Exactly what I was thinking
I even have ordered two vive 2 pro s now because of the bad reviews but also some positive reviews…
Why you may ask?
Because maybe there is some difference in the production units.
I had this with my pimax 8kx.My first one was not so great,the second one i bought was better(less mura and i needed a completly different mechanical ipd,and less eye strain too)
After i get them i will decide if i keep one or nothing at all…
i like to see how the clarity is vs the pimax 8kx.
Also i hope its somewhat close to the hp reverb g2,i loved that screen but i hated the tracking!
source: https://www.roadtovr.com/htc-vive-pro-2-review/
tbh, I so tired about those reviews, how they could see 24 degrees less in FOV, I guess they:
a) took original values from web
b) used thin foam Pro values and intentionally used thick with VP2
It looks for me like intended HTC sells hurt, don’t see any point in it apart from it. HTC has not good eye relief & it doesn’t let to put eye e.g. on my headshape close enough, but it’s just so easy to switch the foam & get closer, it doesn’t require distortion fight as on Pimax, it’s even hard to call a mod. But everybody constantly breaks HTC’s hmds reputation by doing that. I didn’t buy Vive Pro (1) till 2020 due to all this hate reviews, I was so surprised how good the HMD was when tried it, it just on another level in terms of quality, only Valve could compete there (Oculus got lot of compromises since CV1 despite their lenses & sweetspot, colours & display artifacts free are good, but Oculus 3d never felt as good as on HTC for me).
Just try to use a ruler & put Valves lenses on the same distance as closest Vive Pro with thick foam & then compare the sweetspot, I guess you will be surprised. Valve’s sweetspot I guess still will be better but not by that far.
I don’t review modded hardware! I review it exactly how it comes out of the box and this is how it should be. Of course I can do another video “How to improve the FOV of Vive Pro 2”, but not in the actual review.
Also: the guys from Road To VR even hat bad clarity with the native res 
8 Likes
And that’s sad, coz your reviews make people don’t buy good hardware due to your head shape specific, coz for other ppl with different eye relief value the mod may be not needed at all.
3 Likes
Nope, it’s absolutely correct what they write, I can confirm everything besides the Godrays, didn’t have problems with that.
Why whould anybody want to hurt HTC sells? I mean I know many people just want to beleive that the headset is good, because they pre-ordered already or whatever, but I can definitely tell you that the review of Road To VR is absolutely right, you will see when you have the headset!
3 Likes
seems as if I’m not the only one with that headshape, right?
3 Likes
I’m thinking HTC made the face pad pretty thick for “business” so people’s glasses don’t wreck the lenses. They should have put two pads in like they did with the original Vive. But I agree with you, I’m annoyed that I may have to mod the Pro 2 with 3rd party face pads just to have the experience that HTC claims at a steep $799 price already. I expected the Pro 2 specs to be in the Pro 1, which also came out at $799, so I thought it was worth it, but not so sure anymore. On the other hand, if your eyes are closer, you may get better clarity, so it could be worth it. I duno, I may cancel, buy a 3080Ti, and fully enjoy the Index at 120Hz in most games (and give the 8KX a try at 90Hz).
1 Like
So should the VP2 sweetspot be worse than VP1? (Coz it’s ok for me on VP1 with thin foam, on thick I can see only in the little circle in center, with thin foam it looks like a normal average HMD, much better than Odyssey+)
Had no complains about VP1 FOV at all, it was one of the biggest, only Valve/OG Vive was a bit bigger (lets put Pimaxes aside), but for me VP1 horizontal is about 100-110, on Valve index recently in steamvr ROV room, not sure if it’s showing the right values but hurting my face & putting lenses as close as I can without seeing display edges I saw 118 degrees, on VP about 110 if I push it with hands, it doesn’t look any small at all even on default VP1. Do you say all those experience will be much worse on VP2? I don’t have issues with VP1 but clarity & my hopes are high coz near G2 level screen even if a bit less clarity will be a good / best HMD for me (if all previous specs won’t be worse than on OG Vive Pro (I know it’s lcd though & blacks & contrast are concerned, but I got used to index, so I guess VP2 should be better than it).
The only real downside VP1 had is outdated resolution (in my personal case), mic/audio problem is fixable, sweetspot/FOV as I mentioned above as well.
I have about 20 HMDs including all recent ones apart Pimax 8kX (finally ordered it on Amazon after first order cancellation 4 months ago) & VP1 still is the gold standard for me, I use it nowadays as well for some games & it can’t be still beaten for me.
The smoothness (great performance), trouble free tracking (really valve index is the only HMD that behaves as good as HTC in those departments), comfort, troublefree software. 3d presence, great colour reprojection/contrast levels, artifacts free image (aliassing, pixel patterns, jitter, ripple, horizontal/vertical lines etc) (Valve has artifacts like vertical lines even after all those years patches with column correction)
If just has so many small things that nobody by some reason cares about & never mention them during reviews, even if they do it’s always very short like a non important feature, but for high fidelity VR those are essential.
My bold guess is that ppl are just pissed off due price politic & that kinda got a mainstream to hate HTC, everybody always expects higher from their than other brands.
HTC did full body trackers, firts got high res OLED for the time, got exceptional peformance & software compatibility, one of the first got eye tracking & exceptional tracking in conjunction with Valve.
