looking to upgrade from Quest 2

DaYteX

DaYteX

DaYteX

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Joined
7 Dec 2009
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50
Hi all,

I recently discovered DCS world using my quest 2, and it's amazing, clocking in 100 hours in little over 2 months its fair to say i'm hooked.

Problem is the quality from the quest 2 isn't the best, some text and details are not in focus unless I get really close, as well as details outside the plane are poor, from looking online I can see that the VR quality can be better than this. Also wearing the quest for a few hours is uncomfortable and leaves terrible marks on my face.

So now im looking to upgrade to something better, but i'm struggling to understand what to look out for, the specs of the quest 2 seem to be better than many of the competitors which are double the price, It makes me think I'm comparing them incorrectly.

Has anyone here upgraded from a quest 2, Id be keen to know what for and if there was a visual difference?

I was looking at the HTC Cosmos Elite but the specs seem to be worse than the Quest 2, I did look at the HTC Vive Pro 2 but the price tag is a little scary.

The PC im using is a 10th Gen I9, 3080TI, 32GB RAM

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thank You
 
Quest pro is incredible for PCVR. It is a literal game changer with its image quality.

I was totally astonished when I played Elite Dangerous in it for the first time. Every piece of text was sharp and readable. Skyrim which looks really muddy on Quest 2 was sharp and clear and it was like I'd got a GPU upgrade for free.

You wouldn't believe it if you just looked at the resolution specs, but it's a huge jump in clarity and visuals, and is sharper than most high end headsets and is clear right across the lens due to the pancake lenses and Quantum Dot LED screens.

Coming soon is a mod to allow eye tracked foveated rendering for openXR games which includes some of the best Sims, which could give a big performance boost.

I've hardly touched my Quest 2 and Index since getting one.

Plus you can still play your Quest native games on it.

See for yourself:
youtu.be

Meta Quest Pro Through The Lenses | PCVR | MSFS | RTX 4090 FE

Running with TAA, as DLSS is not showing up on MSFS latest build from MS store running on Win 11.DLSS Reflex ON+BOOSTTerrain Level Of Detail 100Ojects Level ...
youtu.be youtu.be
 
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a couple of choices

Sell the Quest 2 and either get a Quest Pro if you currently want "the best" depending on how much you want to spend

or

Sell the Quest 2 and buy a Pico 4 as the Pico is more combatable and a slight improvement over the Quest 2 in picture quality

or

Wait for the Quest 3
 
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DaYteX said:
The PC im using is a 10th Gen I9, 3080TI, 32GB RAM
Click to expand...

Pico 3 link with that spec and DCS. A G2 maybe, but with DCS you'll be grasping for a 4090 when things get busy on screen.

The obvious upgrade is a Pimax Crystal when it releases, visually it blows everything else away from those that have had hands on with it. The main reason DCS looks dash through you're quest is the compression, don't get sold on another headset without a display port connection if you want better for DCS.
 
So the quest pro is good then? I read some user reviews which we not very complementary of it. Is the Quest pro comfortable to wear?

I ruled the pro out due to some bad reviews but mostly the price, would the performance of the quest pro be that much better than the HTC Vive Pro 2? which is a few hundred quid cheaper.

Would there be anything in the sub £1000 mark which would offer a better performance and greater comfort over the quest 2?
 
Quest Pro can be uncomfortable out of the box, best mod seems to be a side-to-side top strap which can be got very cheaply.

Don't believe most of the reviews - if the Quest Pro had been released as the Valve Deckard then people would be raving over it.

You really have to see it to believe it. I dismissed it too as too expensive, and not much better than Quest 2, but I've never seen anything look so clear and sharp. It makes the Quest 2 look like a Gear VR.

On a link cable at 500mbps it looks like a native display port connection. For some reason the Pro seems to show less compression artefacts than the Quest 2. I can play Skyrim wirelessly at 200mbps and it doesn't look like a smeary mess. You can still see the compression but it's not as obvious.

It is expensive, mainly because it's got a lot of stuff packed in there. The biggest issue currently is not all its features are being taken advantage of, but that's changing.

This is a good explanation of how good it is.

