But as said atm it was said to not be available at launch. However with delays who knows it might be.
The Chasis yes. However iirc the Pimax Crystal is using 1:1 panels? Could be wrong.
That being said it maybe possible still to get close to 150° as Wearality did with there Sky model hybrid lenses without Canting screens. But would likely need to be advanced from the stage they were at.
@Heliosurge Keep in mind too though if they try to make some holocake lenses, canting , the display, might not be as necessary because of the type of optic
@mmorselli
I don’t agree. The interchangeable lenses will be a godsend if you ever scratch one and will, in a way, provide a degree of future proofing. As Pimax develops better lenses, the user can buy just them, and ‘swap’ to a cheaper upgrade than a new HMD.
Yes had read a variety of early day issues including an issue that came up with a defective batch of lenses.
If you recall though back then pimax was not manufacturing there own hmds. And warranty issues generally went through the retailer you purchased the headset from. I bought mine from Gearbest and was very fortunate there was no quality issues. As there Customer service is pretty much non existent and you pay to receive and pay to return regardless if it was received DOA.
You might recall Pimax even had to fight with them to accept returns when the p1 BE was shipped to the wrong clients as they were out of BE Boxes. The QHD Oled hmd sold for a higher value than the p1 4k and many users wanted the 4k hmd they had sought to purchase.
That is why I mentioned Wearality Sky that gave a reported Horizontal FoV of 150?
1 screen no canting. I would be curious how much screen usage might be lost to hidden area mask morphing a square into a rectangle? Even 130 horizontal would be plenty for most.
@bubbleball had posted a link to the lense design specifications.
I concede this point. For Pimax, yes, it‘s great as you are clearly expecting the need to fix things which weren‘t done right the first time. But risking to repeat myself, he is holding Pimax to the standards users have towards proper commercial companies, not those claiming puppy protection like a Kickstarter first time garage gang of 3. And for a proper company you‘ll simply ship it back if it doesn‘t perform as advertised and definitely not want to be asked to fix it yourself. We are talking normal user or prosumers or business customers here, not geeks & tinkerers only. Perhaps they need to define their target customer group more clearly so I and a couple of dozens of others can p*** off…
I am glad you are not at all concerned by a product which 6 weeks after launch is missing half of its advertized eco sytstem features and do not consider yourself just as biased, just in opposite direction…
Maybe. I‘m still waiting for the wireless module for the 8K series and Sword Sense controllers, you know. Pimax do not have a track record instilling supreme confidence in fulfilling all of their announcements, so I find it weird to criticize somebody for being cautious while this feature was not being demoed, like at all, although the product was stated to be in production and launched six weeks ago.
Just replace the name Pimax with any random VR manufacturer and ask yourself if you really would be as lenient as you are with them. It‘s great that they managed to build a lot of goodwill with you, but you cannot just assume that others have to grant that upfront too and discharge their arguments base don mere announcements by Pimax without proof of proper implementation.
It will be hard to find another company proudly announcing the release of a VR headset with some fanfare and then you see demoes where only 50% of the features are available and they even need to hot-fix some of those they intended to present.They‘d get fleeced for it too.
To which places like VR experience centers chief complaint with HTC is not having user swappable lenses. It was a question asked during the KS roadshows as featured requested.
A downed headset in commercial space is lost revenue. The Ojo Concept? was set to release an hmd or did with swappable lenses. I think it was Acer but they walked away from VR.
I think majority of “my precious” vr folks would prefer to have swappable lenses vs having to ship it back for what should be easy user repair.
Swappable lenses is doing it right the first time as I have even read of folks whom have had there kid destroy the lenses with scratches.
I still like concept OSVR had of fairly upgradable base. However the lack of focus and cost as it was intended as a hdk was fairly high. And the project folded. But did last long enough to have Steam support.
I understand what you mean about Bradley talking about what people expect from an established company, and not wanting to tinker, but there is some thing I think you’re missing. This headset is not a gaming device 1st. It is a enterprise device. It is competing with Varjo and quest pro. $1600 is more money than an OLED television. I don’t want a device like that to crap out after just a few years.
Do you remember a while back when I think it was next GENVR bought the VR three? A whole bunch of people bought this really expensive. Enterprise headset from this company because of its retinal micro display.
