Good HMD comparison review

[nightauditor198]

"goldenegg" wrote:
The Rift does not do room tracking.

Sure it does? We already know that you could use a second camera if you want to cover a larger area, but even with one camera there is nothing that would prevent you from standing up.

There even have been official oculus demos (reviewed on tested) that include standing up and moving around.

[Christiaan]

"goldenegg" wrote:

"Christiaan" wrote:

"goldenegg" wrote:
The Rift and Vive are identical as far as their HMDs are concerned.

No.

I've tried them both and couldn't tell the difference between them, other than their fit.

The aspherical lenses in the Rift are substantially more complex (and costly) than the sperical lenses in the Vive.

The result should be substantially better off-axis performance and overall greater clarity.

I'm not saying that your opinion is not valid - I have friends who prefer the sound from my desktop speakers to my reference towers - it's just that to say they are identical is far from correct. Identical, they are not. Any more than my desktop speakers offer the identical experience to my MAC reference towers.

Palmer talks about the optical design of the Rift:

http://uploadvr.com/palmer-luckey-talks-advantages-rifts-custom-lenses/

[GoldenRetroGames]

"Christiaan" wrote:

I'm not saying that your opinion is not valid - I have friends who prefer the sound from my desktop speakers to my reference towers - it's just that to say they are identical is far from correct. Identical, they are not. Any more than my desktop speakers offer the identical experience to my MAC reference towers.

Your comparison between speakers has to do with personal sound preference and doesn't apply here. We're not talking about what people prefer to look at.

If anything, I'd compare the two HMDs to both models of the PS Vita. The original model has a OLED display, while the second model is LED. Both displays are quite nice. Both proceed a very nice image and you wouldn't notice any specific deficiencies in the new model, until you put the two side-by-side. Even then, the new model still looks really good.

If anything, that's the level of difference between the image quality of the two HMDs. There's no major difference in ultimate performance which will deter from the overall experience.

[Zoomie]

From what I've managed to piece together the Rift has advantages in both lens quality and sound quality. Neither of those will stand out in a quick 5 minute demo in a noisy convention hall demo.

Unfortunately these qualities are not obvious to the average user. They're certainly less obvious than a glaring difference like the at-release Wands of the Vive. I've often drawn the parallel to cameras: Megapixels matter much less than lens quality, but most consumers don't really understand that fact and simply go for the camera with the "bigger MP's".
Why does a Canon L-series zoom lens cost several thousand dollars when an iPhone camera looks "just as good" to the average teenager on instagram?

Likewise with the Rift, I think people underestimate the differences between these two HMD's.
Many people can't tell the difference between a 2k and 4k TV, or tell the difference between low fidelity and much better speakers.

The reviewer in the video said that the PSVR is 80% of the Rift. Hardly. Still, if he can't tell the difference then why would he waste money on the more expensive HMD's?

[Anonymous]

Does The Vive really beat the Rift in tracking? They just have a different camera set up... The Rift + Touch can apparently do the same thing when configured the same as the Vive (opposing camera set up). This was mentioned at GDC by the guys doing Job Simulator if I remember correctly.

[Zoomie]

Countless reviewers have stated their opinion that the Vive has more precise control. I'm not aware of anyone who has actually done controlled testing of the two units under identical setups.

In most cases, people touting the superior tracking of the Vive admit that they were either testing the 2 Lighthouse config against 1 camera Oculus, or that the Oculus was using 2 cameras on the front wall. Palmer Luckey has stated that Oculus works with room scale, but he was a bit evasive in the way he phrased his reply.

I'd love to see a direct comparison done by an impartial reviewer under the same conditions.
It'll come down to the accuracy of measurement and sampling rates of both systems.
Even if one is superior, the more relevant question is whether both are able to do well enough for whatever developers want to use it for.

At the moment the reviews seem to favour the Vive, however this is still anecdotal. I've personally tried my DK2 and got precise tracking out to the limits of the connection cable - so YMMV.

[greeneblitz]

I will say that whomever is in charge of marketing at Oculus, should be fired, the seemingly lack of a "attack/defense" plan against vive makes me think that Oculus doesn't know that they're in a business war for their survival and the whole "we are all in VR together" seems to only be one sided. Also, not getting the Touch out sooner is a huge mistake.

[Anonymous]

I have a feeling Oculus is more worried about liability issues with regards to room scale. Tested did an interview with the creator of Job Simulator - and by what he said,it seems they have tried it. We'll know the answer anyway, because people are going to try it when touch comes out.

[przecinek]

"greenb" wrote:
I will say that whomever is in charge of marketing at Oculus, should be fired, the seemingly lack of a "attack/defense" plan against vive makes me think that Oculus doesn't know that they're in a business war for their survival and the whole "we are all in VR together" seems to only be one sided. Also, not getting the Touch out sooner is a huge mistake..

Yup. It's like Oculus got stuck in DK1 and DK2 times when they didn't have any solid competition. There's virtually no real marketing going on. They did this giveaway for Defense Grid 2 but you can't really call this a marketing offensive :lol:

As for review, can't say it's that good. Very little VR content on this guys YT channel. I know HTC does feel a bit heavier on the front. Norm and this other guy from Tested mentioned this too. But if you just spend a bit of demo time with both I guess they feel similar.

[Baishan]

"greeneblitz" wrote:
I will say that whomever is in charge of marketing at Oculus, should be fired, the seemingly lack of a "attack/defense" plan against vive makes me think that Oculus doesn't know that they're in a business war for their survival and the whole "we are all in VR together" seems to only be one sided. Also, not getting the Touch out sooner is a huge mistake.

I agree. With two weeks left in the month its supposed to ship there has been almost zero proper reviews. You can't give a proper review from playing for an hour in a demo booth. They should have gotten them out to youtubers (like htc did) and lifted the NDA on developers working with it. I want to hear from people who have had a dk2 and a vive and used them for some period of time so that they can comment on fogging, build quality, how good the bass is on the headphones, tracking boundaries and experiment with room scale. We see plenty of that from vive users (which doesn't ship until months after the rift) and it certainly looks exciting. Even though we will start to see these in a couple of weeks we won't see any of the touch controllers. Buying into the rift is a gamble if you are hoping for motion controls and room scale experience as we have thus far only seen people standing still while using it. I don't yet have space for roomscale but I would like to have the option to try it and create a vr room in the next year or so. In any case it would have been great to see people play around with it and talk about the limitations of both instead of relying on the odd comment from Palmer on reddit. The lineup of games were mostly disappointing 3rd person experiences except for a few games like project cars and ed which have already been around for years now.

I'm just glad I'm not in the first batch and can at least hear some honest reviews of the headset in a few weeks. These should have been available before the first batch went out and a clear picture of the limitations and advantages of the touch controllers.