The Index thread (please keep to subject)

SkScotchegg said:

Mate don't go for inside/out tracking again. No matter how many cameras they stick on it...forget that.

And no matter how nicely they gloss it up with amazing features, you're going to run into trouble.

For me it is an obvious choice to avoid it, especially since the 5-finger tracking is so limiting in that it has to be calibrated for each person using it. And this is how the Knuckles function by default. You can't easily pass the Index to a group of people, because everyone's hands are different, and the fingers won't track accurately unless you take the time to calibrate each and every time you switch between users. For me, this is completely horrible. I've posted on here since 2016 discussing the times I've taken my Rift to work for demo's and have hosted house parties for VR. There's no way in hell I want to go through all that having to constantly re-calibrate the hand-controllers as the HMD is being passed between groups of people.

I don't consider Index to be a 'bad' product. It is just not a product for someone like myself who is looking to upgrade from the Rift CV1. Index is a good "first try" from Valve. But the wait continues!

Zenbane said:

SkScotchegg said:

Mate don't go for inside/out tracking again. No matter how many cameras they stick on it...forget that.

And no matter how nicely they gloss it up with amazing features, you're going to run into trouble.

Not sure why you think this. The inside-out tracking on Quest is just as accurate as the tracking on my Rift CV1. All the complaints about Rift-S on this forum have to do with product defects, not the tracking. So I don't think that there are any grounds for dismissing Inside-Out tracking for any product, including HP and Windows HMD's.

Zenbane said:

The Index is the obvious choice for me. 

For me it is an obvious choice to avoid it, especially since the 5-finger tracking is so limiting in that it has to be calibrated for each person using it. And this is how the Knuckles function by default. You can't easily pass the Index to a group of people, because everyone's hands are different, and the fingers won't track accurately unless you take the time to calibrate each and every time you switch between users. For me, this is completely horrible. I've posted on here since 2016 discussing the times I've taken my Rift to work for demo's and have hosted house parties for VR. There's no way in hell I want to go through all that having to constantly re-calibrate the hand-controllers as the HMD is being passed between groups of people.

I don't consider Index to be a 'bad' product. It is just not a product for someone like myself who is looking to upgrade from the Rift CV1. Index is a good "first try" from Valve. But the wait continues!

RuneSR2 said:

Hmm, maybe I spent too much time in The Lab yesterday, today it's Saturday, maybe I should get out more, maybe do some whitewater kayaking...  o:)

https://youtu.be/SwUpAlmjRgo

SkScotchegg said:

When I'm playing Beat Saber and Audica everything works perfectly until I turn up the difficulty to hard on beat saber or advanced on Audica and that's when the tracking fails miserably for me. Because what happen's is, the only way I can explain it is that the tracking can't keep up with the speed of my Touch controllers movements. So I miss shapes/squares/hits in both games. It's like a latency issue. Soon as you go to advanced level the Touch controllers can no longer track your movements when your hands are moving that fast. 

If I had to give a percentage on accuracy I would say the accuracy goes from 99% on Normal difficulty on Beat Saber down to 75% on Hard. And that dramatic drop in accuracy of the tracking makes it virtually impossible to play at those speeds.

RuneSR2 said:

BTW, had maybe my greatest Index experience so far last night when playing Dead Effect 2. Coming from CV1 ss 2.0 again the Index visuals felt like CV1 ss 4-5 or something. It was truly mind-blowingly better. And the performance was also better - felt really smooth - and this was only 90 Hz. I then found out that it was possible to dial in the lenses nearly all the way without scratching the lenses (or my glasses) - and the fov + tracking + image quality did create what in my mind corresponds to a true "gen 2" experience. That is an experience which felt completely different and much improved to using the CV1 ss 2.0. I didn't experience any glare - colors popped just like the CV1, blacks looked really good. Sound was amazing too. And Danette never looked better :blush:

I'd love to hear what Index + 2080 Ti owners think of Dead Effect 2 - lenses all dialed in, pixel density may be set to 200%, but remember to reduce "Effects Quality" to medium if needed for the fps. 

Here're my optimization experiences using the CV1, but seems to cover the Index perfectly too:

Like Doom VFR this game has many jaggies, unless antialiasing is applied. But to really make this game shine, it needs high levels of super sampling. Like in Lone Echo, Dead Effect 2 VR really shines using super sampling 2.0 (=200% set in SteamVR), but of course something like ss 1.8 may look great too. 

If I force ss 2.0 and max out all video settings, then I get like 45 fps. And that's not working great in-game. Turns out that there's really only 1 truly demanding in-game video setting, and that's Effect Quality. If I set Effect Quality to low, then I can max out all other video settings (FXAA3 antialiasing) and get solid 90 fps, but when I choose Effect Quality = medium, I get mostly 90 fps which occasionally dip to 45 fps. Owners of 2080 Ti may be able to use ss 2.0 + Extreme Effect Quality, the rest of us probably cannot. 
Effect Quality has great impact on light reflections and light conditions, but ss 2.0 is providing so much more depth and clarity to the game - I'd happily trade some Effect Quality for ss. 

In short - I'd recommend going for ss 2.0 (200%) in this game for owners of GTX 1080 or better, while setting Effect Quality to medium (or low). Even ss 2.0 won't completely get rid of annoying jaggies, so you'll need some additional antialiasing. FXAA2 is ok, but FXAA3 seems the perfect match between antialiasing and sharpness. So I'd recommend FXAA3 antialiasing, ss 2.0 (200%), Effect Quality = medium/low and all other video settings maxed. 

https://youtu.be/3AdGR_EEQ6A

Hmmm.... "Davis’s talk will cover his unusual journey into the game industry, his own personal experience at Valve over the years, and his more recent work developing the company’s upcoming flagship virtual reality title."

https://www.geekwire.com/calendar-event/working-video-games-valve-guest-speaker-kerry-davis/

May not mean much, Davis may not be able to reveal the name or much about the game, we'll see.

I'm usually not fond of free stuff, because it often implies low quality, but maybe this could be interesting:

https://youtu.be/GeX3AzReYq0