Gus

Recently I´ve read the Windows October Update 20H2 would improve visual quality for the Reverb G2. If Windows did not automatically updated, it might be worth to push the update. https://www.roadtovr.com/latest-windows-update-includes-visual-improvements-hp-reverb-g2-wmr-headsets/ Got a notification of HP about delivering my ordered G2 end of November

MRTV made some comparison videos between the preproduction model of the G2 and the Index some month ago. He and a friend of him considered the G2 prototype more advanced in terms of picture quality to the Index, what in fact the G2 is with its resolution of 2160 x 2160 compared to 1440 x 1600 pixels of the Index. There seems to be really a lot of improvement being made for the optics ( displays, lenses ) and sound to the G2. The difference to the Index aside from the superior resolution and with this its sharpness, is the FOV of the Index, which could be increased by dialing in the lenses of the Index more closely to the eyes - an option the Reverb G2 does not have. They say, when you leave the position of the lenses of the Index at standard, there is no difference for the FOV in comparison to the G2. Furthermore they say, if you are going to use the VR headset for kind of comic games with less details, like Beat Saber etc., the Index is comparable to the G2, but if you use VR for flight sim, with a lot of details in the cockpit and distant view, the G2 shows its advantage by the higher resolution. Also the G2 is a bit lighter in weight, than the Index, what may make wearing it more comfortable. In result, the only downside of the G2 in comparison to the Index, is the lack of a dialing knob at the back of the headset to adjust the fit on the head. Beside these details in hardware design, there is more to favour the Reverb G2. The G2 is developed in corporation between HP, Valve and Microsoft. This corporation resulting in one product is quite unique so far on the VR headset market and promises an excellent support crossover the APIs of SteamVR ( Valve ) and Windows Mixed Reality ( Microsoft ). Both companies are the main drivers for VR API / Software and hardware - it does look like that all the best developments has come together to create a VR headset at a reasonable price tag, which eliminates the main flaws of VR headsets, like screen-door-effect, Mura, distortion, clarity, glare, sharpness, sweetspot, visible round shape of fresnel lens pattern, colors and brightness. It is to expect, that there will be a focused attention for the G2 in the ongoing development of SteamVR and Windows Mixed Reality to provide best possible quality and performance, with the goal to push the overall acceptance of VR in the user market far more than before. Microsofts Flight Simulator 2020 already got the potential to get more people into VR and in conjunction with the Reverb G2, there won´t be anymore common disappointment, like before for new VR user. Having eliminated the main optical downsides of VR in comparison to flat screens, there still remains the FOV to be technically advanced. So far it looks like pushing the FOV beyond the standard approx 100° - 120° is technically challenging. The Reverb G2 still is within this standard. Beside the efforts Valve, Pimax, XTAL or StarVR made, a large FOV still is not at a point to be standardized for the mass market due to costs and/or quality. So the Reverb G2 still is a step, even it´s a huge step, in the overall development of VR hardware to finally reach the user expectation without compromises in comparison to flat screens. That to mention, that the Reverb G2, as good as it looks to be, might be outdated within one or two years, by a better VR headset with the same technical and visual quality, but with a larger FOV.

HP begun to deliver the first Reverb G2 preorders and first user reviews are online. Looks like a great VR headset is upcoming in particular for flight sims. Me am still waiting to get mine delivered and am mostly interested in how the better visuals and smaller FOV of the Reverb G2 effects the experience in VR in comparison to the Pimax8KX. For the JG1 comrades located in the US: Microsoft offers the Reverb G2 @ 599,99 $ in their store ( currently out of stock ), which is a pretty good price for the piece...keep a look: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/p/hp-reverb-g2-vr-headset/93QB262D0514?activetab=pivot%3aoverviewtab Last week I had a call with the HP customer service in Germany and they told me, that there are far more preorders, than the production could handle at once. So at the moment new orders need to wait for the production, to be delivered. Here´s a longer more detailed Q & A ... And a quick through the lens video of MRTV via Twitter: https://mobile.twitter.com/mixedrealityTV/status/1324800170693939201

Thank you very much and thanks to everyone for liking; finally a big thanks to Klaiber! So, hopefully the time of sweet words will pass without diminishing the meaning of these words in future. Thanking is and always was a rare interpersonal act without expecting something in return. It´s the true base of friendship.

