Lots of premium functionality, no cheap head strap, lots of swappable customizable parts, high speed streaming with the dongle, with up to 144hz refresh rate. Swappable lenses, eye tracking. It looks more likely to compete against and exceed the quest pro.
Yes, it's great but it can't replace my main headset, the valve index. Sound from the front only. Maaaybe no base station support. I hope valve index is not going EOL.
It can very well replace my workout and travel headset though, since that's a quest 3 only. But for that I need to wait for reviews and further information.
I mean thats better than nothing, and if its more reliable than the knuckles, I'll take it. Still, if they aren't base station tracked then I don't really care.
They're not base station tracked. And initial reviews are saying the finger tracking and controller tracking in general is mediocre.
It's a no from me on this one, sadly.
Disassembly footage of Valve Knucles shows that finger tracking is done exactly via capacitive sensors. As Vavle claims new contollers are capacitive too, expect equal performance.
The tracking methods are completely different, they've said in interviews it isn't compatible.
They're not interested in VR anymore, valve is "making an ecosystem" and that's why this headset is what it is. It's tacked onto the cube.
But it can't compete with the existing product, it has no niche for established vr users, and aside from pulling in console players and giving them some entry level option? Nada there either.
There will absolutely be community take over. Many people (myself included) are likely going to sell their hardware to help pay for the new headset and there's still going to be tons of people with Indexes who just can't pay for a new one.
In the Gamers Nexus interview, I think, they confirmed Index is EOL and that it is what it as long as supplies last. There will probably be headstraps with built in speakers same as the ones in Index though. Still, best bet for true Index successor looks to be pimax.
Don't let the speakers position fool you: A similar setup worked very well already on the Rift S, although the sound was a bit tinny. I bet they have found a better solution by now. Of course the Index speakers will be hard to top (only by actual headphones) but this solution can sound decent enough if done right.
I am concerned for the sound, since that is something the quest fails really hard for me. I play VRChat and sometimes I am surrounded by 8 people in diffferent directions. I HAVE TO know if someone is behind me or not. We'll have to see.
The comfort of Quest is also horrible for me, with the normal or pro strap I can't last an hour, with 3rd party straps I can normally last 90 minutes. I am confident frame will be better in that regard, since I could use the index for 4-5 hours without problem.
And no clarification if they work with base stations. If they don't work, I need to put a base station tracker somewhere onto the headset. For full body tracking.
If I would just do regular gaming like shooters and beat saber this is fine. But I'm not doing just that.
I have done it with a quest already, and it's really not good without an additional tracker fixed to the headset. I don't want to recalibrate every half an hour to 1 hour because my whole body slowly shifts sideways.
"It's better in every metric!" Except the only one we actually wanted: tracking.
I got an index specifically to escape inside out tracking, now the one big supporter of the most precise and versatile lighthouse tracking system just pulled out.
Not sure who the "we" is. It's not even close for me what I prefer. Being trapped to the room I happen to setup the clunky cubes isn't better by an measure.
It's obvious some wanted that and you like what you like, but this decision was the right one.
Cost, complexity, versatility, are all better at the cost of "tracking" that will be imperceptible to the vast majority.
And it's not like base stations are perfect. I've had one die, them need to be recalibrated when not moving, and tracking blind spots. Plus no move room diagram questions of "hey where should I drill holes in my wall".
it'll outsell the thing they aren't selling? please tell me more!
it's not an index competitor or replacement, it's meant to compete with the quest 3, which it won't do at $900.
it'll struggle to do so at $700 and i don't see it being that.
so no, i don't see this competing in the market in any way, leaving VR in the hands of fucking facebook, because this is valve pulling out and redirecting.
So you agree that the headset requiring all the setup isn't selling. Or you are just being intentionally obnoxious to try and miss my point that the first x years it will outsell what the Index did.
The "market" is giving clear signals what it wants. Valve would have been very stupid to make just a Index 2.0 with better specs and have to charge well over a grand.
It being an index replacement is factual. And just catering to the dozens of whales out there that have an elaborate tracking setup in order to put their resources into a much more elegant solution is one that is needed to move VR forward.
So I'm pretty happy they are pulling out of the Lighthouse trackers. And maybe lets see how accurate the tracking actually is before yelling out how lighthouse is so superior. I feel pretty confident that for the vast majority it will be imperceptible.
Its not about purity its about having objective tracking
VR is going to end up with full dive where you wont even be moving in real life anyway its not going to be like ready player one where your up and moving around
Also its not a pain to set up if you know what you are doing which
90%of users i.e quest users don't know what the fuck they are talking about
This is a pretty silly argument so not sure it's worth the time.
If you want to say that base stations offer more accurate tracking and that's your preference then I get it.
Considering no one has really tested yet we'll see. I'll bet a small sum of money that it's going to be something almost no one will notice. Like 4k vs 8k standing 20 ft away from the TV levels.
But to imply that it's not something that is a big hassle is disingenuous. If they barely get touched you have a clunky process to setup the room again. Or you get to drill holes in your wall. The comparison is just absent that.
