Has anybody else had problems with the Pimax base stations. I have had four of them- two original and two warranty replacements- and all four have now failed.
All failed within a year of their installations. I am now using a single steam purchased base station with another in reserve. It works ok for flight sims, but it’s not ideal. I can’t wait for the 12k and internal tracking.
Replacing these base stations is expensive and annoying. Thanks
I have just stayed with 1.0 base stations personally, seem more reliable. Haven’t heard of anyone specifically mention that Pimax supplied base stations were worse, I can’t imagine Valve giving them b-stock or deliberately defective units. That seems like a very high failure rate, is there any chance that there could be an electrical issue or such?
I do agree that base stations are expensive and annoying though, I know many love them but I can’t wait to be rid of them.
You mean the Pimax supplied Valve Base Stations.
All v2.0 Lighthouses are made by Valve regardless of where there purchased.
So far mine are good.
Valve v2.0 Lighthouses have not from what I have read been as reliable as v1.0 in terms of quality it seems.
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Yup, that’s been my understanding also. Which is ironic as don’t they have less moving parts?
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Indeed Valve made s big deal about less moving parts thay it was supposed to be more reliable and cost less to produce.
Seems like only one out of two and they didn’t bother reducing consumers’ price.
Ha, great point on the pricing. I’ll stick with my 2 LH gen 1 for now and hopefully can abandon them when I get a reality series.
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Indeed it has also been reported by some thst the v1.0 has more stable tracking. So if one doesn’t need more than is it 2? Might be better to just use v1.0; plus you end up with greater compatibility with SteamVR tracked accessories.
At least I can say ony of my Valve LH2 after a little more than 2 years (so out of EU warranty) already failed, too. I had to buy another one as replacement. So, inside-out tracking prefered for next gen headsets.
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If you’re continually having basestation failures, I would be suspicious of your mounting. When the basestations are running, gently touch them and feel whether they are wobbling. This may not be obvious at all from just looking at them. But if they’re wobbling, they can be expected to wear out their bearings and fail quickly.
I believe this is just rumor based on anecdotal evidence. We don’t have any actual figures for RMAs on basestations, so this rumor originates from posters on forums who are surely judging it based on “feel” rather than data.
Consider this. There are a lot more Indexes out there in the world and so a lot more v2.0 basestations than v1.0 basestations. If the failure rates are actually the same between them, you would expect to hear about more v2.0 failures than v1.0 failures, and that would give the anecdotal impression that they’re less reliable. This sort of thing is why anecdotes are not data.
If we ever did get to see actual RMA data, my bet would be on 2.0’s having the lower failure rate.
This is almost certainly more baseless internet rumor and very likely false.
No this does seem to be quite true v2.0 Lighthouses have become known to be less reliable then the v1.0 Lighthouses. And no there are more v1.0 Lighthouses out there then you might think as I believe HTC still makes and sells them.
Plus it is a poor metric to base Index Hmd numbers as proof of v2.0 Lighthouse numbers as some ppl whom purchased the Index were upgrading from Vive or Vive Pros.
Both the Index & Controllers can be used with either Lighthouse model. With v1.0 Lighthouses giving full compatibility with all currently released SteamVR tracked devices.
Where as v2.0 Lighthouses are only compatible with v2.0 tracked devices.
There is of course nothing conclusive saved some folks must be extremely lucky or unlucky as the case maybe.
Link to a reliable source (or any source) for this data, please. Otherwise, you’re just passing along a rumor. And as far as I’ve been able to tell, that’s the only reason why people on these forums believe this particular rumor. Everyone else said it, so it must be true.
That is a good point that I hadn’t considered, and I concede it.
My base stations are securely mounted in the walls with the supplied plates. I don’t have an explanation, but my Steam supplied base station is still working while all four of the Pimax versions died in less than a year of service.
This is not evidence of a general failure of all 2.0 base stations, but it’s certainly why I’ll be glad to be shut of them.
In my experience, they’d have to evince a manifold improvement just to be considered crap.
V1.0 works with 2 moving axes per base. V2.0 with only one. Therefore, V2.0 can be run with twice the number of bases to cover a larger area. On the other hand, V1.0 with 2 bases is as stable as V.2.0 with four…
Guys this is very interesting and a lot of stuff , i did not know about the ir stations 
so thank you.
My basestations are still from the first Vive and im using them for many years now
Hello,
So far I’ve noticed, the V1 base station seems to be more reliable.
Did you file any ticket with the Valve to diagnose the base station?
What exact problem with the base station, failed to detect or weak tracking signal?
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You just need to do a search. And as mentioned it is very unlikely to have multiple units fail if the quality is sound.
Now by your own words it can also be said your basing them not failing much on non data as well. How well a company addresses rma will impact how many visible complaints are on.
There have been many reports of DOA and multiple v2.0 LH failures with one owner. As this was a new line; Valve has likely had to address several QA failures.
Now had HTC & Valve not had a parting of ways the quality failure rate would likely been lower.
Like it could also be said Index Controller issues & pimax black housing issues are not as prominent as presented.
Valve has wisely been replacing a variety of there products beyond the Warranty period and have quietly fixed different issues.
Now we do have a pimax rep saying it ‘seems’ v1.0 LHes seem to be more reliable. So liky an opinion. However that opinion maybe based on non public data. Ie the batch or batches pimax has received. It would be interesting to see what the ppm would be for defects reported by pimax customers.
We do know that early v2.0 Lighthousrs shipped to backers are early models as they have the old housing that still has a link cable port that is not used. Later revisions have possibly addressed QA design/components issues.
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