I just don’t get these trends. If you want a professional grade VR hardware - pay for it. The issues their HMDs have can be in most cases overcome. There are only great HMD in consumer range for that fidelity atm are: Valve Index, Vives (all of those but comos/mobile). Q2 isn’t PCVR I don’t play PC VR on it, Pimax are good but it’s not professional harwdware & has many downsides. What else? WMR? Phh, despite some strong sides like bright & good screens on O+ always fail in couple of departments. Only 2 good Hmds for now: Index/VP1/2? (CV1 was good by the time) (I belive starvr could be a good, but software incompatibility, also Varjo but that’s not consumer/prosumer levels). Q2 is excellent HDM for it’s purposes but it’s not good PCVR experience (only lightweight games are more or less enjoyable)
I just won’t take your reviews seriously, it’s just poor value for me. Im kinda feel sad that ppl don’t value what will push VR further - stable solid HMD with all aspects (like tracking, visuals, comfort, performance, compatibility) considered as the one package. And when ppl get $hitty G2 / other well know problem HMDs they just got repelled from VR as they think it’s not as good as it can be with solid HMDs. They play 1-2 months & stop it as got bothered by many issues that constantly happen to them. Those points I tried to highlight is one of the major factor why Valve was so successful on the market. Considering the case that they dropped the price coz have steam library & can make money from it (same as PS & Oculus do).
P.S.: I will be glad to post my impressions/small review here on the forum once get VP2 & agree if the HMD really got concerned, but at the time being i have no any feeling I will get such an impression though.
1 Like
I don‘t think that reviewers should base their review on modded hardware. The headsets are advertized as fit to use and not as DIY kits, and frankly, the expectation should not be that you would have to add stuff to make the microphone work properly, etc. etc. We are talking of a pretty expensive device here. It‘s okay of course to ask if a reviewer wants to add a modding suggestions chapter, but I fully appreciate if reviewers don‘t think that that should be part of their review, because at the end of the day you could turn any headset into something completely different if I heavily modded it - so what‘s the point to make that the standard for reporting your experience with the product ?
As to Ben Lang: imho he is pretty much the most objective reviewer I am aware of, and he is not out to harm HTC but to tell it as it is.
I will be getting my Vive Pro 2 and will determine if the pro‘s outweigh the con‘s for my use cases. After reading his review I still see a good chance that it will replace the G2.
9 Likes
The FOV he has with his HMDs is quite small (for all the other units as well). That’s a fair point that if a reviewer reviews HMD he/she doesn’t need to mod it. According to reports, values from the web & the other reiviews his eye relief not a common one, I agree he is not alone who has that value & there are similar ppl.
But such a reviews don’t have value for those who will see opposite experience when get the HMD by themselves, but they won’t as it sounds like a crap HMD.
I don’t say him to review that or another way, I just say for me his reviews are poor value, as it doesn’t correspond to my experience & I can’t rely my decision on his observations as they are not relevant for my case. My IPD is about 68 or 66 I can also play with 64.5 without eye strain. The foam is not a mod IMO, it may be considered so but it’s just very little effort to drastically change the experience. And without mentioning this, knowing the tip & tricks that really works to improve the experience of using a device, what’s a point to review the HMDs then? Just I tried it with this state (even didn’t setup resolution properly) & I didn’t like it. Well, if you enjoy such a content I have no any concerns here. Why I posted all that stuff is to note VR users with my eye relief value or with similar VR needs - that considering how the review was performed - the HMD is BS device - not a quite valid statement. I don’t post comments on his videos or request anything, but I just don’t like the quality of the content & sharing my relation to it to get more opinions on the topic and also try to find some more reviews from the ppl who actually liked the VP1.
I think I can live with that 
1 Like
Thank you! Confirmed
1 Like
Let me ask again @VoodooDE @Teigue @cazman321 @john2910 @VR-TECH or anybody
Do you guys know anything about shipping date for pre-orders?
I know it’ll be released on June 4th but on newegg it says June 11th so I’m a little confused now…
Will depend on where you ordered. Ordered mine from Proshop which shipped today, but il get it either on friday or monday.
i’m in US and pre-ordered via VIVE website
The first one i preordered from the official vive website,shipment they said 4 juni.
But today i ordered a second one at a local computer shop here in holland,they said they had them on stock and that i will get the vive 2 tommorow or one day after(but i have a feeling this is wrong info,but i will let it know here if i get it)
1 Like
With @benz145 review reinforcing yours there should be very little doubt.
Though it seems like déjà vu when the reviews came out that were less favorable on the pimax headsets on release. Don’t let people discourage you @VoodooDE you are indeed a very balanced and talented VR reviewer.
Ben’s & your review reinforces my thoughts on some strange things going on with the FoV. Square panels should not have such wide variance in FoV values. Meaning as Ben described there is either cropping and or stretching on the Horizontal plane. Which makes sense the horizontal has blurring.
With adding Vive Console(Affectionately nicked ViTool). Suggesting HTC will not be as native a steamvr headset as before.
A Reviewer shouldn’t need to mod a headset or use specialized settings. A clean review should be how it functions out of the box with defaults to see how it performs.
After the baseline review it is imho welcomed to see what ingenuity can achieve.
4 Likes
One of the only ways to create a full objective review would be use something like vrRobot head for testing HMDs as you can test min & max ipd.
Reviews will always have a level of subjectivity when not using standardized testing equipment & procedures. Now with presenting both Eq tested results and subjective review can get a decent ranged balanced review.
With current methods it is best to sample a wide variety of reviews especially if the reviewer has similar physiological attributes.
Ultimately the best review is personal when one tries it out for themselves
Well…Ouch!. In all fairness, Ben did not even bother to do testing with the smaller foam. The Vive headset does use a stupidly thick foam.
Just what I though, the issue of clarity will be the lenses. That is the problem with the StarVR One. Stacked lenses introduces a softer image. Once Headset can go back to Aspherical lenses we will see clarity improve. The problem is that added weigh from them.
While I do value Bens reviews, it is here where you find deficiencies on the review. Now, my take on the matter is that Road to VR mainly review products as they come and not how they product could be via hacks.
As is, it is a damning review to the Vive Pro 2 (not so pro)
2 Likes