Using steam and Simple VR, everything seems to be working but the SDE is quite apparent, do I have a headset that shipped with a 2k instead of what is advertised? Would running this thing in extended mode and getting higher res make any difference? I can’t even see anything in extended, doesn’t seem to work. I think in extended my desktop is off the grid or some such/
It’s just that 4K is less of an improvement than many people think it is, and the 4K display in the PIMAX appears to be a Sharp IGZO panel with a wavy zig-zag sort of subpixel group arrangement that is easily noticeable. Here’s an illustration: Imgur: The magic of the Internet
That’s a pretty terrible photo because it was taken through one of the lenses and the subpixel illumination was not ideal, but I’m sure you can see what I’m talking about.
I can still see pixels, but honestly to me it’s a HUGE improvement over what I had using my 1440p screen of my Nexus 6p with a HOMIDO VR glass. In that situation the pixels were really ‘in your face’ distracting and taking away all the 3d effect. WIth 4k screen you have to look closely to see the pixels. They’re still there but to me they don’t bother too much anymore. I think it’s a huge improvement, like going from DVD quality to 720p on a big TV screen.
It’s said that you need about 8k per eye, so 16k in total for VR to not be able to distinguish pixels anymore. But I think going from 2k to 4k screens is really the biggest step of improvement in the process. With an 8k screen I bet you can still see pixels but only if you have good eyes and look really really closely.
Anyway, regarding quality, it looks better to me in 1440p extended mode than in 1080p Pimax mode, there’s just more detail which you can notice. But it doesn’t change the pixel size of course. It’s just that 1080p lacks info which it ‘extrapolates’ itself, which gives a less clear, more ‘smoothed’ image of course.
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I think many of us were grabbed by the ‘no screendoor!’ reviews… there is one YT vid that shows an image - albeit a still lmage - of Pimax resolution without SDE. I don’t know what to believe. 2k is the bare minimum for watching films, so Pimax is fine in that dept. But if a VR headset is touted as being 4k then 4k is what it should be.
It is a 4K headset. There is no mystery here, or misinformation. It’s just that 4K still isn’t enough resolution to render the SDE (or pixels) invisible.
Moreover it depends on visual acuity and subjective sensibilities as well. In other words two people can look at the exact same display through the exact same lenses and disagree about how to describe what they see, or even what is and isn’t actually visible in the first place.
So Pimax doesn’t simply take a HD signal and upscales it to 4k?
Yes, that’s exactly what they do by default. But this thread is about the screen door effect, which has nothing to do with the input resolution.
Correct. This is an important difference that I’ve tried to explain before. Screen door effect doesn’t become more visible due to upscaling: it interpolates the ‘missing’ info. If it could run at 4k native mode at the moment, it wouldn’t improve the ‘screen door effect’. It WOULD make the image more detailed/better looking/sharper/less blurry though.
Yeah this is pretty much what I thought, just wanted to confirm. I wonder how this Pix application came to be, what is the origin? All I see is people sharing it. How can I trust stuff like this when there is nothing about it on the internet.
Very good question, I’ve been wondering myself. Who created the pix.exe ?
Have you had any luck trying to force 4K via the SDK - or, alternatively - getting positional tracking in Extended mode? I’m having a hard time understanding who/what is forcing the headset down to 1080p. SteamVR can obviously render 4K to the desktop, and even higher with SS.
Is it the firmware doing it? Why would Pimax ever do that?
The install folder for Piplay actually has a copy of MaxVR, not as glorified as the one you can buy. But if you run it separately while in extended mode of course, For me, extended mode opens up a second desktop on the headset to the right as if it was a second monitor. So if you open MaxVR on your pc and move it to the right it shows up on the headset. Then there is an option within MaxVR (this new video player screen you just opened) to go full screen. It might be alt enter? Whatever the case yeah I think it is only outputing 1080p. I wont even bother with this Pix.EXE that some unknown person shared and has yet to reveal a source for it, no literature, no explanation of why we should trust it. But let me know if you do try it.