Mostly appreciate, that the ´21 will get a graphical update of its interior and exterior. Also like very much the F-8 and F-4U as modules in development. Overall sounds like very nice guys at Magnitude.

@Klaiber now you gave mood to me Why not go a step further? With Aphex Twin: "Stone in Focus"

Listened to this one the other day on the radio and it made me feelgood. It´s an italian cover version of a 80´s song of a german new wave band called "Trio" :

Just some additional thoughts on the Pimax 8kX after some more VR sessions with it: I´m going to sell the P8KX immediately after received the Reverb G2. Didn´t expected the 8KX to have this bad optics after long time using the Pimax 5k+. Surely the wide FOV is great to have, but Pimax did a bad job developing this one piece. My conclusion is, that developing the 5K+ and the other ones of this series included the development of new wide FOV lenses. In this development they had a display with same dimensions but different resolutions for the series before 8KX and worked on the lenses for it to create this outstanding FOV. For the Pimax 8kX they simply replaced the displays from before with high resolution displays, but with different characteristics and kept the housing and lenses as before. This results in a much smaller sweetspot in the 8kX , what makes the flaws in design apparent all the time. These flaws a mainly a bad convergence between the line of sight through the lenses on to the displays. Whith the original design like in the Pimax 5k+ this flaw could have been covered by the bigger sweetspot, which allows different angles and IPD settings to get a sharp and converged image all the time, but the 8KX´ design doesn´t allow any more space to cover the issues. It´s very exhausting for the eyes to deal with the optics of the 8KX as a constant concentration and force to the eyeballs are needed to focus on a point with both eyes simultaneously. God knows I´ve tried to make this piece work convenient. I´m not so much taking care of comfort or headphones, as I could manage to make these things fit for me, but there´s not much anyone can do to balance the issues of the optics of the headset. The wide FOV and high resolution work fantastic on a first glance, but the lack in quality due to engineering the Pimax 8kX become very apparent and annoying after a time of using it.

Kind of hypnotic music I like to listen from French groups, like ´Air´ or ´M83´. Here´s a song of M83 of their Album "Hurry up, we´re dreaming". The album ( a double CD album ) was disappointing to me, as it is very experimental and only 2 or 3 songs on it I like. But this one song "Wait" never gets old. Also the Video for "Wait" comes in a very artful style with references arranged to a very own narration. The groups name "M83" is a reference to the nearest discovered galaxy to the milky way. <iframe width="1093" height="640" src=" " frameborder="0" allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen></iframe>

Last thing I´ve read was, that the delivery of the Reverb G2 is postponed to the beginning of November - not too long waiting for that ...

