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New Participant
June 2, 2026
Question

Rift S crashing during setup

  • June 2, 2026
  • 1 reply
  • 208 views

Please someone help me. Meta Horizon Link for Rift s on Meta site installs great, green check marks for headset and controllers and sensor. Everything goes bad when I told to finish setup in headset. I see the images guiding me through and less than 30 screen goes black, app closes and opens itself again. I have tried the following:

 

Current behavior:

 

* Rift S is detected by Meta Horizon Link.

* USB, DisplayPort, headset, sensors, and controllers all show green icons/checks.

* The app asks to set up / continue setup in the headset.

* The headset goes black and Meta Horizon Link closes/reopens.

* Sometimes I get a “headset hardware error” message.

* This Rift S used to work on this same Windows 10 MSI laptop years ago.

 

System:

 

* Windows 10 laptop

* NVIDIA GTX 1060

* Intel UHD Graphics 630

* Rift S connected by USB 3.0 + Mini DisplayPort adapter

* Headset had been stored safely and unused for years

 

Things already tried:

 

* Confirmed it is an Oculus Rift S.

* Used the official Rift S download path from Meta.

* Installed Meta Horizon Link fresh.

* Fully uninstalled Meta Horizon Link.

* Deleted leftover Meta/Oculus folders from D drive.

* Deleted Oculus/Meta leftovers from AppData Roaming, Local, and LocalLow.

* Deleted old 2019 `C:\ProgramData\Oculus` folder in Safe Mode.

* Deleted old Oculus setup download cache where found.

* Reinstalled Meta Horizon Link after cleanup.

* Signed into Meta account successfully.

* Removed and re-added the Rift S in Meta Horizon Link.

* Tried the regular Meta Horizon Link installer and the Rift S-specific download.

* Updated NVIDIA driver.

* Switched from NVIDIA Studio Driver to Game Ready Driver.

* Rolled back NVIDIA driver through Device Manager.

* Confirmed NVIDIA Surround is unchecked/disabled.

* Checked Windows power plan; laptop is on High Performance.

* Confirmed USB selective suspend is disabled.

* Turned off USB power saving in Device Manager where available.

* Tried Rift S USB directly in both blue USB 3.0 laptop ports.

* Tried a powered Sabrent USB 3.0 hub with wall power.

* Tried a new Mini DisplayPort to DisplayPort adapter.

* Cleaned/reseated external cable connections.

* Reseated an internal headset cable between the eyepiece/headgear area.

* Checked Windows camera privacy permissions.

* Confirmed desktop apps can access camera.

* Added Defender exclusion for the Meta Horizon folder.

* Repaired Microsoft Visual C++ redistributables.

* Ran Oculus Debug Tool and disabled Asynchronous Spacewarp.

* Restarted Oculus VR Runtime Service multiple times.

* Ran `oculus-driver.exe` / allowed Oculus driver install prompts when they appeared.

* Cleared bad USB device entries in Device Manager.

* Found `Unknown USB Device (Device Descriptor Request Failed)` entries earlier.

* Uninstalled those bad USB entries and the Rift S USB Hub entries.

* Restarted and let Windows rebuild the Rift S USB devices.

* After rebuild, the Unknown USB Device errors did not come back.

* Device Manager now shows 2 Rift S USB Hub entries when USB is plugged in.

* Disabled Dragon Center scheduled tasks after Dragon Center appeared in Reliability Monitor.

* Checked Event Viewer / Reliability Monitor.

* Saw previous OculusDash.exe / OVRServer_x64.exe / BAD_MODULE_INFO entries, but after cleanup the same black screen cycle still occurs.

* Tried Wi-Fi off/on workaround.

* Tried blocking OculusDash.exe in Windows Firewall, then removed the rules after it did not fix it.

* Checked that Link app can detect the Rift S correctly after fresh install.

 

Current status:

After a full cleanup and fresh official Rift S setup, Meta Horizon Link detects everything with green icons/checks, but when setup transitions into the headset, the headset black screens and Meta Horizon Link crashes/reopens with a headset hardware error.

 

Question:

Has anyone fixed this specific Rift S issue where all checks are green, but the headset black screens and Meta Horizon Link crashes when entering setup? I’m especially interested in software/runtime/handshake workarounds before assuming the Rift S cable or headset hardware is dead.

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING
PLEASE HELP
ITS FOR MY SON

-Gabby

    1 reply

    New Participant
    September 29, 2026

    Hi

    (Impresive list of solutions tested.)

    As quick fix:

     once light goes orange, Meta Horizon Link - got frozen

    I found out that force close of "OVRServer_x64.exe" in Task Manager :

    -would cause re-boot of Horizon App (unfreez)

    -make VR Set back operational

    No need of re-boot whole PC or unplug VR or so.

     

    Other quick fix is to put dummy (ball / pillow) to keep VR all the time on / prevent rest mode.
    (Or just turn off before each break)

    I do hope it would helps somethat :)

    Kind Regards
    Rafał D