softer, less sharp image running at 80Hz. So, in summary, it seems the Pimax 5K+ will offer the image quality of the Vive Pro, but with a MUCH wider 200 degree diagonal FOV. This is a pretty big deal since the Vive's FOV is only 110 degrees, so it's nearly twice as much!

The only big con I see is that you really need a 2080Ti to power this effectively. The framerates were pretty abysmal across the board given that in the VoodooDE review, the guy was using a 1080Ti and had the VR graphics quality set to "medium".

And the other con that nobody in the reviews seems to bring up is the fact that you look like a freakish alien hammerhead shark like being when wearing the Pimax.... but then again, everyone wearing a VR HMD looks sort of stupid, so this just amps it up to the next level I guess. :)

I wasn't tempted with the Vive Pro, but if the Pimax 5K+ is offered for around ~$600, I might be tempted to pick one up eventually. Just wish they had gone with OLED based panels instead of LCD - the black levels seem to suck. I also don't see the Pimax 8Kx being able to deliver on its promises anytime soon as it'll require two video signals, one for each screen (and that is something that doesn't have a precedence established yet as to VR devices and their drivers - something I don't expect they'll be able to pull off without Nvidia's driver folks helping out) which will also require a LOT more GPU power... I.E. at least a pair of 2080Ti's... that is unless the graphics quality settings are turned down to "potato".

The future for next gen HMDs is looking bright though. Bring on the massive FOV, eye tracking, foveated rendering, varifocus displays, inside-out tracking and OLED 4K panels to really raise the bar - can't wait to see what Oculus and HTC bring to the table with their true next gen HMD VR offerings in a year or two.
 
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So they both input 1440, the 5K is native and the 8k is scaled up.
I can't wait for reviews. The 5K isn't enough of a jump, except the FOV.
 
So they both input 1440, the 5K is native and the 8k is scaled up.
I can't wait for reviews. The 5K isn't enough of a jump, except the FOV.

Ummm, you can't wait for reviews? Seriously Hagrid, is your browser borked or something? The Pimax NDA has lifted and the reviews are out. Not exactly sure why you would say that. Scroll up above my post. Creig posted no less than three separate in-depth video reviews right there alone. The first one is 33 minutes long and the other two are well over 2.5 hours in length each! The VoodooDE review guy even posted a detailed write-up on Reddit as well:

 
Ummm, you can't wait for reviews? Seriously Hagrid, is your browser borked or something?? Not exactly sure what you are waiting for? Scroll up above my post. Creig's posted three separate in-depth video reviews right there. The first one is 33 minutes long and the other two are well over 2.5 hours long each. The VoodooDE review guy even posted a detailed write-up on Reddit as well:

Well I could buy ocean front property here in Arizona.

I would like to see [H] do a review. You know, one that isn't paid by Pimax. Not saying they are, but I do not know.
 
It's not a commercial product yet. These are reviews of the latest Pimax prototype that appears to be very close to what they plan to sell as a commercial product. And I'm not getting a "paid for" vibe from the VoodooDE guy at all. He even suggests that you'll need a 2080Ti if you are thinking of going with Pimax as a VR HMD option.

I just don't understand your "I can't wait for reviews" comment. It's all laid out already... in great detail. He even includes detailed performance #'s. Anything less than a 1080Ti driving it looks like it won't be all that viable and it appears that a 2080Ti will really be needed to drive it well.

Did you just comment without watching any of the reviews?
 
It's not a commercial product yet. These are reviews of the latest Pimax prototype that appears to be very close to what they plan to sell as a commercial product. And I'm not getting a "paid for" vibe from the VoodooDE guy at all. He even suggests that you'll need a 2080Ti if you are thinking of going with Pimax as a VR HMD option.

I just don't understand your "I can't wait for reviews" comment. It's all laid out already... in great detail. He even includes detailed performance #'s. Anything less than a 1080Ti driving it looks like it won't be all that viable and it appears that a 2080Ti will really be needed to drive it well.

Did you just comment without watching any of the reviews?
I do not know the reviewers, never heard of them. So you want me to blindly trust them? You are joking right?

I really would like to see the 8K in action since it is only 1440p upscaled.
 
I do not know the reviewers, never heard of them. So you want me to blindly trust them? You are joking right?

I really would like to see the 8K in action since it is only 1440p upscaled.

Trust them? WTF Hagrid? You can't buy this. It's not for sale. It doesn't exist as a commerical product. You can't even pre-order it.

If you got in on their kickstarter, then you may have one incoming eventually, but this isn't a commercial product that you can buy.

