Budget VR?

[56RAF_Roblex]

I know a lot of you will hate me asking this but...

 

Let's assume I cannot afford an extra £1500 to buy a top end headset and graphics card,   what is the cheapest VR headset that works with VR and offers an enhanced experience over flat screen with TrackIR?     I don't mean Google Cardboard with a third party app as that offers no advantage over flat screen.  As I only have a 1050Ti card I am guessing that will not handle*any* compatible headsets, Maybe there is a standalone headset that just about handles BoX?    I have no idea what is out there.

[dburne]

Rift S is hard to beat for the money.

[56RAF_Roblex]

2 minutes ago, dburne said:

Rift S is hard to beat for the money.

 

OK.  I had not realised that the Rift S includes the 1050Ti in its minimum spec.   It is probably very marginal but I am used to that.  I spent a few years playing Cliffs Of Dover in MP at 20fps on minimum settings and got by OK ?

 

[dburne]

I found Rift S to be about the same as the original Rift CV1 in performance with much improved image clarity.

Using Open Composite with it rather than Steam VR ( IL-2 does not support Rift natively) really helps in performance also.

[Alonzo]

I believe some of the Windows MR gen1 headsets can be had for as little as $200. They will have the same GPU requirements as a Rift gen1. I expect you could get away with a 1060 as long as you’re ok with 45 FPS being interpolated up to 90. The CPU is also a factor for IL2 since it likes single thread performance. I’m not sure what the minimum would really be.

[haltux]

19 hours ago, 56RAF_Roblex said:

I know a lot of you will hate me asking this but...

 

Let's assume I cannot afford an extra £1500 to buy a top end headset and graphics card,   what is the cheapest VR headset that works with VR and offers an enhanced experience over flat screen with TrackIR?     I don't mean Google Cardboard with a third party app as that offers no advantage over flat screen.  As I only have a 1050Ti card I am guessing that will not handle*any* compatible headsets, Maybe there is a standalone headset that just about handles BoX?    I have no idea what is out there.

 

This is not an enhanced experience it is a different universe. Now some might argue that it is not mature enough, not as pretty as hi-res on a screen, that you will not perform as well as with a trackir, maybe. But VR is no less than another level of experience, you are inside the cockpit, in the air. Not in front of a screen.

 

19 hours ago, 56RAF_Roblex said:

 

OK.  I had not realised that the Rift S includes the 1050Ti in its minimum spec.   It is probably very marginal but I am used to that.  I spent a few years playing Cliffs Of Dover in MP at 20fps on minimum settings and got by OK ?

 

 

Forget the 20 FPS, that's hell in VR. The absolute minimum is 45 FPS, unless you want to puke. Which is a problem in IL2, you need a powerful processor, preferably overclocked, to constantly stay over 45 fps no matter what. The adviced processor which is not too expensive is the is the intel i5 9600k overclocked around 5 GHz.

 

For the graphic card, I am afraid your 1050ti won't be enough even if IL2 is not too GPU bounded. I have a 1070 which does the job if you don't push details and oversampling too much.

 

For the choice of the headset, on cheap ones Rift (S) is king.

Edited July 5, 2019 by haltux

[HansBlitz]

I've flying with a I7-7700k, Rift CV1, and RX480 graphics card. I do turn off the shadows though. I get mid 45 most the time and 50~68 fps at times depending on which map, amount of cloud, and such. My graphics card is my bottleneck.

[seafireliv]

20 hours ago, 56RAF_Roblex said:

 

OK.  I had not realised that the Rift S includes the 1050Ti in its minimum spec.   It is probably very marginal but I am used to that.  I spent a few years playing Cliffs Of Dover in MP at 20fps on minimum settings and got by OK ?

 

 

I second the Rift S.

 Had the Vive before and was very, very disappointed. The Rift S is what I expected the Vive to be. Much clearer visuals, also lighter and easier on the head.

 

Its (Rift S) sound is rubbish, but in my opinion it`s best to use your own headphones anyway. Build quality is also a less quality than the Vive. I wouldn`t waste time with the Index (Steam VR) as, from my research, it`s not much of an improvement visually considering how much you have to pay. In other words, the visuals don`t match the cash you fork out for it compared to the Rift S.

 

I advise a minimum 1060 6gig, but if you can go to 1080 even better. the Rift S doesn`t require as high fps either going only up to 80.

20 hours ago, dburne said:

I found Rift S to be about the same as the original Rift CV1 in performance with much improved image clarity.

Using Open Composite with it rather than Steam VR ( IL-2 does not support Rift natively) really helps in performance also.

 

What`s this open composite? can you point me to a link, please?

