DK2 quick review

[Gregster]

Well having owned the DK2 for a few days, I thought I would do a write up of it and maybe do a video review another time.

Ding dong goes the doorbell and the delivery man hands me a package that is a lot smaller than the pics look but who cares about size? (except women and they do :p) Anyways, I eagerly head to my den and rip open the happy Birthday wrapping paper (made me chuckle) and open up a brown box with the word DK2 stamped in black. The instructions are very easy and no problems with the wiring. It connects to a camera which sits atop my monitor and the camera and goggles connect to a very small box, which have 2 leads, which are a HDMI and a USB styleee.



After plugging in and pressing the black button on the goggles, Windows 10 makes the connected hardware sound and up pops a small box telling me the DK2 is connected and working (I had previously installed the software and the SDK 0.8 runtime). Fire up the demo scene in the OR box and pop on the goggles. A very boring scene of a table, a monitor, a plant and a chair but everything is working as it should.









Time to have a look and the first thing I fire up is "Back to Dinosaur Island" and WOW!!! totally blown away by the immersion and this is a short but very well done demo that is great for showing others, as you pretty much just sit and look. Anyways, onto Elite Dangerous and the main reason I bought the DK2.....

Fired up Elite and no option for the OR But wait! I remember reading up the day before about Elite and how the 0.5 SDK was needed and a couple of great guys from the VR community had made a little program to switch between the 0.7 and 0.5 SDK, so done what it said on the tin and within 5 seconds, I was now running the 0.5 SDK and I opned up the display control on W10 and set the monitor to extended and again fired up Elite. Set the OR option and secondary monitor and I was now seeing Elite Dangerous options screen through the goggles but upside down So back to CP and flip the extended display and blah blah blah.

Everything set correctly, I press start on Elite and I can see my Anaconda in 3D spinning around while the game is loading, a few seconds later I am in and in a completely empty house I say aloud "Oh my ****ing God" I can't believe what I am seeing. This game was meant for the Rift and my jaw was sitting on my keyboard. I have never felt immersion like it and I finally have that "Tron" moment of actually being in the game. I play for roughly 2 hours and take off the goggles and my eyes do hurt a little but nothing bad and I am still in shock for what I have just witnessed. Speechless is an understatement.

I fire up a few more demo's and a couple really do need a mention for the sheer quality and they are: Sightline the chair, Welcome to Oculus, Don't let go, Apollo Experience and Motorbike. These and many others are fantastic games/experiences and well worth a download. I play ED some more and the next day and the next day

I look through my Steam Library and see PCars and know this is a big OR game, so fire that up and again, immersion factor is incredible and with everything set to max, it runs very smooth on my system which really did surprise me. I decide to watch the replay and I stick my head out the window as I am flying along and all of a sudden, I feel sick, I stop the game and take off the glasses but yer, motion sickness has got me in this for some reason and not sure why. I take the dogs for a walk and 10 mins later I am fine and fire up PCars again and no problems this time but I didn't watch replays, so maybe a heads up there for others.

All in all, it has been a very easy experience with very few issues. The biggest problem the OR faces is pixels and you can clearly see edges when looking through the goggles and they can be a little off putting but stick with it and your eyes will start to block them out naturally and you won't notice them so much if at all. The CV1 will have a vastly improved resolution and this will help big time but as the tech savvy will know, a bigger res will need more grunt and as the DK2 doesn't work with SLI or CF, fingers crossed that the CV1 will have that option.

I would recommend anyone to at least try before writing off this tech and see what is what and if there is more support in games, I can see this being a long term tech. It does need a better res but I have no issues running the DK2 and the one game I bought it for looks incredible and if that makes my gaming experience even better, then happy days.

TL: DR - I love the VR experience and recommend anyone to give it a try.

[Arithon]

I'm selling mine this week. A few guys in TeamSpeak asked me to post about it, so here's the link: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Oculus-rift-D ... 1849737987

The DK2 is excellent and can be a better experience in Elite with a few tweaks.

Because the DK2 screen is OLED the green pixels are half the size of the red, so by changing the HUD colour to green, the DK2 looks far, far sharper to read in the Rift.

Because everyone has different eyes, the Rift can be a mixed experience for some. A thing to note is that the Inter Pupil Distance is a configurable option for Elite, so once you use the DK2 config application to find your IPD value, you can make sure the Rift works for you. There is an excellent app that'll set the HUD colour and the IPD for you without fiddling around with XML config files yourself, it is here: https://forums.frontier.co.uk/showthread.php?t=65258

Whatever graphics card you have (I had a GTX 660 originally and then I upgraded to a GTX 970) the most important thing to avoid motion sickness is a high frame rate. If you see motion blur or stutter turning your head, start with the lowest detail settings and raise them a few at a time, keeping a view to stable fame rates. The lowest tend to be in station, which is handy for testing them.

I'm not a great CQC player, but I kick ass in a DK2 - the peripheral vision and situation awareness gives you an edge.

Also, when you try each ship you can see the variety and artistry that has gone into each cockpit. While the HUD is uniform, the cockpits are as unique as fingerprints. I love the Python with a random cable strung across the floor (health and safety!) and the yellow neon of the Orca, the luggage rack behind the seat in the Drop Ship or the elevator welcome mat on the bridge of the Anaconda.

[GlobusDiablo]

Thanks for sharing. What kind of hardware do you have?

[LionOfNarnia]

Anyone know how well VR works for those who wear glasses?

[Gregster]

Some good points there Arithon and most of which I have done.

As for glasses, my wife wears them and has had a play and said it was comfortable for her. You can increase and decrease the distance the lens's are from your eyes.

My system is:

3930K @ 4.4Ghz - RIVF - 16GB 2133Mhz ram (2333Mhz) and a Titan X.

[LionOfNarnia]

Kewl

I do have a few contact lenses left, but they're a pain

[GlobusDiablo]

...My system is:

3930K @ 4.4Ghz - RIVF - 16GB 2133Mhz ram (2333Mhz) and a Titan X.

Emphasis mine.

Ah yes, the elusive Titan X. I'm a bit on the fence about VR unless I can run it decently with a single gpu setup, and the TX is apparently the only current card capable of running E: D properly.

So should I hold out for next gen (Pascal) or try to find a TX second hand? Any and all advice appreciated.

[Gregster]

Well the 980Ti would also be capable as it is just behind the TX in performance (literally right behind with about 3-5%) but Pascal is rumoured to be Q1 of 2016 although I would be very surprised if we see it much before April but Nvidia know their stuff, so very possible.

I personally would wait it out and see what is what on the CV1 and then decide.

[GlobusDiablo]

...I personally would wait it out and see what is what on the CV1 and then decide.

Yeah, solid advice. I guess I just need to hear it sometimes.