Cosford 2017 FlightSim Show

[Lewis - A2A]

Was a great day, wish it never ended. Thanks to everyone that said hello, and if you got a card remember to fire me that email!!!!

cheers,
Lewis

[Tutmeister]

Great to see you Lewis, what a fantastic day although I’m not entirely sure about the selfie...

So many things to see and try, I even tried a pimax headset as there are so many conflicting opinions and have been wanting to compare it to my rift for a while.
I managed to bag myself a bargain yoke too with a massive discount of about 400 quid!

Chris

[Paul K]

A very enjoyable day. It's reassuring to see the world of flight simulation in such rude health, in terms of software, hardware, and the length of the queue at the door. There's an awful lot of development going on - more so that I can remember in the last 10 years. I haven't done much simming lately, but the Cosford show has rekindled my enthusiasm. Plus, of course, it's always nice to see Lewis ( almost forgot to mention him ).

[Lewis - A2A]

Great to see you Lewis, what a fantastic day although I’m not entirely sure about the selfie...

So many things to see and try, I even tried a pimax headset as there are so many conflicting opinions and have been wanting to compare it to my rift for a while.
I managed to bag myself a bargain yoke too with a massive discount of about 400 quid!

Chris

Can you let us know about thoughts on the headset Chris, I didnt get a chance to see it. Which booth was that on, there was so many VR equipped booths, it was awesome

[Christopher Low]

It seems that I was stood right next to Lewis at the Mutley's Hangar stand without even recognising him! I was the half bald guy wearing the black 24MX jacket

[Tutmeister]

Hi Lewis
It was on the wired2fire stand.
By the way for anyone who doesn’t know me, I often worry about appearing snobbish over hardware as I like to try a lot of new hardware and I have high standards so please don’t think I’m showing off, I’m just comparing to what I like and prefer.

I had a chat with the guy manning it regarding pros and cons of the pimax compared to the high end headsets. He was enthusiastically pitching it to anyone who wanted to try it but was also happy to recognise its drawbacks when discusssing it with anyone who had more knowledge. I think this was because there were a lot of people there who have never tried vr so to them it was a great experience.

I have heard a lot of bad things about this headset but it supposedly has that one advantage over the resolution of the rift/vive so I was happy to try it with an open mind but I also knew what failings to look out for.

So the headset we are talking about is the 4K pimax. This has a resolution of 3840 x 2160 which gives a resolution of 1920 x 2160 which really means you are looking at 2k rather than 4K but hey, it’s a lot more than the rift right? So firstly, resolution and screen door. Yes it is noticeably higher resolution than the two main vr headsets and the screen door effect is much reduced but it is still there if you look for it.
The rest of my observations unfortunately are that it falls short of my rift in all other areas. It does have its own integrated headphones, which can be removed if need be, which simplifies putting it on however it still isn’t quite as slick as the rift. I can pick that up and literally pull it on like a baseball cap. The pimax takes two hands and needs a bit more care in positioning the visor and earphones. I know this isn’t a big deal but this is a comparison and if you want to compete with the big boys then you better have your ergonomics right.

As you probably know it does not have any positional tracking. A lot of people have suggested this wouldn’t be a problem for them in a sim as they are seated and will never need room scale but for me it is a no go. At risk of sounding snobby, I think it is because they have never tried true vr presence - By the way the term presence in the vr world means having a refresh rate high enough and sub millimetre tracking to properly fool that lizard bit of your brain into really reacting like you are there. Just having 3D and rotational tracking is not enough. If you tilt your head to the side a millimetre your body will know it and if you’re eyes don’t see the corresponding change then you can forget presence.
When using vr in the cockpit you still need positional tracking as you tilt your head and move around. The first thing I did when I couldn’t read the instruments was lean forward, except nothing happened when I did so you can forget leaning in to read things and never mind peering down the side of your seat to check fuel contents or trim position or leaning round to see over your nose when s taxying your spit...... Yes the resolution helps but we aren’t there yet where you don’t have to lean in.

The screen used is an lcd panel rather than the oled ones in the higher end devices. This means the image wasn’t as bright as it could be and the colours weren’t as vibrant. The other thing with the screen is that it runs at 60hz rather than the 90 that the others run at. This was noticeable and combined with gyros giving only rotational tracking I felt that it was very slightly laggy compared to the perfect tracking I’m used to.
The lenses used also mean that as you look around with your eyes the image warps and swims towards the edges of your vision. You really do need to keep your view straight ahead in the sweet spot and just move your head. The optics in the main two are custom designed and are not your standard round lens which allows distortion free viewing almost to the edges of the display as you move around.

So on the face of it the pimax should compete or better the other two as it does almost everything you need for vr right?
Unfortunately people often don’t appreciate the research, development and custom designed technology and screens that went into the proper vr headsets, all of which is needed to achieve presence. This leads to some people thinking that this headset is in the same league but unfortunately it isn’t really comparable. When it came out it wasn’t a bad effort especially for the price, however for £400 you can now get a rift with full room scale capability and touch controllers. Even if you don’t need the hand controllers, you really do need head tracking.

So to sum up, better resolution, built in headphones. Poorer quality optics and 60hz screen lead to no presence and distorted image at the edges. No positional tracking breaks immersion and an odd feeling when you move your head and nothing happens. This will ultimately lead to motion sickness.

Id be interested to try the 8k (really a 4K) when it comes out as that will supposedly have positional tracking and 90hz but we won’t know if the other tech and software will be developed enough as there is far more to this art than just hardware specs.

Lewis, when I say rift, I mean rift or vive because as you know, they are pretty much the same thing quality wise. Each has drawbacks and advantages over the other but these days they are so close it is meaningless. I have access to both but as you know, I own a rift.

Sorry for the essay, got carried away! Any more questions just ask. Honestly, I’m not being elitist, I’m being honest! If I were to buy now I wouldn’t have one as the cost advantage over better devices has reduced to the point where it isn’t worth it and you can get a rift on eBay for not much more than the cost of the pimax.

Chris