HTC VIVE Cosmos

Tracking could still use some improvement but it is a great headset that doesnt need light houses. Since I dont have a dedicated play space this is exactly what I need. It has an official attachment coming that lets it use the light houses so I can upgrade if I do get a dedicated space.

I am still trying to understand what HTC intended with the Cosmos Set. Considering the whole background and all the competitors and their technologies, I expected this one to be a ground breaking release. I dont like the lenses and I dont like the bad tracking on artificial lights. It is not compatible with Windows Mixed Reality despite all the cameras, and cant track anything else unless you purchase the whole outside tracking extra stuff.... Just like Hello Games did to No Man Sky, I am expecting HTC to release a update that will unleash some untapped potential of the Cosmos head set... If that happens I will come back here to change my statement. One more thing, 1 year of viveport subscription is nothing considering the software that you get access to. I expected to have at least Beat Saber, Sparc, and others to make it worth consider a continuous subscription. I am only considering 3 stars there, because eye resolution and sound quality are quite good. Also due to the flip up and cooling features. Others issues are, parts come off too easily, it is very hard to set focus sweet spot, it is connected to Steam VR but it fails to initiate Steam when it runs the VR room,

If your getting this headset for some casual play or just to explore scenery, its perfect. But if you want play real games and get into it, it fails to keep tracking when you need it most. Until they release the option to use lighthouses for tracking, I would not recommend getting this in its current state. HTCs inside-out tracking tech is far behind Oculuss. I often found when I brought the controller up to my face to aim with a weapon, its loses tracking and flings around everywhere. I regret getting this headset early, if you want inside-out tracking, get Oculus. Theyre way farther ahead with their software then HTC is. The fact that they thought they could release a headset in this state is just unacceptable. The flip design is great, but there no eye relief, and Im constantly losing the sweet spot. If they had a way to properly secure it to your face, itd be perfect. The headphones that come with it are cheap. They snap up and snap down, I often found they never stayed snapped down hard enough that theyd snap back up.

The controllers are very bulky and feel cheap. The vibration does not feel natural at all more like a buzzer. Rotating one of the thumbsticks around would click and felt like tape was coming up when depressing it. I could not get any audio to playback after messing with it for a half hour this might be a steam issue. The headset would also message that the room was too dark with natural light room light and controllers would not track even with their bright lights. My setup had to be in near daylight to work properly. The controllers still seemed to lag even when it was working. If you passed the controllers in front of your face crossing cameras the tracking would get stuck and take a second once it was in a position to track them. The headset display is better than the Oculus Rift/(S) and is more comfortable being able to position the headset from the Halo. However nothing else measures up to it. Tracking is not as good. There is considerable lag tracking the controllers compared to the Rift/(S). And it does not bounce back near as fast. I really wanted to like this headset being the only VR new headset with PC Wireless capability but sadly is a major letdown and will be returning.

This review is of the Vive Cosmos. Ive seen Vive Pro reviews get mixed in here. My primary basis for comparison is the original Rift with Touch controllers. To start with the good points: • Resolution is excellent. Text is clear, where I always had legibility issues with Rift. The higher pixel + subpixel density make a huge difference with clarity. • Much reduced SDE (screen door effect). Related to resolution. They opted to use RGB LCD displays instead of RGBG OLED displays. Not only is the subpixel density of LCD 50% higher than OLED, but the actual light emission surface area of OLED is much lower than LCD, giving more black space between subpixels, exaggerating SDE. • Halo design very comfortable. Overall fit feels more balanced than the Rift and less fatigue on long sessions (1 hour +) • Flip up goggle design amazing for eyeglass wearers. This feature is a godsend for putting on and taking off the unit for anyone that wears eyeglasses. It was always a battle with the Rift, having to stretch it out as far as it could go and still having the goggles catch my glasses. I can also wear glasses with larger frames than I could with the Rift. • Good ventilation. There is improved ventilation around your eyes with the gaps at brow and nose, ventilated design of the electronics components, and induced draft from the cooling fan for said electronics. I generally no longer sweat around the fit of the goggles like I did with the Rift. • Controller ergonomics improved over older Vive controllers. I thought the wand type Vive controllers felt awkward in VR the one time I used them. These feel natural, albeit not at the same level as the Touch controllers. If only someone would figure out a way to use the Cosmos headset with Touch controllers/sensors • Wireless adapter option. I can hardly wait to pick up one of these to cut the cord for good. Never was an option with the original Rift. • Very easy setup. Thanks to the inside-out tracking, there are no lighthouses to set up and configure. Now for the downsides: • Vive optics are exquisitely awful. Godrays, a tiny sweet spot, seeing reflections off of the Fresnel ridges, distortion. Rift also uses Fresnel lenses, but the ring density is higher. Still has some of the same problems, but it is obvious more effort went into optics design on the Rift. FORTUNATELY there is a solution to the optics problem. Third parties sell an adapter and lens kit that takes the lenses from a specific GearVR unit and incorporates them into a 3D printed adapter to fit in the Cosmos. It will set you back another $70, but worth every penny. Takes about 5 minutes to install and the clarity afterward is unbelievably good (photo of the replacement lenses installed in review). Personally, I think ALL VR sets should use similar lenses stock. (DISCLAIMER: THIS WILL VOID YOUR WARRANTY and prevent returns, but imo this improvement is still worth the risk) • Tracking not what it should be for a 2nd gen headset, yet. It is difficult to compare this to the Rift, which uses outside-in tracking that is extremely responsive and solid. Sudden headset motions will give a detectable lag. Rooms that are not reasonably well-lit are a problem (used to be a big problem). Controller tracking sometimes choppy, although it is possible my older rig is playing some role. Sometimes the controller tracking locks up entirely and Ive had to restart my PC to resolve it. I have only had this happen if I pause a session for a while then come back to it. Sometimes I cant get the headset to start tracking at all and have to restart the PC. However, all these issues are software related and it would be a good assumption to claim they will gradually go away as the product and software matures. Overall, this is a good product that will become a great product once the software and firmware kinks are resolved. Hopefully htc will wake up and release a version with improved lenses. Fresnel lenses should have no part in fine optics. Before doing the lens mod, I was disappointed in both the product and my purchase. Since, the visuals are stunning and I am seeing improvements being made to the software. The Viveport Infinity membership included is a nice touch. Lots of content available which is typically expensive for VR platforms. UPDATE 9/17/20: After nearly a year, HTC still cant get their act together. Head tracking never was quite right and the scene will always bob with moderate to sharp change in movement. Controller tracking very glitchy - often times my virtual hands would freeze up allowing rotation, but no movement. Viveport software buggy and getting any title to run is always a far longer process than it needs to be. Audio only works half the time. It seems that every time I want to use the device, there are some problems that need to be fixed first. Exact opposite experience as with Oculus. In addition to the lens mod, I added the wireless module. While it does un-tether you from the PC, its not truly wireless and requires you have a cable from the headset to a chunky power supply on a belt clip. The Cosmos is such a power hog you cant use just any power supply, but a 21W model I havent seen anywhere except through HTC. Their video compression is not that great and there was noticeable pixellation in some games wireless. Now the Oculus Quest 2 has been announced at less than half the cost of the Cosmos and specs are better in almost every way except maybe audio and stock headband comfort.

