Steam Hardware Survey - July 2025 results included (see latest post in this thread)

TomCgcmfc said:
There is no doubt that the Q2 has the best lcd blacks and for the most part they are almost as good as oled. 

However, even the VD developer, ggodin on his discord channel, has recently commented that he is always surprised how much better the blacks are when he goes back and forth from his Q2 to his oled Q1 and he hopes that Oculus develops another oled headset in the near future. 

Completely agree. My only point is that often times, that difference is taken to an extreme. The fact that Q1 has better blacks than Q2 doesn't equate to Q2 being unusable.

We could consider the Q1 a Ferrari (a great drive) and the Q2 a Lamborghini (better exterior, slightly inferior driving experience). Just because the Lambo doesn't drive as great as the Ferrari doesn't make the Lambo... a Scooter, na' mean?

A lot of the Black Levels rhetoric around Q2 tries to portray it as a Scooter just because it is more Lambo than Ferrari. lol

DaftnDirect said:

If I was able to try out a Quest 2 and be sure one of its IPD settings was good for me, I'd probably have swapped my Q1... I use the Q1 a lot stand-alone and Rift-S for PCVR.

Whether it replaced my Rift-S for PCVR would depend a lot on comfort... I've heard good things about the GOMRVR Halo strap so maybe if there's a Q2 price drop at some point I'll just take a punt. As with nalex, getting my money's worth out of it with PCVR probably depends on a PC upgrade for me, and availability of those 3080's or better. If Q3 is looking like maybe 18 months away, I'm good with waiting and my upgrade should definitely have happened by then!

I have tried all kinds of straps and finally decided to do the Frankenquest.

The DAS is by far the most comfortable and complete solution.

The headphones do not have quite as much bass as the CV1, but still sound good and move in and out of the way easily.

I can wear it for hours without discomfort. 

Nunyabinez said:
I really love my Quest 2 for the sharpness. But, my first disappointment with it was going back to Vader Immortal #1 and seeing Darth Vader walk in. Compared to the Quest or CV1 it definitely hurt the experience.

Hmm, I'll give this a try! I'm still waiting to see which of these comparisons is supposed to be disappointing. I tried multiple suggestions, and the closest I saw was one room in that horror game, The Mansion. Everything else seemed pretty much the same to me. 

But maybe I just don't have the same black level memory as everyone else lol

Nunyabinez said:

DaftnDirect said:

If I was able to try out a Quest 2 and be sure one of its IPD settings was good for me, I'd probably have swapped my Q1... I use the Q1 a lot stand-alone and Rift-S for PCVR.

Whether it replaced my Rift-S for PCVR would depend a lot on comfort... I've heard good things about the GOMRVR Halo strap so maybe if there's a Q2 price drop at some point I'll just take a punt. As with nalex, getting my money's worth out of it with PCVR probably depends on a PC upgrade for me, and availability of those 3080's or better. If Q3 is looking like maybe 18 months away, I'm good with waiting and my upgrade should definitely have happened by then!

I have tried all kinds of straps and finally decided to do the Frankenquest.

The DAS is by far the most comfortable and complete solution.

The headphones do not have quite as much bass as the CV1, but still sound good and move in and out of the way easily.

I can wear it for hours without discomfort.

Sounds good. There now seems to be about 20 different straps available for the Quest 2... I guess some could be the same under different brands maybe.

RuneSR2 said:

dburne said:

RuneSR2 said:

nalex66 said:

I don't have Robinson or Gloomy Eyes, but perhaps I'll try some comparisons if I have time this weekend. But really, in all my VR (or other screen-viewing) experience, black levels have never been a concern or issue. The brain has a way of getting used to the current brightest and darkest tones in what you're looking at and filtering the image based on that. When you're in a movie theater, the darkest on-screen black is still much brighter than the surrounding real world darkness, but do you notice it throughout the movie? I don't.

By the way, Virtual Desktop has a brightness slider built in, and people who claim to be particularly sensitive to black levels have said that it helps a lot. I haven't bothered turning it down from 100%, but perhaps I'll experiment with that too.

My lack of lcd habituation is probably also because I constantly switch between CV1 and Index - and with Revive 2.0+ all my apps and games are suddenly available for both lcd and oled, and I'm very exposed to the differences. 

If I only used lcd, I probably would not know what I'm missing. I played Squadrons for a long time using only Index, and it was fine - I never gave it a thought that the gray loading screens should indeed be black, lol - but that changed when the devs added native Oculus driver support for the Steam version. 

To me it does make a great difference - like experiencing the Claustral Canyon first using Index res 200%, and it did not look "right" making me think it was a mediocre app - and then using the CV1 ss 2.0 and I was blown away. Close to a night and day experience. 

That certainly does not speak well for the Index then.
My CV1 was permanently retired when Rift S came out. Can't stand the SDE. Don't miss dealing with the sensors.
It was great for it's time though.