The Valve Index must be the so far best overall engineered headset. Valve invented a new lens technology ( there are actually two lenses per eye in the Index ) which provide a sweetspot nearly over the whole visible image. The downside of the Index is its resolution of 1440 x 1600, which was at the time of the release of the Index already outdated by the HP Reverb and Pimax 5k+. Very unfortunate for Valve as the development in VR headsets is going on very fast. The Vive Pro got the same resolution as the Valve Index, but without any new lens technology. The HTC headsets always got a small sweetspot, even their newest one, the Vive Cosmos with a resolution of 1440 x 1700 still got this small sweetspot. The above report of the new Pimax 8kX is more an initial impression, than a review. I´ve received the P8kX only a few days ago. But it should get an impression, what to expect. Most people don´t like to fiddle around too much to make a VR headset work as intended, but the Pimax headsets do need a lot of adjustment to fit individually. The new Pimax Experience tool is great but at the moment a work in progress and still in beta state. There is already an option integrated for a virtual IPD setting test and setup, but the function is not available at the moment and will be implemented later. Also the Pimax software provide an option to adjust the image vertically, which is good and als needed. Especially when swithcing from the original headstrap to the HTC Delux Audio Strap the vertical image, respectively the point of view to the image on the vertical line, need to be adjusted. So, on the bottom line, the Pimax 8kX is not a out-of-the-box VR experience, but man, once adjusted, the image quality is so far the best I´ve ever seen in VR. So far means, until the HP Reverb G2 arrives in a few weeks :). I´ve preorderd the Reverb G2 to have some relaxing flight sessions and tp enjoy the beauty of places in our world in Microsoft Flight Simulator 2020 and am quite excited about a comparison between the G2 and the P8kX. I would expect of the Reverb G2 a much better engineered headset and easy out-of-the-box experience, but with the downside of a small FOV about 114°. I would say, that we´re getting there in terms of development of a really good VR headset with properly engineered lens technology, high resolution displays and wide field of view. Currently there are trade offs with every headset, but there´s a massive increase in quality in every manner, but still not all together in one headset at a reasonable price tag. Coming back to the P8kX, I could imagine to like the headset more after some long time usage. The initial setup really is a pain in the ... with the P8kX and a result of bad engineering. Can´t emphasize less the visual quality of the 8kX: Yesterday reinstalled the Spitfire in DCS and took a flight over Normandy and it was inside and outside the cockpit a perfect view all the time... so much enjoyable after some years of using VR. Regarding the sometimes appearing Mura effect, I´ll try to reduce this effect next by adjusting brightness and contrast. The Mura effect could not totally eliminated by software adjustment as it is a result of display technology and appears, when there is too much heat on the displays, but maybe it could be reduced a bit.

