Which VR headset to buy in 2020?

[kalston]

It really depends on your use case and the games you play.

 

[flegg]

Yea i was really on the Quest 2 train prior to actually buying any headset... now that I have one.... yes motion is great but unless I have a defective one...
1) the sweet spot is tiny
2) The graphics have more jagged edges than a nintendo 64. Really distorting, tough to read text.
3) None of the games seem to be really worth the money unless you hook it up to pc anyways (so there goes the wireless advantage)

Bottom line would I sacrifice going from 4k to 1080p for perfect motion? Sure maybe. Would I sacrifice going from 720p to worse than SDR with distortions and moving jagged edges for perfect motion? Nope. And there's no damn way I'm using this as a stand alone movie player over my phone.

Could this be a result of me having a bad lens on a myopic unfavorable headset? Maybe. And this isn't even going into the facebooking and raised blacks (which really don't bother me that much)

Probably going to return or resell Q2 and get a G2 unless I can find a Q2 with better lens.

 

[Chief Blur Buster]

ugh.. so many opinions here and i can't make up my mind. I have had a CV1 for a few years now and i use it somewhat infrequently. Do i go for the G2 or the Quest2? lol! I do primarily play games like beatsaber which would really be great for Quest2 since i could ditch the wires and overall seems it would be a visual upgrade for other games i play, or do i go for the higher resolution of the G2 and perhaps suffer with worse tracking and not have a wireless option! I guess if its a toss up I should definitely go for the cheaper option since i don't really play many games where I am sitting in my chair and tracking and freedom would probably be more important for me.

How about Option C....?

Quest 2 for takealong / intros to friends. And exercise-anywhere convenience.

And a flagship like G2 for the high end experience.

You can buy on Steam VR once and play the same games with both. And you’d still buy some in-headset games like Beat Saber which isn’t detail-dependeant, it’s sometimes just nice to exercise without a computer in any room of your home/apartment. That spare headset is cheaper than some gym memberships for the lifetime of the headset!

 

[Chief Blur Buster]

Yea i was really on the Quest 2 train prior to actually buying any headset... now that I have one.... yes motion is great but unless I have a defective one...
1) the sweet spot is tiny

Damn — don’t know if it is is your vision or the lens. I presume you tried all 3 IPD stops.

I’d try one RMA dice roll.

Be warned, for a VR newbie, many SteamVR games is still hit and miss — you will encounter many with jagged graphics and less value than Quest 2 games. You still have the wild-frontier angle but the appstore situation is much better than it was in 2016. Try the free games such as Robo Recall, and some sharper-graphics paid games such as The Room or Superhot (which doesn’t have as much graphics degradations or fuzz-factor).

Of the last $200 spent on SteamVR on other headsets, and the last $200 on Quest 2 app store (mainly 4.5+ star apps like Beat Saber and Down The Rabbit Hole etc), I have roughly the same buying remorse percentage (good games, soso games), so YMMV. Regardless of headset, many AAA VR games will be more $ per hour of entertainment. But cheaper than $ per hour of going to a movie cinema.

The gems like Half Life Alyx will look better on a G2, so cherrypicking (whether Q2 or G2) is your friend. If you buy based on just one game in a cherrypicked setup, then G2 probably will blow the Q2 away.

 

[empirebuilder1]

I'll make it easy for y'all.

Whichever headset is NOT controlled by ZuccBook.

As far as I'm concerned, Oculus is dead and should not be considered.

 

[MaZa]

Earlier I copy pasted a wrong link. I meant to direct it to the original message which has a comparison of a good lense and a bad lense.

https://www.reddit.com/r/OculusQuest/comments/jqi2ia/what_bad_lenses_look_like/

 

[flegg]

With my sock mod it is usable but my right lens still has a fairly narrow sweet spot. With sock mod i still feel like things are wrong- even dead center I feel like things should look a lot better. Going to RMA.

Without sock mod i get the left image in the Reddit post, with sock mod I get closer to right in left but still closer to left in right. The problem isn't limited to a narrow sweet spot- even the clear spot is not very clear. I've cleaned the lenses thoroughly and its not an IPD issue.

 

[reaper12]

With my sock mod it is usable but my right lens still has a fairly narrow sweet spot. With sock mod i still feel like things are wrong- even dead center I feel like things should look a lot better. Going to RMA.

Without sock mod i get the left image in the Reddit post, with sock mod I get closer to right in left but still closer to left in right. The problem isn't limited to a narrow sweet spot- even the clear spot is not very clear. I've cleaned the lenses thoroughly and its not an IPD issue.

Your Quest 2 sounds faulty to me. My lenses are perfectly clear. There is blurring around the peripherals, but that is to be expected because of the foveated rendering the Quest 2 uses.

 

[ng4ever]

Is the valve index worth it?

 

[reaper12]

Is the valve index worth it?

It's still one of the best headsets out there. It has a a few advantages over the newer headsets like the Quest 2 and Reverb G2. Better FOV, higher Refresh rates, better Audio and has the Knuckle controllers.