The Index is awesome, most users love the Index blacks and do not notice any problems. I'm just being very picky about extremely dark games and apps, and again, if you can't see any difference between lcd and oled, do go on enjoying life ;)

https://www.reddit.com/r/OculusQuest/comments/jak789/wow_the_black_levels_on_quest_2_are_really_really/

https://forums.oculusvr.com/community/discussion/94251/quest2-wow-no-more-dark-areas

LCD in the Index or Q2 should have been the cheaper option for those that can live with LCD, and a Index Or Q2 pro with OLED for those who are happily pay a bit more for OLED.

Zenbane said:

TomCgcmfc said:
There is no doubt that the Q2 has the best lcd blacks and for the most part they are almost as good as oled. 

However, even the VD developer, ggodin on his discord channel, has recently commented that he is always surprised how much better the blacks are when he goes back and forth from his Q2 to his oled Q1 and he hopes that Oculus develops another oled headset in the near future. 

Completely agree. My only point is that often times, that difference is taken to an extreme. The fact that Q1 has better blacks than Q2 doesn't equate to Q2 being unusable.

We could consider the Q1 a Ferrari (a great drive) and the Q2 a Lamborghini (better exterior, slightly inferior driving experience). Just because the Lambo doesn't drive as great as the Ferrari doesn't make the Lambo... a Scooter, na' mean?

A lot of the Black Levels rhetoric around Q2 tries to portray it as a Scooter just because it is more Lambo than Ferrari. lol

 Ya, very true mate.  Sometimes comparisons are not always Black and White, lol!  I guess it depends a lot on what apps you use and how you use them. 

I struggled to decide between Rift cv1, Rift S, Q1, and Q2 to see if I could just use one of these headsets for everything.   
I ended up returning both my Rift S and Q2.  I'm mainly continuing to use my Rift cv1 for most of my Oculus store apps and my Q1 for standalone/media and wireless w/Virtual Desktop for PCVR apps that benefit from wireless.  On top of that, I mainly use my Vive Pro (w/Etsy Gear VR lens mod and Index controllers) for all my flight/racing sims.  So much for one headset does it all eh, lol!

I think that Steam stats puts me in the Rift cv1 category although I'd guestimate that my overall usage breakdown is roughly 40% Rift cv1, 40% Vive Pro, 10% Q1 standalone/media, and 10% wireless PCVR.  Thanks to OTT, Vive Pro Link Box on/off button, and Virtual Desktop, all these are very easy to switch between. 

Oculus Link is slowly improving but I still think it sucks compared to wireless w/VD.  Also, I've found it's a royal pita to adjust SS and asw when you have multiple Oculus headsets installed like a Rift (cv1 or S) and a Q1 (or Q2).  At least SteamVR seems to recognize which is which when you run things through SteamVR.

Maybe for Quest 3 we'll get some options, with a low-grade unit and a high-grade unit that offers better lenses, and internal hardware (processor, etc).

The skies the limit at this point!  <3

Zenbane said:

Maybe for Quest 3 we'll get some options, with a low-grade unit and a high-grade unit that offers better lenses, and internal hardware (processor, etc).

The skies the limit at this point!  <3

I hope you're right mate.  Right now it sounds like Q3 is going to be  even cheaper ($199) with hand tracking (no controllers).  Mainly aimed at social VR.  Seems Oculus Facebook will do anything to help get VR mainstream, lol!  Any possibility of a cv2 seems pretty remote now, sob-sob.

TomCgcmfc said:

Zenbane said:

Maybe for Quest 3 we'll get some options, with a low-grade unit and a high-grade unit that offers better lenses, and internal hardware (processor, etc).

The skies the limit at this point!  <3

I hope you're right mate.  Right now it sounds like Q3 is going to be  even cheaper ($199) with hand tracking (no controllers).  Mainly aimed at social VR.  Seems Oculus Facebook will do anything to help get VR mainstream, lol!  Any possibility of a cv2 seems pretty remote now, sob-sob.

Yep! That mainstream train is in full effect, and there aint no stopping it now. I'm just keeping my proverbial fingers crossed for some sort of Pro Quest options in the future. Similar to how Apple will release 2 versions of each iPhone (one cheaper, one pricier).

So far, Facebook is dabbling in this area by releasing two different Quest units where the difference is simply the local storage space. They just need to stop the foreplay and start adding other goodies to the mix. nom nom nom

Since this thread derailed to black levels discussion i have found very helpful settings in Virtual Desktop while playing Lone Echo on Quest 2.

Video nominal range (or something like that) makes black color more black. It does lose some details in dark scenes, but somehow it still looks very natural on Lone Echo. It makes shadows really pop out.

I have tried it few other games too, but so far Lone Echo is only game where nominal range- setting looks better than without. That is my personal opinion only ofc.