HTC Vive

ci_newman · 7 Apr 2016 at 17:04

But no comment on the orders with declined CC transactions, or their status

Zumber · 7 Apr 2016 at 17:23

Still news here either. I asked her to look into my order. No answer. Still awaiting a call back from them which was supposed to come within four hours. I rang to complain and they said they'd get their ecomm team to ring me asap. Still waiting. Here we have a company that likes taking peoples money and offering no customer support.

Princey · 7 Apr 2016 at 17:25

Well technically they haven't taken my money yet

Zumber · 7 Apr 2016 at 17:28

They have mine. On the 29th of Feb about 5 minutes of the sales going live.

D3K · 7 Apr 2016 at 21:02

Rilot said:
From their blog: "We will be issuing a refund of the shipping cost difference to all customers who paid for express shipping but received economy shipping. We apologize for any inconvenience."

Have they opened up the choice of economy shipping yet?

The blog post lies. Very few of the people who had their orders repaired have gotten their place back in the queue, and even fewer have had anything shipped.

TriedandTested · 7 Apr 2016 at 21:12

What's the mobile phone integration like? Can't find anything online.

Blackbadger · 7 Apr 2016 at 21:38

It looks a little fiddly, but useable.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.htc.vivephoneservice

Nismo · 7 Apr 2016 at 21:59

GF just spent an hour in VR with Cloudlands Minigolf no problem, then I wimped out after about 30 seconds of playing the Brookhaven demo

Most compelling experience so far is Will of ex Tested.com fame and his FooVR app. Brilliant use of VR IMO, I can't wait for more episodes.

jommy999 · 7 Apr 2016 at 22:26

I heard that SteamVR come with a “Desktop Theater Mode” that will make any game playable with SteamVR (and thus the Vive), even if it wasn’t coded for VR originally.

can anyone confirm this ? wonder do i need to buy Virtual Desktop software ? or both are different ?

darkgen · 7 Apr 2016 at 22:34

Rilot said:
From their blog: "We will be issuing a refund of the shipping cost difference to all customers who paid for express shipping but received economy shipping. We apologize for any inconvenience."

I wonder how that will be applied. Or will it continue to be a case of "bring it our attention and We'll do something about it". I'll wait to receive the thing on Monday (hopefully) and then start making faces.

pioneer2000 · 8 Apr 2016 at 00:24

From their updated blog:

"My pending authorisation hold dropped off my card and I haven't received shipping information. What do I do?"

"Please contact our customer care team with you order number and we will look into this for you".

Brilliant HTC. Sounds like you've lost my order then! Not sure why I need to contact THEM, when it's their mistake.

BIG Phil · 8 Apr 2016 at 00:36

pioneer2000 said:
From their updated blog:

"My pending authorisation hold dropped off my card and I haven't received shipping information. What do I do?"

"Please contact our customer care team with you order number and we will look into this for you".

Brilliant HTC. Sounds like you've lost my order then! Not sure why I need to contact THEM, when it's their mistake.

I had a response from HTC about this very query this afternoon and was told everything was "fine"...

That will be something to look forward to dealing with later today then.

hyperseven · 8 Apr 2016 at 04:57

Anyone tried 'DCS World' yet?

Nismo · 8 Apr 2016 at 06:53

jommy999 said:
I heard that SteamVR come with a “Desktop Theater Mode” that will make any game playable with SteamVR (and thus the Vive), even if it wasn’t coded for VR originally.

can anyone confirm this ? wonder do i need to buy Virtual Desktop software ? or both are different ?

Virtual Desktop does more in terms of configuration and movie playback, and also seems a smoother and better experience as it uses a different VR API to Steam I think.

Both let you play normal games on a massive virtual screen that appears to float just in front of you. It's OK but I think due to the resolution of the Vive I still prefer to use a traditional monitor for non-VR games.

Cosimo · 8 Apr 2016 at 07:38

twoodster · 8 Apr 2016 at 08:25

pioneer2000 said:
From their updated blog:

"My pending authorisation hold dropped off my card and I haven't received shipping information. What do I do?"

"Please contact our customer care team with you order number and we will look into this for you".

Brilliant HTC. Sounds like you've lost my order then! Not sure why I need to contact THEM, when it's their mistake.

I'm gonna hold off doing that. Plenty seem to have shipped despite the charges expiring.

Plus given how HTC have handled everything I'd rather not deal with their customer services as it'll probably end up being cancelled

I even see some people that ordered the day after have got their Vives now haha

bimbleuk · 8 Apr 2016 at 10:52

Nismo said:
Virtual Desktop does more in terms of configuration and movie playback, and also seems a smoother and better experience as it uses a different VR API to Steam I think.

Both let you play normal games on a massive virtual screen that appears to float just in front of you. It's OK but I think due to the resolution of the Vive I still prefer to use a traditional monitor for non-VR games.

I played Dying Light and Tomb Raider via Virtual desktop last night and they were perfectly playable though mouse and keyboard is awkward so controller input is highly recommended. Anyway yeah the resolution was reduced especially as I'm used to a 21:9 1440 monitor.

I also found reducing the desktop res down to 1080 also helped though again a compromise but the immersion is quite good.

What I struggled with was 3D SBS films. I tried VLC & MPC HC and neither would work in full screen as the 3D looked overlapped. In a window it was better and the 3D was good but V.D. doesn't project to a screen it appears to try to fill your full vision by cropping the window to the SBS portion of the video player window.

However I could still see borders at the periphery and that was causing bad God Rays. Plus due to the cropping it was right up near my face so i felt I was only really seeing the center portion of the picture in focus.

I'm going to post on the V.D. forum to see if I'm missing something crucial.

Blackbadger · 8 Apr 2016 at 11:26

3dtv.at has been the goto app for 3D video for years, I believe it has support for the rift, unsure of the vive.

chef-borjan · 8 Apr 2016 at 12:02

I feel quite bad for Jules on Twitter who is trying to sort this all out... I'm sure she is swamped by unhappy customers!

Vinno · 8 Apr 2016 at 12:13

hyperseven said:
Anyone tried 'DCS World' yet?

I had a quick go in the P-51. Its been a looooong time since I last played so none of my bindings were set up and I'd forgotten the start up sequence.

It was truly frustrating, but once I got it semi sorted I had a quick flight.

As far as the resolution goes, I think it will be possible to play "seriously" if you are familiar with the aircraft. If you know which dial is which beforehand you can make out whats going on. But in terms of pure readability the resolution is too low to read any actual lettering or figures clearly.

For anything with advanced avionics I'm not sure, I'm going to try it out a bit more later. When I play on my monitor I have a button bound to zoom the view in but it doesn't seem to work with VR active, which is a shame - this would make it totally playable for me. I'd normally zoom in when using the MFDs in the A-10 or something anyway.

The feeling of flying is something else though. I took off in the P-51 and instantly felt my stomach roll a little bit. Doing barrel rolls and maneuvers close to the ground was such an amazing feeling. Almost terrifying since you do actually feel like you're actually there.

I'll try to have a go later and over the weekend. Hopefully it's playable using all of the dials and readouts etc. It could be amazing.