I want my Pimax!
Delivery is a mess but they have a new guy and production is ramping up, far from the « all back for X-mass » so be patient and fill your info here to help relief everybody stress:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1sK1w_-gU6LaPYmZF1B-5W-Mr7gC1pFTuGkv2WBrQr-Y/edit?usp=sharing
I am a backer! I just pre-ordered!
Be patient, if you are a higher back number you should have a better experience than I have, as the diver/software will improve.
I am a dev!
You don't need Pimax, it's more trouble than problem solving: you need your UI to work great on small FOV and not just on Pimax.
Testing performance is just impossible, Pimax is kinda hacking SteamVR, they use different rendering resolution with different drivers, these are constantly changing, so way to tailor content performance. Also requiring a top of the line GPU that not even 10% of people have is just non sense. Rift/Vive are GTX 970 min. Trying to have a 1080ti as a base?
Wait for GDC 2019, there are some cool news coming for you.
Final thoughts
What Pimax is trying to achieve is brave, that is also a synonym for useless, why don't we have larger FOV (140-150) releasing very soon, even as SDK? Because the tech is not here.
You could push FOV to 140-150 if you have some very good R&D and top people in the field, going beyond that is just not doable using the current combination of flat screens, and a set of Fresnel Lenses. You need much more, you need eye tracking, very advanced optics and some great software.
It won't work without having the HMD calibrating with the user eyes (Through eye tracking cameras).
Pimax is trying to do something not possible with the tech they are using. You take a Rift and a Vive and try to push their FOV and that is exactly what you will get: failure.
You probably could do it for 1 user, having the full pipeline tailored and calibrated for him, but consumer HMDs need to be good for « 98% » of your users.
The pimax is looking exactly like a Rift/Vive on steroid.
It's showing the optical limitation of the current tech in combination of software compensation for distortion and Chromatic aberration.
With the current software implementation, and low FPS it's definitely for me not worth Deving VR on it, I'd rather continue using my Rift.
It's all sad really because I want Pimax to be good, FOV has always been for me a much bigger problem than resolution, I remember having presence in some great Dk1 demos, but FOV is really my 1st wish.
Pimax is like that thing you want, you want to believe it's a usable HMD that will replace your Rift/Vive, something good enough to be Gen 1.5 or even 2!
With every VR hardware: when you try something better, you just can't go back, on any aspect, Pimax shows you amazing FOV, but the trade off for all the rest, the fact that it doesn't improve anything else make it not the right solution using that current (outdated Rift/Vive)technology.
You could very probably if you are Valve or Oculus make a 140-150 ish FOV without Eye tracking, better resolution, less optical issues and great software, but that's about it. Not much better.
True Gen2 will need to be much more than that.