Ok, so you haven't watched the reviews... they show the 8K in action as well as comparison video stills.
 
Trust them? WTF Hagrid? You can't buy this. It's not for sale. It doesn't exist as a commerical product. You can't even pre-order it.

If you got in on their kickstarter, then you may have one incoming eventually, but this isn't a commercial product that you can buy.

Ok, so you haven't watched the reviews... they show the 8K in action as well as comparison video stills.
I watched them. Still does not change anything. There are many factors that could make it look better. I did not get in on the kickstarter since I wanted to see if they were going to have 4K or
if it was just going to be upscaled.
 
I watched them. Still does not change anything. There are many factors that could make it look better. I did not get in on the kickstarter since I wanted to see if they were going to have 4K or
if it was just going to be upscaled.

OK. Let's just say that I simply don't get where you are coming from nor understand what point you are making here. Maybe it's just me. I'll just disengage and back away now if that's ok. All good here! :)
 
OK. Let's just say that I simply don't get where you are coming from nor understand what point you are making here. Maybe it's just me. I'll just disengage and back away now if that's ok. All good here! :)
It's the same with people waiting for [H] to review the 2080's. They know that [H] just does the reviews and is not paid one way or the other of the outcome.
 
These guys aren't getting paid by Pimax for their reviews. Otherwise I'm sure they'd be pushing the 8K rather than the less expensive 5K+. They're just avid VR enthusiasts. Go look at their respective channels. They review ALL VR hardware/games.
 
It's too bad that sli/cfx is dying. VR could really use it. I believe a few games use it. Maybe they need to start implementing it more now with VR getting higher res and more FOV, etc.
 
So the interface chips (in terms of imaging bandwidth) are still the limitation, just like for screens. Sigh and hard pass.
Good to hear it has helped improve the situation though... looks like holding out till gen3 at this rate.
 
5K+ . . . looking good
8K . . . . looking worse
8K X . . looking forward to this one!
 
5K+ . . . looking good
8K . . . . looking worse
8K X . . looking forward to this one!
Your summary pretty much matches mine.

5K+ = Nice headset. But still has visible SDE. 90 Hz refresh rate.
8K = Nice headset. Barely perceptible SDE. But blurring can be seen in stills from non-native signal upscaling. 80 Hz refresh rate.
8KX = Complete unknown so far. But if it can be fed a native res signal and run at 90 Hz, will probably be the best of the three. Will most likely require a 2080 Ti to maintain frame rates, however.
 
Can't wait to see when the 5k+ is released and what they will charge for it. May have to buy it a i've been looking to get into vr.
 
Your summary pretty much matches mine.

5K+ = Nice headset. But still has visible SDE. 90 Hz refresh rate.
8K = Nice headset. Barely perceptible SDE. But blurring can be seen in stills from non-native signal upscaling. 80 Hz refresh rate.
8KX = Complete unknown so far. But if it can be fed a native res signal and run at 90 Hz, will probably be the best of the three. Will most likely require a 2080 Ti to maintain frame rates, however.

The only problem with the 8Kx will be how to feed it. A 4K signal @ 90Hz X 2 (the 8Kx supposedly does true 4K per eye without upscaling) just isn’t doable via a single video cable. It will require two separate video cables AND two separate graphics cards to drive it. A single 2080Ti just doesn't have enough power to feed it 2 separate 90Hz 4K graphics signals. Hell, the 2080Ti would struggle to even do one 4K signal at 90hz with full-on graphics... the graphics quality would have to be dialed down a bit. So, the 8Kx will need two GPUs in a non-SLI arrangement feeding it via two separate cables and this will take some major VR driver mojo that the Pimax folks most likely just aren't capable of unless they pair up with someone like Nvidia. Lots of long tent poles involved here with the 8Kx. Add to that they are only making 400 of them per the Kickstarter. I can see them having a viable VR gen 1.5 product on their hands with the 5K+ in 2019, but to succeed they will have to price it at ~$450 or less and rely on the HTC wands/lighthouse ecosystem. (Sell those as another $275 add-on for folks that aren't simply upgrading from an existing Vive setup.)
 