Edited July 5, 2019 by seafireliv

[dburne]

1 hour ago, seafireliv said:

 

What`s this open composite? can you point me to a link, please?

 

https://gitlab.com/znixian/OpenOVR

 

Scroll down until you see Open Composite.

Download the system wide installation.

Unzip and run Open Composite, and use it's switcher to change from Steam VR to Open Composite:

 

I get better performance using Open Composite rather than Steam VR.

[seafireliv]

38 minutes ago, dburne said:

 

https://gitlab.com/znixian/OpenOVR

 

Scroll down until you see Open Composite.

Download the system wide installation.

Unzip and run Open Composite, and use it's switcher to change from Steam VR to Open Composite:

 

I get better performance using Open Composite rather than Steam VR.

 

Thankyou very much!

[dburne]

10 minutes ago, seafireliv said:

 

Thankyou very much!

 

You are most welcome, let us know how you make out.

[seafireliv]

On 7/5/2019 at 5:36 PM, dburne said:

 

You are most welcome, let us know how you make out.

 

Well I wanted to try it for SkyrimVR  (can`t use it for IL2 since it`s not Steamed) in which it does improve the game since it`s not waiting for Steamvr to start. Nice.

 

I`m mostly flying IL2 at the moment though. The Rift S makes everything so much easier to see and therefore immersive.

[dburne]

39 minutes ago, seafireliv said:

 

Well I wanted to try it for SkyrimVR  (can`t use it for IL2 since it`s not Steamed) in which it does improve the game since it`s not waiting for Steamvr to start. Nice.

 

I`m mostly flying IL2 at the moment though. The Rift S makes everything so much easier to see and therefore immersive.

 

You can use Open Composite for IL-2, I have the stand alone version of IL-2 ( not Steam version) and it works great with it.

[seafireliv]

9 hours ago, dburne said:

 

You can use Open Composite for IL-2, I have the stand alone version of IL-2 ( not Steam version) and it works great with it.

Ha! You`re right! It does work. Thanks again. now to have a fly around.

[dburne]

2 hours ago, seafireliv said:

Ha! You`re right! It does work. Thanks again. now to have a fly around.

 

 

Good deal!

[DD_Arthur]

Agree with Don; can't recommend Open Composite enough for the Rift

 

@Roblex; there's a guy who posts over on the RoF forum who flys Flying Circus with a Rift CV1 and a 1050ti who seems happy enough with his performance.

 

A couple of months ago I decided to take the VR plunge but minimise my risk by buying a CV1 from Ebay.  Now I'm waiting until the end of August when I hope to make a decision for either the Reverb or the Rift S.

 

Theres no going back to a 2D screen as far as I'm concerned.

[seafireliv]

I`m getting a weird problem. IL2 appears to start when I select "Play", the hard drive light flickers, then nothing.

 

I put the 64 bit DLL Composite  file in the IL2 Game folder to replace the original.

 

If I remove it and replace it with the original all starts fine.

 

Any idea what I may be missing here?

[HunDread]

38 minutes ago, seafireliv said:

I`m getting a weird problem. IL2 appears to start when I select "Play", the hard drive light flickers, then nothing.

 

I put the 64 bit DLL Composite  file in the IL2 Game folder to replace the original.

 

If I remove it and replace it with the original all starts fine.

 

Any idea what I may be missing here?

 

If your are not using the installer you also need to create an opencomposite.ini file in the same folder you are placing the DLL to. I have one line in the file but I believe it should work as empty as well. 

[Stolle]

Can I use the opencomposite.ini file with the system wide installation and can I use it to set the supersampling value?

[seafireliv]

1 hour ago, HunDread said:

 

If your are not using the installer you also need to create an opencomposite.ini file in the same folder you are placing the DLL to. I have one line in the file but I believe it should work as empty as well. 

There`s an installer? I just saw the exe  here. https://gitlab.com/znixian/OpenOVR/blob/master/README.md#system-wide-installation

 

I have no idea how to create an ini file.

 

I`m probably being dense. It`s been a busy time. I`ll figure it out.

 

 

Edited July 9, 2019 by seafireliv

[HunDread]

1 hour ago, seafireliv said:

There`s an installer? I just saw the exe  here. https://gitlab.com/znixian/OpenOVR/blob/master/README.md#system-wide-installation

 

I have no idea how to create an ini file.

 

I`m probably being dense. It`s been a busy time. I`ll figure it out.

 

 

 

Creating an ini file is just that you create a new text file (.txt) then rename it to opencomposite.ini - meaning you rename the extension too from .txt to .ini - Windows will ask you if you are sure, and you just click OK.

 

But if you downoaded the exe from gitlab then that must actually be the installer. I never tried that so I don't want to give any false advice on that.