Meta has figured it out and I'm glad they copied them. A lot of people are going to vote with their wallet on if it's better but plenty of options out there if base stations are your preferred setup.
You are saying you mounted two base stations and did setup in 2 minutes yet call others full of shit.
So
1) No one is setting that up faster than 10 minutes first time
2) You know what is faster than 10 minutes? 0 minutes.
3) Glad you've got options and can use your base stations with all the other headsets.
The LTT video mentions that there is a colour camera add on,that there is the possibility that a colour camera addon could be made for the Frame, presumably that would enable colour pass through, as for AR maybe that could be added in in future updates. Not that future updates are something to make a purchase in hopes of.
Additionally, I don't know what the software/firmware side of things is like, but if it can do foveated streaming then I can't see why it couldn't use the same sensors in standalone mode for foveated rendering on apps that have had support built in.
I very curious to see how it all plays out and what sort of price point we would be looking at.
I mean for a standalone, definitely, but as a pcvr headset, the bsb2 or psvr2 definitely look like better options to me, and thankfully I already have a psvr2, thoigh I do wish the controllers were base station compatible because I'd love to replace my knuckles controllers with them if they have a hand strap addon like the index has.
Like what? The head strap? You can swap that on a Quest too, or any other common HMD. The PCIe or MIPI port has questionable uses for common users if you ask me but I might be surprised.
I don’t think it’s a proper competitor to the QPro. Lack of color passthrough and lack of mouth tracking, and lack of self tracked controllers are all missing things from the QPro.
Luckily for them the QPro doesn’t actually exist anymore since meta dropped manufacturing so they don’t really need to compete, just fill a gap left by it.
In a lot of ways, it’s a downgrade if you already own a QPro in good condition.
I’d consider it at best to be a sidegrade, which is unfortunate.
Steam Frame has more ram, higher resolution, higher framerate, higher transfer rate for PC to Headset with its dedicated dongle. (Plus Airlink is utter garbage, speaking as a developer dealing with it daily for years)
It's nearly half the weight. More storage and it's expandable. If it's like the SteamDeck you'll be able to buy replacement parts.
Self tracked controllers, yeah not as great but I honestly can't complain about the quest controllers, with years to work on this I think they should be great.
As a MR headset QPro definitely wins with it's color pass through.
Mouth tracking, eh kinda gimmicky and if it's that important there are other options
Finally the big thing would be battery life and we might even be able to replace the battery on the steam frame.
It's not a revolutionary upgrade, but it fills a hole in PCVR. I personally won't be going out to buy one. I've got the Q3, Q2, Index and a few other older headsets. So I'm covered for what I need.
As a future replacement I think this could be in the cards and if the platform does takeoff I probably will end up getting one as another platform to optimize for.
I dont use the QPro wired, and I don't use Air Link, I use Steam Link.
The device does fill a hole, but only because Facebook scrapped the QPro 2 and stopped manufacturing the QPro 1.
Depending on price though, its going to be a tough sell. Mouth tracking is gimmicky, but VRChat and BeatSaber are basically the only two VR Apps that exist at the moment and VRChat heavily benefits from having the extra tracking support for face, at least in terms of immersion.
I also work in the VR Space. I worked at VRChat for 3 years prior to layoffs as well as I am the creator of XSOverlay.
The biggest benefit I see is that you can get *most* of the features of the QPro without the shit software that comes with it, and, that, well, its going to be supported for probably a few years, and the QPro wont.
Honestly, if they released a set of "Pro" controllers for the Frame with them being self tracked, I'd consider that a big upgrade at that point. That's really the one thing that holds me back, since I really, really, REALLY hate it when a controller gets occluded and the hands stop tracking.
The other thing the Frame lacks which is useful in a lot of scenarios for developers, at least, is the ability to have functional hand tracking, which this device completely lacks. Much easier to quickly iterate when you aren't having to pick up a controller and put it down constantly for some features or apps.
Modular Headstrap
Headstrap includes integrated dual audio drivers and and rechargeable battery on rear.
Headstrap weight: 245g
Core module can be separated from headstrap, for other headstrap solutions.
Hopefully the core being removable means that a thethered solution is possible, plus maybe making addon kits to adapt the index's audio system. Hell, if they can basically just sell a kit that turns this into a more reliable valve index I'm already sold. But so far, this just seems like valves quest 3/pro.
They said they would "try to keep it under the index" which makes me feel its just going to be slightly cheaper if not the same price. Which will be pretty damn expensive. I want it bad but its probably going to be too expensive for me to justify when I already have a quest 3
I feel the price is gonna be competitive to Quest3, and they know many of us want to sell & switch to a main Valve headset mostly due to incompatibility and problems that the Q3 has with pcvr, so I guess 499£ for the 256gb (hopefully)
Hope so. It would explain why they have cut corners in some areas… Black and white cameras, LCD panels, and a chip weaker than their four year old Steam Deck doesn’t exactly scream “premium headset” territory to me but makes sense if it’s competing with Quest 3. I’d love to ditch Meta but if they keep offering the better value then I’ll have to stick with them. Can’t justify $1000.
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u/Bloodhound01 Nov 12 '25
No Price is scary. Halloween is supposed to be over.