The only problem with the 8Kx will be how to feed it. A 4K signal @ 90Hz X 2 (the 8Kx supposedly does true 4K per eye without upscaling) just isn’t doable via a single video cable. It will require two separate video cables AND two separate graphics cards to drive it. A single 2080Ti just doesn't have enough power to feed it 2 separate 90Hz 4K graphics signals. Hell, the 2080Ti would struggle to even do one 4K signal at 90hz with full-on graphics... the graphics quality would have to be dialed down a bit. So, the 8Kx will need two GPUs in a non-SLI arrangement feeding it via two separate cables and this will take some major VR driver mojo that the Pimax folks most likely just aren't capable of unless they pair up with someone like Nvidia. Lots of long tent poles involved here with the 8Kx. Add to that they are only making 400 of them per the Kickstarter. I can see them having a viable VR gen 1.5 product on their hands with the 5K+ in 2019, but to succeed they will have to price it at ~$450 or less and rely on the HTC wands/lighthouse ecosystem. (Sell those as another $275 add-on for folks that aren't simply upgrading from an existing Vive setup.)
I would rather have true 4K and a dial where you can tone down the details. This way you can play how you want and have room to grow with the new GPU's.
 
I would rather have true 4K and a dial where you can tone down the details. This way you can play how you want and have room to grow with the new GPU's.

As opposed to? Even if the 8Kx were a product you could buy (which you can’t), you would need 2 2080Ti’s just to drive its two 4K panels with “toned down” details @ 90Hz... plus the nonexistent drivers needed. That was the whole point I was trying to make in my post. F that!

As long as we are throwing nonsensical “I would rathers”... Me, I’d rather have a DB5.
 
As opposed to? Even if the 8Kx were a product you could buy (which you can’t), you would need 2 2080Ti’s just to drive its two 4K panels with “toned down” details @ 90Hz... plus the nonexistent drivers needed. That was the whole point I was trying to make in my post. F that!

As long as we are throwing nonsensical “I would rathers”... Me, I’d rather have a DB5.
Because if you can lower the detail settings like you can on regular games? You have seen the options for that right?

Let me know when you figure it out. ;)
 
Sorry Hagrid, couldn’t resist trolling you a bit there. It’s just that your posts just come out of left field, usually completely missing the point, and take off on random tangents. I just don’t grok where you are coming from half the time. No one else ever pipes up, so maybe it’s just me.
 
Sorry Hagrid, couldn’t resist trolling you a bit there. It’s just that your posts just come out of left field, usually completely missing the point, and take off on random tangents. I just don’t grok where you are coming from half the time. No one else ever pipes up, so maybe it’s just me.
Well yes, 4K native each eye is insane. But with sliders to get it where it's playable would be good.1080ti and up) Maybe they really need to bring back sli/cfx or something to utilize 2+ cards.

Stop trolling the troller. That is my job! :)
 
Well yes, 4K native each eye is insane. But with sliders to get it where it's playable would be good.1080ti and up) Maybe they really need to bring back sli/cfx or something to utilize 2+ cards.

Stop trolling the troller. That is my job! :)
Maybe 3 processors on 1 board (1 for each eye then one for the game)?
 
As far as the 8KX goes, I could see someone using a pair of 1080 Ti for now and then upgrading to something faster once the prices (hopefully) drop. I doubt this headset will be surpassed by anything in the next couple of years simply due to the GPU processing required to drive two 4K displays.
 
As far as the 8KX goes, I could see someone using a pair of 1080 Ti for now and then upgrading to something faster once the prices (hopefully) drop. I doubt this headset will be surpassed by anything in the next couple of years simply due to the GPU processing required to drive two 4K displays.

While a great idea, the execution is what's going to be problematic. I don't see Pimax being able to pull off writing their own custom Nvidia VR drivers to make something like this happen.
 
While a great idea, the execution is what's going to be problematic. I don't see Pimax being able to pull off writing their own custom Nvidia VR drivers to make something like this happen.
Possibly. There is another way to solve the GPU issue (besides foveated rendering). Pimax could combine the 8K and 8KX into one model if they added the bridge chips and dual connectors from the 8KX to the upscaler in the 8K. Then, if you plug one DP cable into the headset it runs through the upscaler and a single 1080Ti or higher would be enough to drive it. Later on you when faster cards are available (or if SLI works on it), you can plug in the 2nd DP cable which then tells the headset to bypass the upscaler and deliver the native signal to each 4K panel. I can't see (off the top of my head) that this would be unreasonably difficult to design.
 
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Possibly. There is another way to solve the GPU issue (besides foveated rendering). Pimax could combine the 8K and 8KX into one model if they added the bridge chips and dual connectors from the 8KX to the upscaler in the 8K. Then, if you plug one DP cable into the headset it runs through the upscaler and a single 1080Ti or higher would be enough to drive it. Later on you when faster cards are available (or if SLI works on it), you can plug in the 2nd DP cable which then tells the headset to bypass the upscaler and deliver the native signal to each 4K panel. I can't see (off the top of my head) that this would be unreasonably difficult to design.