As VR is getting more and more popular for flight sims, I just thought to write down some of my experience and impressions with the new Pimax 8kX headset if anyone considers to purchase or preorder one. VR is now technically on the edge of fullfilling its expectations for the user, in particular: the visual quality of high resolution headsets provides an image quality in VR very close to a regular monitor. Before I got the 8kX, I had the Pimax 5k+, Samsung Odyssey ( and the Odyssey+ ) and before a HTC Vive. In terms of resolution the 8kX surely is the next step up and it does provide a lot more details in DCS. The cockpits in DCS became very rich in details, just like used to get on a monitor. Readability of the panels is much better ( not perfect and depending on how the headset is setup ) and especially the landscapes and depth of the world in DCS now looks fantastic in VR. Spotting is now no longer a disadvantage in VR. The resolution definitely is convincing! So, the high display resolution of 3840 x 2160 per eye and the huge field of view are the selling points of the Pimax 8kX. First thing, what becomes an issue, is finding the sweetspot ( the sharpest area in the field of view ). The sweetspot of the Pimax 5k+ is huge and you don´t have to adjust the headset to instantly be in this sweetspot, when putting on the headset. In the 8kX the displays are much smaller, than in the 5k+, but both frames are the same. I think it was a bad decision to replace the bigger displays with smaller displays while keeping the same housing and lenses. In addition to this, the new face mask ( they call it comfort kit ) of the 8kX puts the headset a bit more away from the eyes, which results in an even smaller sweetspot on the lenses for the eye. Pimax reacted to this issue by replacing a thicker face foam with a thinner face foam to get the eyes closer to the lenses, but its not enough to reach a sweetspot like the 5k+ or other VR headsets, like Valves Index. I had to replace the face mask of the 8kX with the one of my old 5k+ to get closer to the lenses and not be forced to fiddle around every time I put on the headset, to find the sweetspot. At this point a positive effect falls into place: I need to wear glasses, because of being shortsighted. With the modified 8kX with 5k+ face-cover there is not really space for glasses, but due to the circumstance of modding the headset, now the visual focus of the eyes had come into the area, where I don´t need glasses. In VR the visual focus of the eyes is around 0,80 m to 1,50 m I would assume. But that´s not enough about the sweetspot. It also depends on IPD ( inter pupil distance ) settings. My IPD is 63,5 mm, but as the P8kX uses smaller displays, while keeping the lenses for bigger displays they used before, the physical IPD dialer, which moves the lenses, need to be pushed down to the physical limit of IPD 60 in the headset´s frame. Then by software IPD adjustment, the individual IPD setting ( -5 to +5 ) need to be found to get into the sweetspot. Everything outside the sweetspot is blurry! Now another issue appears: As the lenses are now dialed down by physical IPD setting, they got physically such close together, that the nose gap between the lenses is nearly gone and the plastic frame of the lenses now pushes hardly directly on to the nose, or let´s say: my big nose. So far I´ve handcrafted kind of soft pad out of a corona face mask and some soft material, to make the 8kX wearable on the nose. Now the sweetspot issue is solved and I always got instantly a sharp high resolution image, when putting on the P8kX. One word to the integrated headphones in the Pimax 8kX ( they call it modular audio strap crap. Totally crap! The cheapest headphones, I´ve ever heard. Needed to replace the head strap with the Vive Deluxe Audio strap. Another issue, which now goes viral in the Pimax forums is ´Mura´. This is like a thin dirty looking shadow over the entire view. Mostly visible in bright, white areas. This effect appears, when focussing the lenses instead of the image behind. Mostly it is not noticable while concentrating on the image and what happens there, but when looking into a bright sky in DCS or looking down on a shiny desert landscape, the effect becomes apparent. Other headsets got this too, more or less. It´s annoying, when you see it, but does not make the headset unusable. Regarding the demand for performance, the 8kX is pretty good usable for me in DCS, as I don´t measure the fun I got in the simulation with an FPS counter. What´s not so good is, that the native resolution of the P8kX is 3840 x 2160, but the rendered images @100% SteamVR SS setting is a lot more, because the wide FOV needs more pixels to compensate the distortion in the peripheral view. A regular headset with approx 110° not canted displays don´t need this extra rendered pixels, which is a waste in performance the system needs to provide. Going under 100% SS SteamVR the image looses quality and shimmering of far distant objects become visual. Anyway the headset needs a quite powerful PC, that´s for sure, but with that, the performance in DCS is ok, at least for me. A nice thing is the new Pimax Experience Software. This tool or overlay program really makes configuring the headset more easy. The software got some nice feature, which makes life with any Pimax headset more easy. Finally I have to say, that I do enjoy the high resolution and highly detailed images of the P8kX. Also the wide FOV is very enjoyable, especially in the flight sim. But this headset got issues, like the Mura effect or the focus/sweetspot, which other older headsets got as well. It also got some design downsides, as other headsets got as well. Also need to be mentioned, that it is quite expensive, but provides beside the high resolution image and wide FOV only poor quality. To be honest, I would not buy the Pimax 8kX headset again, because the overall quality appears too poor at this price tag and sooner or later other companies will bring up headsets with comparable specifications to the P8kX´s resolution and FOV.

Maybe the new MSAA Mask slider within the VR Options is related to the special Varjo headset support, as the Varjo got an inner resolution in the sweetspot of view and kind of peripheral screens with different resolution. I would guess the with the MSAA mask slider the outer resolution of the Varjo headsets could be enhanced by additional MSAA. I got the impression that the MSAA slider provides benefits for enhancement with all VR displays for the total resoluted VR images. Beside this, special support for Varjo headsets might be more of promotional decision than a practical. Practically none of the DCS gamer will get a Varjo for VR, but Eagle Dynamics promote Varjo headsets and in return Varjo promotes DCS for their showcases - with both in mind for industrial customers and application ( like military ) for reaching higher values in price tags for both products and at least providing an image as ´professional (VR)´ suppliers. For me the narrow sided view of the Varjo is a no-go at this price tag!

Pushed the button for the Hornet. For half the price, I couldn´t resist in view to the upcoming Supercarrier. Just took a freeflight round: Looks and feels fantastic! Such a paperweight flight model in comparison to the Tomcat - I´m sure I won´t regret this one.