- YouTube

Enjoy the videos and music that you love, upload original content and share it all with friends, family and the world on YouTube.
www.youtube.com www.youtube.com

The alternatives are the Pico 4. or wait for Quest 3.
 
Firstly, Thank you all for the suggestions.

Im worried investing in the best headset like the Quest Pro, or the Pico G2, ill then be needing a new GPU and before you know it ive gone done the rabbit hole.

Ive not heard of Pico before, they seem to have a few options, I wouldn't need it to work as a stand alone headset however this is an advantage as long as the weight isnt to much. The pricing seems to be more what I was looking for and the screen res seems to be an improvement on the quest 2, Which would be best in my situation, the Pico 4 or the Pico neo3 link or neo3 pro eye? do they all have a display port connection?

Finally are the Pico comfortable to wear for a few hours at a time? The design looks just like the quest which after 30 mins I have marks on my face and after an hour I need to take a break.
 
The neo 3 link would be the best in your situation, per the hardware you have and the game you wish to play. Performance for me (3090 same CPU) was greatly improved swapping out the G2 for the Neo3 in DCS with no noticeable difference in visual quality. We're all made different, so i wouldn't comment if you could wear it for hours.

The quest pro is a bit of a dud, there's a reason they knocked £300 off the price. If you really did wish to blow 1.5k, wait on the Crystal.
 
I’ll have to see what my Quest 2 looks like now with encode set to 500mps with 4090 driving it.
That could actually be a better VR upgrade overall for you.
 
OP sub £1k you might want to consider the HP Reverb G2 or Pico 3 Link which are both well liked, the Vive Pro 2 really divides opinion, personally I wouldn't buy 1 after the feedback I've seen on it. At around £1.5k you have the Quest Pro which seems better than it's quite low resolution suggests or the upcoming Pimax Crystal which specs wise is comfortably the best but the company has a tarnished reputation. Quest 3 will release this year, that's what I'll be upgrading to from my Quest 2.
 
Quest pro, if you're happy second hand, seems to be going for quite a lot less than rrp on ebay. Failed scalpers, or maybe people selling off business units that never got used?
 
lokiss said:
The quest pro is a bit of a dud, there's a reason they knocked £300 off the price. If you really did wish to blow 1.5k, wait on the Crystal.
Click to expand...

It's not flying off the shelves at that price for sure, but it's by no means a dud. The hardware is legitimately next level VR.
It comes closer to the mythical 'perfect' headset than any other I've tried.

It's not until you try it on a decent PC that you realise that it's more than the sum of its parts.

I know I'm going fanboy on this but it really is that good.

Here's a video of some guy just talking about how good it is.

youtu.be

Quest Pro review

This review of the Quest Pro is from a gamers perspective.it's simply wonderful.enjoy.
youtu.be youtu.be

Quest pro is the perfect upgrade from Quest 2, but only if you can get one relatively cheap or don't mind paying the full price.

And let's put that price into perspective. The Index is 4 years old, has low resolution and is still regarded as one of the best PCVR headsets. It costs £930. It requires lighthouses so is restricted to a single location.

The Quest Pro blows the Index away in terms of image quality, it can be used wirelessly and has eye and face tracking, none of which are currently possible with the Index. It also has a standalone library and built in hand tracking and can be taken to any indoor space. The controllers self-track and have advanced haptics.

When you put that into perspective it starts to look less expensive by comparison.
The issue is that people are comparing the Pro to the subsidised Quest 2 when in reality it should be compared to high end PC headsets.
 
Trying not to go off topic but has anyone seen/read what extra GPU load it takes to encode real time full res. VR frames (at 500mps for example)?
Having your graphics card doing this extra work increases time spent in the 11.1ms frametime thus leading to reprojection and therefore worse image quality. Yes the pro will be great upgrade due to actual panel type and improved optics but using USB in theory is still gonna drop quality.
With enough GPU headroom obviously you won’t see a difference game dependant.
 
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I liken the Pro to the Matrix "
Andy D said:
Trying not to go off topic but has anyone seen/read what extra GPU load it takes to encode real time full res. VR frames (at 500mps for example)?
Having your graphics card doing this extra work increases time spent in the 11.1ms frametime thus leading to reprojection and therefore worse image quality. Yes the pro will be great upgrade due to actual panel type and improved optics but using USB in theory is still gonna drop quality.
With enough GPU headroom obviously you won’t see a difference game dependant.
Click to expand...

