How do you like the Crystal? I also have a 4090 and Reverb G2. How does the crystal compare to the G2?

@@tomgromko5641 There is absolutely NO comparison tbh. The clarity, the colors, the FOV, the BLACK black... I was super happy with my G2, but there definitely are levels to the game. None much higher than the Crystal though. Not for the price point at least 🙂

Eye tracking is not yet active for everyone unfortunately. I’m not sure how long it will be, but it feels like it’s very close to being ready. In fact if it was up to me, I think it’s ready to throw out there for people to try.

​@@ImmersedRobotwhat's the deal with that? Reviewers get preview software?

@@RobFisherUK it’s not exclusive to reviewers. There’s a beta group testing features of upcoming software updates.

I record in a couple of ways, depending on if I just want to capture a bit of quick footage, or if I want to record via a separate PC in order to give an accurate representation of performance. I'll quickly outline them below: 1. Recording on the same PC I'm playing: I have two monitors on my PC and always use the second monitor to display a full screen view of my mirrored VR. I usually do this by using the 'Display VR view' option in SteamVR, but also sometimes use an OBS plugin to capture the OpenXR mirror (this is required when playing OpenXR native titles such as MSFS). This means that I have a full 1080p display which can then be captured in OBS while playing. I usually upscale this when redering it out to 1440p (this is a trick to force KZfaq to use the higher quality video codec, since it won't always do so for 1080p videos), but it's effectively a 1080p capture of my left eye in VR. 2. Recording on a second PC: With this method, I basically set things up in the same way as above, with my second monitor showing a fullscreen display of my VR view. But this time I route this through an Elgato capture card to a second PC and record this display using the Elgato software. This way, there is no performance hit on the PC I'm playing on. This is slightly more hassle, but frees up my main PC to play the game. Recording in SBS-3D is something I've only experimented with briefly, so can't really speak too much of a way to improve that aspect unfortunately.

@@ImmersedRobot Thank yew sir…keep up the great work

Haha! That might well be true.

I’d like to try locking things to 45fps, and that may follow if the motion reprojection or smart smoothing is confirmed to be working as it should. The black bars are definitely associated only with performance issues. In minor situations you would really have to jerk your head around to see them, but they become more noticeable at lower framerates. It also isn’t exclusive to MSFS. I wouldn’t be too concerned by them if you can tweak and get framerate to a reasonable level.

No problem. I can definitely understand the frustration of people not able to use a feature which, to me, feels ready to deploy. However, I believe there are some concerns over rolling out an update which could cause other issues behind the scenes which cannot be easily rolled back (at least this is one of the reasons I’ve heard). I believe they want to be sure no permanent issues are caused by the update, but it’s still difficult to see that when beta testers appear to have very few issues.

@@ImmersedRobot I see that but I just compare it with Steam apps where you can switch back and forth between betas, release candidate and stable. But of course, integrating this feature into Pimax Play isn't easy and we are probably better off letting them put the work into actual features for the Crystal. But they could provide Beta software with the note that you might need to re-install in case it doesn't work... Anyway, big thanks for your words and for your helpful videos!

Sorry to hear that. I’m not sure what else to suggest as I don’t really have any special contact with Pimax support. I have a contact for Pimax, but they don’t have any involvement with the support side. I’ve heard this several times now, and feel like they really need to get this resolved - it is definitely damaging their reputation.

@@ImmersedRobot Thanks anyway, Gary, I fixed my Crystal by satisfying my curiosity regarding what would happen if I held down the Power and Volume buttons as I applied power (plugged in USB). The power light started bright white (now blue) and when I looked in the HMD I saw the Pimax home!! All is well again.

Good to know! Thanks.

@@ImmersedRobot And also, London is THE most demanding place in the whole world to fly (in the sim at least). As such it is a great place to dial in your set and forget settings. If it works good THERE, it will work great other places.

@@ImmersedRobot And volumetric cloud is the single most FPS hungry setting,apart from the terrain level of detail. The objects level of detail is also costly, but the volumetric clouds will easily eat 10 FPS, at least if you crank it up a bit.

How come? Is it a permanent issue?

@ImmersedRobot at first the screens were flickering so I lowered the resolution down which seemed to cure the problem, then it would freeze and totally lock the machine out or screw with my other USB devices. Then I had an issue where if it was connected to the computer when starting it wouldn't allow the machine to post. And finally it muted all its sound output in Windows and just sat turning its lh screen on and off. I've emailed the issues to pimax and am awaiting a response however the unit is now removed and waiting to send back. The mighty hp g2 is now back on duty for the time being. But the short time I had with it working correctly was good, but the g2 is much better to wear.

@@anthonypinder9384 sorry to hear that. Hope they respond quickly!

Let’s hope so one quick question are you suppose to get an extra set of lenses with the crystal as I only got the ones on the headset.

@@anthonypinder9384 they are sending out the 42PPD lenses separately, although Pimax are also now giving the alternate option of upgrading to the wide FOV lenses for a reduced cost instead. I don’t know the specific details of that at this stage however.

I don’t do mid-rolls, give me some credit at least.

Buy Premium.

@@ImmersedRobot Fair enough mate