Come and try out Pimax Crystal and Portal in New York!
This Monday to Tuesday, meet us at
https://www.meetup.com/pimax-vrâŚ/events/290008745/
Discuss Roadshow once Event Live. Impressions will copied to Announcement Topic for easy reading.
RSVP ! Only one week away. Very excited about it.
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As Michael explained, that lighthouse is for the Varjo Aero only.
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Time to report my findings.
Adorama is quite a fancy gadgets store located in Manhattan. Hadnât been there for ages, today for the Pimax roadshow I went there for a tryout of the Crystal.
Michael was there and he was friendly with everyone. He introduced the history of Pimax and its current status. Also he answered my questions with the best effort. I raised some suggestions, and he duly put them in his phone for later consideration.
I went there mostly for Crystal. I donât play VR games and can hardly bear moving pictures. So my concern is mostly about the stationary picture quality and distortion.
The overall impression of this headset is that its picture quality is good.
The App I watched is Brink Traveler showing the Horseshoe Bend. It has detailed rocks, blue sky, bright ground and dark water. So itâs quite ideal to see what Crystal is capable of.
- Color
In this test the bright ground is not as bright as the same ground Varjo Aero shows. The whole picture tends to be a little darker. The color therefore is more saturated. The water below seems quite dark. Itâs like someone somehow put a polarizer filter into the app. Though Crystalâs color is pleasing to my eyes, I hope they will fine-tune the headset so it can match the brightness of Varjo Aero. - Screen door effect
I tried my best to find gaps between pixels, but those were almost impossible to see. I ended up suspect that the tiny gaps I see perhaps were just artifacts or the pixels of the app. I am very happy about the high density of the panel. The lens is 35 PPD one, and itâs good enough. - Distortion
Both Varjo Aero and Crystal have distortions when moving my head around. Varjoâs distortion happens mostly around the edge, where the brim will change shape slightly. Crystalâs distortion is about the center, where the center mount of the horse shoe will not stay the same shape when I look around. This is a familiar problem back in my Cardboard days. This distortion is subtle but can be easily seen. It seems Pimax still need to do a little more calibrations for Crystal. And I am sure that this problem can be fixed by software or firmware. - Motion Smoothness
The Varjo Aero was connected to a laptop with 2080ti. Of course itâs not enough GPU power so I could see obvious motion jumps. On the other hand, the Crystal was connected to a powerful desktop ( though I donât know the detail specs), so when moving my head, the motion was basically smooth and the picture was sharp. Still, from time to time I saw a little jumping. This just shows that you need a powerful machine to drive Crystal. - Ghosting and color bleeding
Couldnât find any either in Crystal or Varjo Aero, as expected for aspherical lens. - Portal
I was surprised by Portalâs picture quality. The FOV is larger than Meta Quest 2, the color is vivid and itâs very hard to see the tiny gaps between pixels. When I was back home, I took out my Quest 2 and checked. In my opinion their picture qualities are on par. Hard to say which one is better. The good thing about Portal, again, I can see things clearly without my glasses, while Quest2 is fuzzy without them.
Moreover, according to RoadToVR, the portalâs lens are exchangeable as well, which could give us a higher density 27PPD or even 40PPD movie mode. These are quite attractive options for me.
Before this visit I donât really care about Portal, but now it seems itâs a good and versatile alternative to Meta Quest 2. If this is really selling for $300 itâs a very good gadget to have.
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Thank you very detailed evaluation. It is too bad the Aero was not on an equal pc to have a better even comparison.
The Portal on the KS page does mention 2 lens sets with one being more for cinema.
The Portal as I have suspected is growing on folks after they have a chance to xp it for themselves. Imho the Portal will need strong marketing exposure to do well.
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I know not everyone here is a member of the Pimax discord, thereâs some NYC roadshow user feedback reports thatâll I copy paste here for those who havenât read them.
Obneiric:
âWent to the NYC roadshow today and main thing I wanna mention is the vertical FOV since I saw so many different reports on it, to me it feels exactly the same as 8kxâs vertical FOV. The Crystalâs FOV in general pretty much feels like the 8kx on small FOV mode. Pretty impressive with 90% edge-to-edge clarity and no distortions, but Iâm definitely still waiting for the 12kâ
geekrobot:
"Just tried Crystal briefly at NYC roadshow.
Head tracking was okay, but it did bug out a bit even in my brief time with the demo.
Controllers, they basically couldnât keep em charged, so when I tried them, they had them plugged in, but they didnât work. A fellow user here also was waiting to try them as heâd tried the hmd earlier in the day and they were not working then, either. Not goodâŚ
Comfort was ok, last pimax I had was a 5k+ before MAS was standard. I installed the vive DAS on that and this was similar but definitely lighter weight.
There were no speakers attached to the strap on our demo. That was also janky and disappointing.
Demo was chaotic, no order to who was trying it, just a bunch of civilized vr nerds negotiating who got next.
Software didnât seem to crash though, so despite tracking issues, we didnât have to reboot pc or headset while I was there.
Now the good. As people said, the displays are really good.
The colors and blacks were deep in range and contrast. The sharpness and clarity of the lenses were excellent, as was brightness. The stereo depth was really nice: I havenât had that much feeling of depth in the 3d image since the original vive or vive pro. That alone made it stand out to me a lot. The edge to edge clarity was the best I have seen, so huge kudos to Pimax for achieving that at this resolution. The fov was good enough that I could look left and right all the way, and the entire image I could see was clear!