They wanted to have monitor resolution in the center of their FOV. Problem was, that feature only worked in Vario demos, and behind the subscription paywall.
With the higher, PPD lens on a crystal, somebody who doesn’t have the money to invest in a whole ecosystem for proprietary software to leverage extra resolution, can just use a lens design for greater clarity and maintain compatibility.
That ability to be adaptable on the fly is way more valuable to enterprise level customers, but it can have value for gamers to.
Imagine you are in graphic design, and you want to do some detailed work. You need extra resolution. Do you want to buy the VR three or the XR, which requires a yearly subscription, or a pimax crystal that you can use on an ordinary rig with open XR and get 75% of the detail by changing the lens?
The problem with this review is that Bradley is marketing it as if it is the same as what was the $800 8KX gamer device.
Vario arrow was that companies shot at the prosumer market, while Pimax crystal might actually have some value beyond video games
I have made many posts on this very forum complaining about Pimax’s release dates surrounding these headsets. So much so that I have literally been called toxic. I don’t know why you seem to assume I am some Pimax apologist because I don’t like some youtubers attitude. My post history speaks for itself.
A lot of replies, haven’t read yet. Just typing up thoughts as watching the video.
First, he calls Pimax ‘snakeoil’ which fits in with his earlier tweets about portal being ‘yet another scam’. Pimax have never scammed to my knowledge. Closest would be the stretch goal of the wireless adapter that never materialized and they tried to make up for with vouchers etc. Extreme delays definitely but scam/snakeoil? Snakeoil doesn’t eventually start working down the line.
He mentions the products won’t deliver with the feature set claimed. I agree, that’s a fair point, Pimax have already said no standalone on launch and I expect many features will take a long time with faceplates taking even longer.
Pimax portal persistence/blur: Was not present when I tried it. I only got to try the blink traveller demo but the blur would have been present there if it was this fundamental of a flaw. You could see in the video I posted that there was no blur (but perhaps we wouldn’t see it without a headset on?) Anyway I noticed no blur but that doesn’t mean the version he had didn’t have that so he might have had a bad showcase. These things happen, and that’s his experience and it’s valid as such. This raises a concern with the roadshow being too early which is also a valid point.
Watching further he said he tried the same canyon/blink demo. There was 100% no blur for me, so not sure what was going on there. Definitely seems like an issue with his demo but good to know that it’s not an issue across the board. Also, I am very sensitive to blur and disable any and all motion blur etc so I don’t think it’s just a personal experience difference.
‘Super front heavy, could not look around without holding on’. I didn’t have that issue whatsoever, it’s basically the exact same as Quest 2 (far from ideal but far from what he is saying). Not sure if he just didn’t adjust the strap or something, could be headshape maybe? I would be getting the battery strap version or modding it with a DAS or such anyway, no fabric only strap for me thanks.
On the point of larger companies trying it and failing: All were 3DOF, all were phones. And were they really failures or just discontinued? Gear VR turned into Go which turned into Quest. Really a failure? Cardboard was, in classic google fashion: abandoned. These are bad faith points to just reinforce an opinion that was made before going in imo.
I do agree overall that the portal is no where near ready. I’m not sure if showing off the VR mode in this state publicly was a good idea tbh. I personally saw the potential and am very excited but I’m under no disillusions that it still needs a lot of work and the Kickstarter shipping date is just the usual KS nonsense dates (which I will never understand why KS campaigns always do that…okay I do, things are sold on hype lol). I wouldn’t be so quick to write off portal, I think it could be huge and the potential is absolutely there but I do also see how the available demo for the skeptic or non interested would result it writing it off entirely so I think Brad is about the middle ground here in some ways. The motion blur was definitely not a thing for me though.
His sneer on the current headset visuals makes no sense. They do give great visuals, what’s the issue there? It’s just a negative for the sake of it. He has basically no experience with the headsets anyway. Frustrating point that seems negative just for the sake of negative, really don’t get his disdain in general. Makes it hard to listen to his points and take his opinion on board but I’m trying to.
‘Crystal still felt like a prototype’ - True point, it is pretty much. I guess with the proper cable and software updates the current prototype could be pretty close to the final product though.