1 out of 9 games from steam work on it. Includes obv choices like SuperHot - totally unusable. The games that do are very sub par. The controls are junk, totally not intuitive. The original Vive was great for that. The headphones WILL NOT WORK FOR YOU. They make sound, but they were designed to snap against your ears. Only... they dont. They spring out, so you hear sound from 2 away from your head. Terrible design. The setup process barely works. Actually, Id say it DOESNT work for the vast majority of people, you just need to thrash around at buttons and boundary settings until something happens and it moves forward. Took over an hour to do that. Did I mention the control are TERRIBLE? This is a MASSIVE step down from the original Vive. Returning this and setting up my Vive again. What a piece of junk.

Fun to play have trouble at first after updates works great now

Reviewing the Vive Cosmos: I have this in a room with no direct sunlight and it tracks flawlessly. Not sure if its improved software or better room lighting than others but Ive had no issues. I also havent noticed any issues with the controllers playing Beat Saber which has run and responded totally smoothly. Its pretty comfortable, the sound is good, screen and FOV is great, no issues tracking. The issue finding the sweet spot for clear vision is real though. Ive been able to fine tune the fit to make it work but a DIY velcro strap or something will likely be better. The controls are a little heavy and not grippy so Im looking into something to aid the grip with them. The batteries in the controls last about as long as Id expect and I just use a rotation of Eneloop batteries so its not an inconvenience at all. Six batteries with two swapped out and charging/charged gets the job done. The fact that the controllers are non-standard and dont work with a bunch of programs is by far the biggest issue. Why? It doesnt make any sense. Overall really happy. Not having to set up a room is great. I threw this into a box with my PC and headed to a friends house for an evening of VR and it was super easy.

Do you see a lot of reviews of the Vive cosmos that are negative? Well this one isn’t. I think it’s a great headset fairly comfortable when adjusted right. The six cameras do incredible work in virtual reality. You are not Imprisoned by base units it’s just the headset and the controllers. I choose to play sitting down often mostly because I’m still learning and I don’t want to knock everything over in my house. You can stand up, some games Require it. This is a moderately priced headset and controller box and worth the money! I’ve been having fun that I didn’t know existed.

This headset would overheat after 1 to 2 hours of play time and the picture would go black and restart constantly, the fit was not very comfortable either so I couldnt imagine leaving it on for more than 3 hours anyway. As a company I would advise not doing business with HTC, they have a strict no refund policy when it comes to their online games service. I started the 14 day free trial but did not find many games that were fun to play for longer than 30 minutes. Before the end of the trial I could not log in to my account to cancel, I opened a ticket with customer support because even after resetting my password I was still unable to get in. Support took 3 days to fix the situation and I had gone past the free trial end date and they charged my account for a years subscription. I explained to customer support in a separate ticket about my situation, receiving a defective product, being unable to log in to cancel my free trial, and requesting a refund only 2 days after it started. They refused me flat out and kept quoting their no refund policy. So now I am stuck with a years subscription to a service I cannot even use. Not recommended, there are far better VR systems out there for a similar or cheaper price.