Vertical fov for me actually covered the entire visible range. Horizontal fov was rectangular and though I could see the end of the fov, as mentioned, it was good enough where using just my eyes to glance side to side I could still see screen. The true periphery isnât covered, that would be great but would fall outside of my focus focusable eyesight anyway. The edge to edge clarity enhances the feeling of width in the FOV.
So my opinion is that if pimax refines the tracking and fixes the controllers, they have a very very good headset, it would be my daily driver for awhile. Thereâs a lot of the usual pimax jank that hampers the experience as of right now.
People asked whether theyâll offer a controllerless bundle that instead includes the Lighthouse faceplate, Kevin said maybe summer
I asked when the faceplate would be available in any case and he said itâs easy and that they have it already since the older models basically use that â i.e. 8kx use basestations and the enclosure is similar/ same
My inclination was to then ask well then why not include it at launch but I didnât want to press poor old Kev too hard as it was the end of their day when I got there
So for me Iâll likely keep my reservation and hope to God they get that faceplate out asap so I can skip the shoddy inside out tracking and controllers until they refine them
For reference Iâve been developing in vr since dk1 and have tried many HMDs. Iâve owned cv1, vive, vp1, vp2, quest 1 and 2, Aero, 5k+, g2, maybe a few others. Iâd say Crystal is definitely a very good step for image quality. Live from new York itâs geekrobot pimax Crystal impressions!"
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Thank your for sharing those impressions, much appreciated!
Iâll definitely order the Crystal once available from amazon.de, it could be a good sidegrade to my VR-3 [for which shelling out âŹ800 p.a. is becoming increasingly a turn-off].
2023 should be a very interesting year hardware wise, looking forward to it!
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This is the disconnect between certain Pimax employees. The optimists like Kevin Sweviver and now Josh tell you what you want to know. The reality of delayed launches, bad inside out tracking and zero outside in tells you what you know.
Iâm sure Pimax are just making this launch look hard when itâs actually easy so we appreciate the Crystal more âwhenâ it gets launched for real.
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I think you give them too much credit. I see no evidence theyâre that good at planning ahead 
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Have to point out that the inside-out tracking is a welcoming improvement over the 6DOF head tracking I am having now with 5k super. It was accurate and good enough for my purpose.
Also, a little improvement I forgot to mention: Crystalâs video connection is actually a short dongle. So itâs much easier to connect and disconnect than my 5k super. Michael said it was designed this way because some people complained about it from this forum. See ? They do listen carefully to us.
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Isnât that box just because in stand-alone mode you want to have a convenient and easy way to disconnect the cable? Rather than put wear on the headset connector you add a cheap part that takes all the strain.
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Their stand-alone mode probably still has a long way to go. The addition of the dongle does make it easy to connect and disconnect the Pimax 8Kx cable.
One thing I forgot to test, is that whether the headset can run without the battery or not. It seemed there is an extra USB-C port on the right side to charge the battery only. During the test in Adorama, the charge cable and battery was always on. Michael said he never tested the headset without the battery. So, this is still a mystery. I hope the dual USB plugs from the 8Kx cable provide enough power for Crystal to run in tether mode.
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So Iâve watched all the impressions to date and the general consensus seems to be the displays are great. When asked would you upgrade they usually reply will wait for the 12K
Although the displays are good there doesnât seem to be much impulse to run out and buy one for $1600. Especially with a better model supposedly coming out?
I personally want one just for the local dimming but I will sit and wait for the wide FOV version. That will be a dream headset for space sims
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Iâve talked to around 220 people with reservations in person and around 25 of them or so are waiting for the 12k after seeing the Crystal. It has aspheric optical glass lenses and the 12K has poly lenses that are hybrid aspheric/fresnel. The resolution is spread across a much wider area so the highest resolution area is much smaller in the center. Itâs clearly debatable but most have opted to stick with the Crystal for now. I also havenât met even one person who removed their reservation after trying the Crystal out.
Wide FOV is what originally attracted me to Pimax but itâs worth considering the Crystal does have more screen real estate than other things except for the 8KX style lenses and the upcoming 12K. (and things like the StarVR if you still count that.)
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This is perhaps easy to see why. Some of the folks going to the Roadshows are going to see what they might be able to expect with the 12k Realityâs Potential.
There will be people whom have the financial security to buy both. While others will have to choose between them. So the savings with going with the Crystal will be due to clarity and having enough FoV to satisfy there needs.
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Itâs also the case that you probably have more customers that will actually be able to afford the crystal given the present economic global climate.
I freaking love the idea of the 12k for the sheer immersion of it, but I definitely think the crystal seems to offer insanely good value.
The 12 K reality series is going to be able to eat the highest end hardware. You can throw at it for a few years to come. With Crystal, a customer should be able to own a rig that can presently run an 8KX. And have a very premium experience.
I would love the opportunity to win either of them lol. I tend to make big purchases that will build memories like a vacation or riding ATVs. Everyone has their taste though lol.
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Hi Kevin
Not trying to diss the Crystal in anyway, was just replying to Turkeyâs impressions post which claims exactly what I observed from most of the âafter eventâ videos
If the 12K lenses are inferior like you say maybe the Crystal is the best option
Question. Is the 12K panel just as capable as the Crystal panel in terms of contract/black levels? Reason I ask is when I upgraded my JVC e shift projector to the native 4K NX7 there was a significant rise in black floor. Probably due the the native panels being new tech
I know your an old school AV geek 
Black levels are important. Will the 12K be on par with Crystal?
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I would assume that the panels are just as good on the 12K, but if the lenses were at the same quality and made of glass, the headset would probably cost close to $4000 or $5000.
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