[seafireliv]

6 minutes ago, HunDread said:

 

Creating an ini file is just that you create a new text file (.txt) then rename it to opencomposite.ini - meaning you rename the extension too from .txt to .ini - Windows will ask you if you are sure, and you just click OK.

 

But if you downoaded the exe from gitlab then that must actually be the installer. I never tried that so I don't want to give any false advice on that.

 

That is indeed easier than I thought. We put all this in the `game ` part of the IL2 folder, right?

 

Update:

IL2 still simply doesn`t start... until I remove the dll. I`ll figure it out. But thankyou.

Edited July 9, 2019 by seafireliv

[HunDread]

14 minutes ago, seafireliv said:

 

That is indeed easier than I thought. We put all this in the `game ` part of the IL2 folder, right?

 

Update:

IL2 still simply doesn`t start... until I remove the dll. I`ll figure it out. But thankyou.

 

I quickly tried it. Removed the opencomposite.ini file and see exactly the same as you. The game just won't start - no error just nothing happens.

 

So it must be the .ini file.

 

It has to be in the same folder as the DLL file: ..............\IL-2 Sturmovik Great Battles\bin\game

 

 

CORRECTION: I tried if the file is empty and still nothing happens that way too.

 

So I was wrong assuming it can be empty. My file has this one value: 

 

enableAudio=False

 

You can open the .ini file with notepad and put in this value, or originally create the text file with this value then rename it to opencomposite.ini

Edited July 9, 2019 by HunDread

[seafireliv]

42 minutes ago, HunDread said:

 

I quickly tried it. Removed the opencomposite.ini file and see exactly the same as you. The game just won't start - no error just nothing happens.

 

So it must be the .ini file.

 

It has to be in the same folder as the DLL file: ..............\IL-2 Sturmovik Great Battles\bin\game

 

 

CORRECTION: I tried if the file is empty and still nothing happens that way too.

 

So I was wrong assuming it can be empty. My file has this one value: 

 

enableAudio=False

 

You can open the .ini file with notepad and put in this value, or originally create the text file with this value then rename it to opencomposite.ini

 

I did as you instructed. It looked like it was going to start then- `Config Error on line 1"

 

I can tell I`m close. Just gotta figure out what it finds so bad about line 1...  Might be something to do with my audio setup even.

Edited July 9, 2019 by seafireliv

[HunDread]

3 minutes ago, seafireliv said:

 

I did as you instructed. It looked like it was going to start then- `Config Error on line 1"

 

I can tell I`m close. Just gotta figure out what it finds so bad about line 1...  Might be something to do with my audio setup even.

 

That's a good one. Tried to recreate it but couldn't. I even put some unnecessary spaces like at the beginning and before and after the equals sign but it still starts.

 

For reference this is how mine looks like (windowos language is not English):

 

 

 

[seafireliv]

6 minutes ago, HunDread said:

 

That's a good one. Tried to recreate it but couldn't. I even put some unnecessary spaces like at the beginning and before and after the equals sign but it still starts.

 

For reference this is how mine looks like (windowos language is not English):

 

 

 

 

I figured it out just after you posted that. It just wanted a space before and after the equals sign, like ` enableAudio = false`

 

It seems like such a little thing, but it worked right after I did that.

 

Also thankyou very much for helping me get there. You guys are great.

Edited July 9, 2019 by seafireliv

[HunDread]

2 minutes ago, seafireliv said:

 

I figured it out just after you posted that. It just wanted a space before and after the equals sign, like ` enableAudio = false`

 

It seems like such a little thing, but it worked right after I did that.

 

Also thankyou very much for helping me get there. You guys are great.

 

Oh! These programs are crazy aren't they? 

 

Good to hear it's working finally. Have fun!

[HunDread]

4 hours ago, Stolle said:

Can I use the opencomposite.ini file with the system wide installation and can I use it to set the supersampling value?

 

I don't know how the system wide installation works but the ini file can be used to set supersampling.

 

I never tried but this is copied from the gitlab page: https://gitlab.com/znixian/OpenOVR/blob/master/README.md

 

"supersampleRatio - float, default 1.0. The supersample ratio in use - this is similar to what you would enter into SteamVR, a value of 145% in SteamVR is a value of 1.45 here. A value of 80% in SteamVR is 0.8 here, and so on. Higher numbers improve graphics, at a major performance cost"

[Stolle]

Thanks HunDread

I got the system wide installation working with supersampling now. 

[WIS-Redcoat]

On 7/4/2019 at 2:05 PM, dburne said:

Rift S is hard to beat for the money.

 

Given the scenario you gave, You can’t go wrong with this advice.  You could probably find a lot of used 1 generation headsets for sale this summer, but for the money, Rift S over used rift / Vive