I received my 5k+ headset in February 2019, having opted to receive it early, at which point I tested it, marvelled at the FOV, and then put it away. It wasn’t much use without base stations or controllers, after all.
Fast forward one year. The headset which is still brand new is now out of warranty. In January I decided to buy the index controllers and stations via Plan F, figuring Pimax may never ship theirs (turns out I may have been right). I received them in March and started finally enjoying my 5k+. It was great!.. up until last month when tracking completely stopped working for the HMD only. Steam confirmed the base stations are fine, Pimax spent an hour on TeamViewer trying to fix it. No luck - maybe the IR sensors failed.
So I ask if I can get it fixed. The response? “Sorry, your warranty has expired. If you’re interested in upgrading, you are still eligible for Plan A.” Oh, yeah, the warranty… which expired before Pimax sent me the hardware required to even test the tracking on the headset… meaning there was not a possible world in which i may have detected faulty tracking while the product was still under warranty, because I’m a backer and decided to get it before the full package. I think I am being punished for backing this project. Now I have a headset that is basically useless after only four months of use, and the only way to recoup any value after spending $1100 is to give Pimax an additional $5-600 to upgrade, while forfeiting my stretch goals.
Maybe this is old news by this point. But maybe my experience can be some sort of warning to others in a similar situation, who have only started being able to use their headset in the past few months. Your warranty is expired - be careful with your headset, Pimax won’t replace or fix it. I’m so disappointed…
As stated in the post, I already went fully through Steam Support (who confirmed the base stations are in perfect working order) and Pimax Support (who also agree that it is a hardware issue in the HMD).
The controllers track completely perfectly and the headset does not track whatsoever, and both base stations have white indicators and the infrared is visible through camera. They weren’t touched or moved when the tracking suddenly stopped working.
It doesn’t matter what you opted for… to wait on the full package or get it “early” … Pimax ended up ignoring that survey and sending out all the HMDs to all backers regardless. One of the bitter pills I, you, and many full kit backers have had to swallow. My 5K+ worked in it’s testing when I received it, but it’s also sitting in a box awaiting full kit, warranty long expired.
These kinds of scenarios are really disheartening to hear about. I’m sure Pimax doesn’t enjoy this kind of publicity either… Someone at Pimax will say this is really a minority of cases, like a fraction of a percent. Well if that’s the case then it shouldn’t hurt to give an extended warranty to these small percent of backers who are having this problem. The payoff in optics would be well worth it. Unless these things really are that prone to failure and not a small percent at all.
If I were you I would open it up there is a good chance that this is just a ribbon cable that has come loose , you have nothing to lose .
The likely cable is at the top of the hmd at the front and easy to put back in properly.
This is indeed very wrong. There should be after warranty service, not free, but still available. Forcing you to buy new headset just because sensor went wrong so quickly - well I am pretty sure that new headset would not be Pimax anymore in my case.
In Europe, warranty is 2 years by law and resets to day 1 if an article has malfunctioned and must be replaced. The producer then has the choice between repairing, replacing, or stepping back from contract (refunding).
In Germany it can be enforced by getting a title on it. So if they refuse it, and they host a meeting in Germany or go to a fair, you can prepare and claim that title and appear at that place to take company assets with police. You can also sell the title to specialised companies for an offset whose core competency is claiming stuff. Poor Germans and unwilling half-criminals in Germany hate that system and consider them blood sucking mosquitoes, but I think it’s quite nice. They work together with the city that employs the “Gerichtsvollzieher”. Don’t know the English term, maybe there is none.
Just a little excourse. The point is, I really think Pimax must stick to the law.
Yes, the law applies to Pimax even if they are in China. It is clearly referring to the place of (edit because I translated unclearly) where the customer is located during purchase. RL Friend of mine forced MSI to replace his RTX2080 in March or April (forgive my bad memory), I was really impressed by that.
As @burstingtops said, Pimax should simply treat its backers better. A nice letter of the ceo in the 8kX package looks nice, but really important is the way Pimax acts.
If there are just a few cases, why not just exchange the faulty hmds or offer free or cheap repair?
I just do not get why Pimax is not using these cases as a positive marketing opportunity.
Pimax support has clarified that actually I am not eligible for Plan A, I would have to pay $300 more for Plan C. I forgot you don’t trade in the existing headset for these. Well I can say with certainty, if I can easily expect their headsets to fail after so many months, I’m not dropping $900 on another one.
The hardest bit is actually pulling off the plastic cowling , i did it by prising with a plastic lever starting at the nose bit and working round , the guilty cable connection is probably the wide one on top , just gently prise up the retaining tab , reinsert the ribbon cable tab and press the retaining tab back down .
I did a diy audio socked re-soldering job about 6 months ago , it’s been fine ever since
How do you know its the headset only? My headset don’t show any image at all when it’s not tracked. Are you able to disable lighthouse tracking and have it work? Just seems odd that the sensors would just fail. I’m not sure I can help at all just trying to understand the situation better in case something similar happens to me.
I truly hope they can help you out better then just the upgrade path but it may not be bad to consider and this case is the first time I I’ve thought or said that.
With the headset on, pitool and steamvr don’t recognize the base stations and say the headset is not tracked. When it’s like this there is no image as you say, but when lighthouse tracking is disabled it does start working as normal (minus tracking). When the controllers are turned on, suddenly both controllers and both base stations are reported to pitool and steamvr, but the headset itself still remains untracked and black screen in lighthouse mode. This behavior was reproducible immediately when testing on another computer.
Damb, sorry to hear. Sound broke for sure then. My only thought just now is if there might be some type of work around with a vive tracker (puck). Probably more hassle then it’s worth and definitely not ideal.
Does it instantly switch the headset to lighthouse tracking when you turn on the controllers?
It doesn’t, I don’t think, so perhaps what you say may be possible… and maybe I can use the controllers in 9axis mode. Seems like it would be really janky though, I greatly dislike not having positional tracking on the head
Just tried it and it switched instantly to lighthouse tracking. Maybe someone could write some code or make an adjustment to pitool if it goes open source. No chance you put the pimax sleeve on the headset somthing could be blocking the sensors?What pitool version you using? I had tracking issues with some earlier versions.
have you tried tagging @PimaxUSA about this? I know some really good conpanies will sometime fix things out of warranty for reasons they acknowledge are clearly not the users fault in exchange for the good karma they will certainly get.
I’ve had same issue with my 5k+ as you describe, but always get it online again by exiting steamVR, setting “9-axis” tracking in pitool then “reset service” from within pitool… After hmd has rebooted I change from 9-axis to lighthouse, start steamVR and hmd would track again…
@Raymondo Wow… Nothing me, Pimax, or Steam tried worked, Pimax even installed all these experimental drivers and versions of PiTool and all of that stuff. It even didn’t work on another computer. But you, sir, have just restored my headset to perfect working condition. I’m just completely speechless.
I guess it’s also possible that leaving everything unplugged for a few weeks somehow did it too, but… wow. Thank you so much. I did NOT expect to be able to use that headset again.
@PimaxQuorra I strongly recommend you forward this advice on to the engineers - it should be somewhere on the list of steps to fix broken tracking.