@Razwald Oh yeah, "Another Brick in the Wall" is a classic one. ´The Wall´ and ´Dark Side of the Moon´ are legendary ... So, if ROUND 1 would have asked for a german song for a german Tiger IV Panzer Kompanie attacking and destroying a british batallion on a misty morning, it would be this one: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xh99sYnEdqQ BTW: With which button do I embed youtube videos directly?

Being born ten years too late for the music poker, I would not have too much to add to it. Ironically my most beloved musician started his career in this timeframe. Saw him twice giving a concert in Germany. About 15 years ago in Frankfurt with his original Band and some years later at an open air concert in Mainz with another band. Of all the Youtube live footage, I like this version of my favorite song the most: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04SyevARRcc

Always some great variety of music to be found here. Also liked very much The Hu - great vibes of rock! ( even Pete Townsend isn't the lead singer anymore ) Anyone into RADIOHEAD? Yaron Herman Trio - &nbsp;No surprises Reggie Watts loves Thom Yorke

@Britchot just undone the settings for the DCS.exe and Run.exe and took the exact flight on your server, we did yesterday. After a while the same black screen appeared again.... So the VR optimization settings could be excluded as a source of the issue. Guess it has to do with the new Pitool beta I had installed shortly before I left home for some days. I´m pretty sure now my issue has to do with Pitool. Need to investigate more...

Did not set it back yet, but will do next time and test in the simpit. It´s very likely that it depends on the hardware/software in use. I´m running a Pimax5k+ newest Pitool (beta), SteamVR. Will report back after I had the chance to revise the settings.

Yesterday, I´ve set up a few of the other tipps mentioned in the video, but with questionable results. Setting MSAA up in the Nvidia driver had not nearly the same positive effect in visual quality than setting MSAA 2x in DCS - I would assume, that deactivating MSAA in DCS lead to most of the performance improvement noted in the video. Beside this I have experienced several black screens, in which the VR headset doen´t receive any more signals after adjusting the settings in accordance to the tips in the video - I could only guess, that the black screens in VR resulted of modifying the DCS.exe and run.exe to not allow the optimization for full screen ( DCS.exe -->properties ). Before the modification in the DCS.exe I had never experienced the symptom of black screens in VR before.

That sounds really beautiful. It just came to my mind, how much I´ve ignored good music in the last 10 years; rarely looked for buying new records. Music is such a great source for inspiration, leading into a self-reflecting state of mood. ... ´Death Growl´ ? So, there is a name for it :-))) Just tried to imagine Abraham Ben Jacob arriving in Denmark and a bunch of raw men with beards, long hair and leather clothes welcomed him with death growls. Also very funny, that there was mentioned Tom Waits in the linked article :))) Hope to meet you in one of the new sunday´s practice sessions. It´s really a much more convenient time to fly together over the continents.

I´m always sceptic to bands which appear a little overdressed, but like the tribal sound inbetween... somehow meditativ. But in the middle of the song the guys ruined the song for me, when starting to sing/speak with a deeply faked voice, like the Black Metal singer used to have. Apropos heavy metal ... do you know Catpower? Chan Marshall is a wonderful artist, unfortunately she ruined herself in her late career with alcohol and drugs, but her music still is wonderful. One of my favourites songs and a good one to enter the music of Catpower is "Metal Heart"... wonderful lyrics, wonderful music. An early version of "Metal Heart" was released on one of her early albums "Moonpix", later she released a new and more intense version of "Metal Heart" on the album "Jukebox" which made the song more succesful. She don´t has any bad albums, they are all different and great.

... currently watching youtube videos like this : https://youtu.be/7dPAklBFyXs

Some interesting tipps... I would have expected more of a performance gain by this mod, but if you're already tested and don't see any advantage by the mod, I could gladly skip the mod stuff. In one way or another, mods in DCS always gave me more worries than less. Didn´t come to practice flying very much in the last months, but as still being off from home for over a week now, I seriously start missing flying and the practice sessions. Youtube Videos of DCS Mig21 help a bit to avoid hard withdrawal symptoms.