All the headsets that use compression over USB work better on higher end graphics cards, especially Nvidia cards which have better encoding. You do get a bit of additional latency but I've never noticed it.

Would I prefer a display port connection? Of course. But at 500mbps encode rate over USB I can't tell the difference on the Pro, even in very complex scenes like modded Skyrim or fast moving racing sims like PC2.

The thing about the Quest Pro is its actual encoded resolution is slightly less than Quest 2 and it's much less than high res headsets like the G2, so you get some of that performance back as it's not pushing as many pixels but is hugely sharper and clearer across the whole image. It seems contradictory but it really does give a better image at a lower resolution due to the advanced optical stack.
 
The only way to see this is to try it for yourself. Then go back to your old headset and compare and be astonished how you put up with fresnel lenses and washed out LCD for so long.
 
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DaYteX said:
Hi all,

I recently discovered DCS world using my quest 2, and it's amazing, clocking in 100 hours in little over 2 months its fair to say i'm hooked.

Problem is the quality from the quest 2 isn't the best, some text and details are not in focus unless I get really close, as well as details outside the plane are poor, from looking online I can see that the VR quality can be better than this. Also wearing the quest for a few hours is uncomfortable and leaves terrible marks on my face.

So now im looking to upgrade to something better, but i'm struggling to understand what to look out for, the specs of the quest 2 seem to be better than many of the competitors which are double the price, It makes me think I'm comparing them incorrectly.

Has anyone here upgraded from a quest 2, Id be keen to know what for and if there was a visual difference?

I was looking at the HTC Cosmos Elite but the specs seem to be worse than the Quest 2, I did look at the HTC Vive Pro 2 but the price tag is a little scary.

The PC im using is a 10th Gen I9, 3080TI, 32GB RAM

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thank You
Click to expand...

Since you have the Quest 2 already, I would try to improve that first. Have you messed about with Oculus Debug tool to change the encoder bitrate etc? There are some changes there that make a big difference to the visuals.

In the Oculus App, what resolution are you using?
 
melmac said:
Since you have the Quest 2 already, I would try to improve that first. Have you messed about with Oculus Debug tool to change the encoder bitrate etc? There are some changes there that make a big difference to the visuals.

In the Oculus App, what resolution are you using?
Click to expand...

As you might be able to tell, I'm a total VR noob, and i didnt know you could change anything, Stupidly i assumed the image you got was the image. Are they any useful videos on how to get the best performance you can out of your quest?


Ravenger said:
I've read some good stories of people getting brand new unopened Quest Pros off eBay at a cheap price.
Click to expand...

I didnt think to look at this and your right, the market is flooded with them, which is good but also worrying as to why.

lokiss said:
The neo 3 link would be the best in your situation, per the hardware you have and the game you wish to play. Performance for me (3090 same CPU) was greatly improved swapping out the G2 for the Neo3 in DCS with no noticeable difference in visual quality. We're all made different, so i wouldn't comment if you could wear it for hours.

The quest pro is a bit of a dud, there's a reason they knocked £300 off the price. If you really did wish to blow 1.5k, wait on the Crystal.
Click to expand...

I very nearly bought the Pico 3, but my worry is that on paper its the same as i already have but with a display port, is it really worth around £200 after i sell my quest to upgrade for this? The pico also dosnt have many aftermarket options for head straps while the quest has loads, and it seems this sort of design really messes with my face, I have to time my gaming and avoid using it when I know im due to go out in an hour or so.

The Vive Pro 2 really looks like a headset which was designed for full immersion and is comfortable for long hours of use, but £1200 for a 3yr old bit of kit is silly, plus them controllers are horrible.



I find myself drifting back towards the Quest Pro now the price isnt so much of an issue. The one thing im getting mixed vibes on is the lack of a display port cable for it. Id assume this is an issue from some of the comments but others above seem to suggest that you can get just as good of a rate due the chip in the quest pro helping with the compression? or is this the GPU helping with this in which case would my 3080TI be ok?

Or as someone mentioned before, just avoid anything without a display port cable.. ?
 
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