Really depends on what you plan to play. If it's mostly sim games than no, the Reverb G2 is better. OR if you like the idea of wire free gaming and the ability to play nearly anywhere quickly and easily, then the Quest 2 is better.

 

[MaZa]

Is the valve index worth it?

It is still the best all around headset as an overall package, except the resolution is last generation quality which puts it in a weird space now that Quest 2 and HP Reverb G2 exist.

I do not know if Valve is planning on releasing Index 2 any time soon but I personally would keep on waiting and saving just in case it does get released and if not you just might manage to gather enough money for Pimax 8KX + Knuckles bundle, which is pretty much equivalent of Reverb G2 in sharpness but has much, much bigger FOV.

 

[ThatITGuy]

I ended up getting the Index and love it. The only thing I miss is wireless freedom. I may look at getting a 2nd VR set that I would be able to drag around anywhere with me (especially since i mounted the Index base stations to the walls of my office), as well as to not have to deal with trying to manage "turns" for my 2 boys. Beat Saber is the current favorite, though VR Chat's "Among Us" minigame is a close second for the boys.

 

[Snappshoota]

Well I was trying to order a Quest 2 for the past few weeks, and was always out of stock. Decided to check out ole CL, and found a Samsung Odyssey Plus for 150 bucks.

Only VR I have actually had a chance to play is PSVR. So I may not have the best perception of whats supposed to be good or bad.

But So far with my 2 weeks of play time with it. Pavlov, BoneWorks, and Population One.

For the price I got it for its definitely a no brainer, but there are some things im not to thrilled on.

Mainly in Pavlov, I notice when I try to pull sights up while aiming, every once in a great while it will lose track of front controller, and spaz out a bit.
And the blurriness of things outside of the center of lenses.
Battery Life in the wands. I had to order some 1.6v rechargeable's, which definitely helped. The first few days tho, I went through 8 AA's and didnt feel like I played that much maybe a couple hours at a time.

Not major issues to me, (Not a serious VR nut, yet) more so just a nuisance at times, but have been having a blast. Still trying to get my VR legs, and holy crap does Bone Works make my stomach turn.

Ordered 6ft extension cables for USB and the Hdmi, and made a world of difference as far as immersion, as I dont feel the cable much anymore.

All in all Must say Im having a blast, and the community of VR, is amazing. Dont see many toxic players, More often than not everyone is just laughing, talking shit, and having fun. Even offering help.

I dropped my weapon in pavlov, and couldnt reach it since I didnt have the floor height set right, another player saw me struggling, and actually picked up my weapon and gave it back, right before blowing my head off! LMAO

 

[cageymaru]

I ended up getting the Index and love it. The only thing I miss is wireless freedom. I may look at getting a 2nd VR set that I would be able to drag around anywhere with me (especially since i mounted the Index base stations to the walls of my office), as well as to not have to deal with trying to manage "turns" for my 2 boys. Beat Saber is the current favorite, though VR Chat's "Among Us" minigame is a close second for the boys.

I'm undecided between the HTC VIVE Pro and the Valve Index. Are you still enjoying the Valve Index?

 

[RazorWind]

I'm undecided between the HTC VIVE Pro and the Valve Index. Are you still enjoying the Valve Index?

I have a Vive Pro. It was the best on the market when I bought it (Index was vaporware), but the Index is better and cheaper unless you need the eye tracking version for some sort of business application.

I love the Vive Pro, though. They don't sell it new here in the US anymore, but if you can find a used one for cheap enough, it's pretty great. There's a wireless kit available, and it can also use most of the accessories for the Index, like the Valve handy-twiddles.

 

[reaper12]

Valve handy-twiddles.

lol great name for them!!

 

[Supercharged_Z06]

The Index is still the best “complete” package - best tracking, best hand controllers, best fit/comfort, best sound, etc... The HP Reverb has much better resolution, but it really suffers in comfort/fit, has some quality control issues and sports some sub-par controllers.

I have the Index and am very happy with it. (Started with the Vive, then the Rift)

Right now, if you want to go inexpensive and can stomach FaceBook, I’d say that the Quest 2 using the optional PC link cable is probably your best PC VR option out there.

But the Index is better for the ”complete“ PC VR experience if you don’t mind it costing twice as much. Even though it lags a little behind in resolution performance, its fit/comfort, superior controllers and support on Steam really make up for it. Hopefully Valve is working on an Index 2.0 to address resolution improvements.

 

[JMCB]

I had an Oculus Rift S, but I want to do wireless with 5ghz wifi so I upgraded to the Oculus Quest 2 (delivery tomorrow). I'll put up my review next week.

 

[sharknice]

I had an Oculus Rift S, but I want to do wireless with 5ghz wifi so I upgraded to the Oculus Quest 2 (delivery tomorrow). I'll put up my review next week.

I think for any standing VR single player experience this is the best way to do it. The wireless freedom is amazing.