To be honest, from a design standpoint the 8Kx would just be the 8K with an extra port/cable to by-pass the bridge chip/scaler and feed both panels independently via each provided video cable signal The hardware design portion of this is easier than the 8kx... it's getting functional drivers created and having the ability to supply enough GPU brute force to adequately supply the dual 4k 90hz signals that will be problematic. A 1080Ti and even a 2080Ti isn't beefy enough to provide this with graphics features cranked... they would need to be dialed way down. A 2080Ti can only just manage a 60hz 4k signal with things cranked ro 11, much less drive 2 4k displays at 90hz.
 
To be honest, from a design standpoint the 8Kx would just be the 8K with an extra port/cable to by-pass the bridge chip/scaler and feed both panels independently via each provided video cable signal The hardware design portion of this is easier than the 8kx... it's getting functional drivers created and having the ability to supply enough GPU brute force to adequately supply the dual 4k 90hz signals that will be problematic. A 1080Ti and even a 2080Ti isn't beefy enough to provide this with graphics features cranked... they would need to be dialed way down. A 2080Ti can only just manage a 60hz 4k signal with things cranked ro 11, much less drive 2 4k displays at 90hz.
Exactly. It would take minimal effort for Pimax to have a combined 8K/8KX model (8K+?) from a hardware standpoint. For now, most people would use an 8K+ in single DP mode utilizing the scaler. Those people with really deep pockets could spring for a pair of 2080 Ti and could probably run the headset at native 4K with a few settings turned down. As more powerful graphics cards are released in the future (or possibly foveated rendering is available), more and more people will be able to run in dual DP mode for increased clarity running at 4K. It would be a fairly simple hardware change that would dramatically increase the longevity of the headset by giving options to people for future GPU upgrades while retaining the same HMD. And it would actually simplify things for Pimax by eliminating a model from their lineup as they would only have the 5K+ and 8K+ to deal with. Those two models would cover the broadest spectrum of consumers. The less expensive 5K+ running at native resolution (1440P) and the more expensive 8K+ with the scaler giving the options of displaying both 1440P and 4K. Yet both retaining the massive FOV (compared to today's headsets) of 170 degrees.
 
This sounds nice, but I wouldn't even think of getting one till the 2280 Ti or later cards come out. That is assuming we get a minimum of 30% increase or more in 4k frame rates over each generation. :)
 
Wish AMD and Nvidia would push concurrent rendering- the idea is like SLI and CF, but you're not rendering alternate frames, you're rendering slightly different viewpoints of each frame.

This means that frame pacing shouldn't be as nearly as much of an issue as you're not trying to boost framerates over those of a single card.
 
Wish AMD and Nvidia would push concurrent rendering- the idea is like SLI and CF, but you're not rendering alternate frames, you're rendering slightly different viewpoints of each frame.

This means that frame pacing shouldn't be as nearly as much of an issue as you're not trying to boost framerates over those of a single card.

Fully agree - you'd give each card it's own complete render pipeline duties, one for each eye and just use the SLI/Crossfire "link" to keep the output frames fully synced, rather than sharing workload... It's an expensive solution, but it would provide the highest quality VR possible and I'm sure there's a fairly large group of VR enthusiasts that would buy a second card for this, especially if it meant making true 4K resolution per eye possible. While Nvidia did release some driver tech to render dual viewpoints on one card, it really makes performance sense to dedicate two cards to this instead if you want the very best VR performance possible.
 
Fully agree - you'd give each card it's own complete render pipeline duties, one for each eye and just use the SLI/Crossfire "link" to keep the output frames fully synced, rather than sharing workload... It's an expensive solution, but it would provide the highest quality VR possible and I'm sure there's a fairly large group of VR enthusiasts that would buy a second card for this. While Nvidia did release some driver tech to render dual viewpoints on one card, it really makes performance sense to dedicate two cards to this instead if you want the best VR performance possible.

And with that driver, I don't see how it would be that hard for Nvidia to take that extra step to support, I'll call it, 'discrete stereo rendering'.

The expense will be there as you point out, but the reality is that this is going to be an expensive solution all around.

[I also take issue with the '8k' labeling; 8k is 4x 4k, not 2x 4k, basically half the work that real 8k rendering will entail whenever that comes around]
 
I also take issue with the '8k' labeling; 8k is 4x 4k, not 2x 4k, basically half the work that real 8k rendering will entail whenever that comes around
It's all marketing. Unlike computer monitors, there is no set aspect ratio for VR headsets. And as the 8K is 7,680 pixels wide, they do have a legitimate reason for calling it the 8K.
 
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