On his point on the lenses, and I see so many agreeing: Cameras with interchangable lenses appear. You don’t just throw one in the bin once some dust gets in, you just clear the dust out. Seriously, the lenses are not an issue and the point is so so so painfully dumb. At these roadshows they keep constantly pulling off the lenses to show the capability. Likely in 1 day of a roadshow they remove and reseat the lenses more than the average person will in the entire time they have the headset. And not a single person has complained about dust while testing the crystal during the road shows except for him. Hmm. Interesting. Come on, at some point it just becomes laughable.
I think he is right that 3rd parties probably won’t jump on custom lenses, except for many perscription lenses.
On the controllers, I believe him. I really really hope they fix it and improve it drastically but it seems pretty obvious that the controller tracking is no where near ready. I also agree with his point on the recent ‘launch’. It’s not a good luck.
Overall, the video makes some good points and some bad points. I think it’s important that he put it out and spoke frankly, don’t agree on all points but I don’t disagree and I also think he does reflect a pretty significant and important part of the market that Pimax will need to work hard to change the opinions of. If this roadshow was marketed more as an event for getting feedback on products that are still in development then I think it would have been much more positively received by someone like Brad.
I am very hopeful about both products but also not expecting them until Summer realistically. I am more than happy to wait, I don’t see the rush. These could be amazing products, and I really want them to be a success.
They do have an option to buy out the paywall
I don’t think this is possible due to the size of the view port that the lenses have. Also the panel size is a limit.
I could be wrong though!
They do have the option to buy out the pay wall but there it is, it’s more money.
What I’m talking about is what you’re getting for value of money piMax is offering you a feature set that enables indirectly I suppose enterprise level functionality without the pay wall or the cost to get around a pay wall.
Another thing I think people are missing is that so many people are waiting for the 12 K, but it will have the same growing pains as the 8K-X did when it came out
It took five years for computers to actually catch up to 8K-X. Finally the 4090 now does the girth to run it at the large FOV that it was originally designed for. That’s an insanely long time it took to be able to run what was essentially designed to be the default and only FOV for the 8K-X
People are gonna go through that same issue with the 12 K it’s gonna take about five years to be able to render stereo 6K resolution good frame rates with decent settings that don’t need to be ridiculously optimized.
Right now the crystal is offering versatility that nobody else is offering at a price that is competitive. It’s in that sense that I feel this review is insanely unfair it omits things, overlooks things, and doesn’t even consider other market segments where this things going to be valuable over time.
Pimax have never once said crystal is an enterprise headset, it has been marketing entirely as a gaming headset from top to bottom.
@SmallBaguette Yes, true but the main stream companies that represent their chief competition are i marketing, their HMDs as in the enterprise space, or an enterprise company developing a pro Sumer device.
Quest pro for example is an oversized quest two that has special lenses and is marketed by Meta as an enterprise device.
Aero was Varjo’s first foray outside of enterprise, and into the prosumer space.
Crystal kicked the pants off of both of those devices at the same price point.
So yes, it’s true that pimax is not declaring it’s an enterprise device, the competition is what is saying their device aims at
You don’t have to call it an enterprise device, where it is competing on specs, and price is what says that it’s enterprise facing as well. It’s not a bad look for this company to bring forth the crystal when quest pro is what Meta calls enterprise. Lol
The truth the 4090 is only currently able to catch up for now til newer content demands more. Now there are titles like Hellblade that recommends irc a 1080 for low FoV hmds.
The FoV options were both to help expand compatibility as is the various refresh options. But imho the FoV setting option was intended also as a compromise vs having different lens options. To which I maybe wrong but do not think the 12k would have that option from the crystal. But this is speculation on my part as I don’t believe pimax has mentioned lense swap options save on Portal and Crystal.
As for enterprise use that will depend on a company if they take interest. I imagine Marek with being impressed with the 8kX encouraged there own 8k model as the 8kX might have been a concern vs there 5k model. After all if the 8kX could be sufficient for a company use. You could at the time buy 3-5 8kX for the price of 1 5k Xtal.
They would be morons not to put the swappable lenses on the 12 K
Swappable maybe. Different lens options not as probable. Swappable makes sense to reduce downtime. Replacement lenses may have a high price vs conventional lenses.
That’s exactly what I mean. Just because it’s not marketed directly at enterprise doesn’t mean that it won’t be valuable to them.
The Document he had linked is dead now.
But here is pimax to wearality Sky lense comparison (pics)
With additionally a post of the monster wearality lenses.