For fast paced competitive games it's not necessarily the best way to play. There is a slight delay when running wirelessly. It's slight enough that it would probably never bother you if that's the only way you've ever played.
But if you've played a very fast precision based game both ways you can tell going back and forth.
For example Echo Arena. I got the PC version working extremely well over virtual desktop, and it looks much nicer than the native Quest 2 version. But you can tell there's just a tiny delay when you grab and push off things compared to the native version. It's probably only 20 ms or something like that, but in a fast paced competitive game like that it's noticeable.
But still, for games like those I prefer to have the game run straight on the quest 2's hardware over a wired connection to a PC. Wireless freedom is just so nice and more important than better graphics IMO.

 

[JMCB]

So I got my Oculus Quest 2, and call me unimpressed. Idk why but the tracking on this thing is all over the place (unlike the Rift S, which seemed perfect despite not having any external add-on sensors). Also set up was awful - I never planned on using it as a standalone headset, but I had to do the whole setup process anyways. In addition, no brightness controls when using the link, and I have to switch to standalone mode to raise it? Initial hiccups aside, the screen resolution is better for sure, as is the higher refresh rate. I need to work past the tracking. Will need a few more days to decide if I want to keep it.

 

[MaZa]

Poor tracking? It uses the same system as Rift S.

 

[LGabrielPhoto]

So I got my Oculus Quest 2, and call me unimpressed. Idk why but the tracking on this thing is all over the place (unlike the Rift S, which seemed perfect despite not having any external add-on sensors). Also set up was awful - I never planned on using it as a standalone headset, but I had to do the whole setup process anyways. In addition, no brightness controls when using the link, and I have to switch to standalone mode to raise it? Initial hiccups aside, the screen resolution is better for sure, as is the higher refresh rate. I need to work past the tracking. Will need a few more days to decide if I want to keep it.

Poor tracking???? It is actually brilliant so either you have bad unit, or maybe using some low powered batteries (which I have seen reports of causing tracking issues)

 

[JMCB]

Poor tracking???? It is actually brilliant so either you have bad unit, or maybe using some low powered batteries (which I have seen reports of causing tracking issues)

I used the included batteries. I’ll replace the batteries and see if that works in resolving my issue. If not, I’ll probably return it and just keep my Rift S.

 

[LGabrielPhoto]

I used the included batteries. I’ll replace the batteries and see if that works in resolving my issue. If not, I’ll probably return it and just keep my Rift S.

The includes batteries should be fine. If its not tracking correctly, exchange it for a new unit. Like I said, the tracking on the quest 2 is fantastic

 

[ThatITGuy]

I'm undecided between the HTC VIVE Pro and the Valve Index. Are you still enjoying the Valve Index?

Very
Only downside i have found so far is need to be tethered, but i would rather be tethered and have the quality. I may eventually pick up a wireless headset when i find one cheap and that can play the games i play most (Beat Saber, SuperHot, maybe Elite Dangerous/TWD and others but that may be asking a bit much) while wireless, just for the portabiity. I have the base stations for the Index mounted up on the walls in my basement office, so i cannot easily take those with me on a trip.

 

[sharknice]

I used the included batteries. I’ll replace the batteries and see if that works in resolving my issue. If not, I’ll probably return it and just keep my Rift S.

Make sure you have good lighting. If you have the lights really dim it doesn't track as well.

 

[reaper12]

So I got my Oculus Quest 2, and call me unimpressed. Idk why but the tracking on this thing is all over the place (unlike the Rift S, which seemed perfect despite not having any external add-on sensors). Also set up was awful - I never planned on using it as a standalone headset, but I had to do the whole setup process anyways. In addition, no brightness controls when using the link, and I have to switch to standalone mode to raise it? Initial hiccups aside, the screen resolution is better for sure, as is the higher refresh rate. I need to work past the tracking. Will need a few more days to decide if I want to keep it.

The tracking on the Rift S and the Oculus Quest 2 is almost exactly the same. If you are noticing a massive difference than there is something wrong. If you are using it in the same room with the same lighting, on the same PC as you had the Rift S, then your Quest 2 might have an issue.

Maybe what you are noticing isn't tracking but latency? What games have you tried? Something to test out is try downloading Beat Saber demo onto your Quest 2. See how it tracks. If it tracks ok then there might be some issue with the cable/USB port.

Another thing you could try, is to disable hand tracking. It sometimes interferes with PCVR games.

 

[Diablix]

I recommend Pimax 8KX if money is no object. Great HMD, undisputed champion in FoV. Their software is much more stable and reliable than before. I'm selling my Pimax 5K Plus, and when I took it to my friend, we didn't have any problems to have it work, just restarted his PC and he played War Thunder in VR. While two years ago it took my whole day to have it work.

On other hand, their customer service is a mess. Like ffs, horrible. It took me 6 months to receive replacement cable for snowing issue with 8KX. But when it works, I guess it's the best it gets for now. If you don't mind lower refresh rate. I have like 30-40 fps in modded Fallout 4 VR.