Question Switching to Reverb G2: What do I need to know for VaM?

[Jocks3D]

I've been using the Quest 2 headset for VaM and will be ordering an HP Reverb G2 since it's only $299 for Black Friday. Looking forward to the better image quality. What do I need to know to run VaM with it? Do I need to use Steam VR or can I see my PC desktop with the G2 and launch VaM natively? Anything else I should know?

 

[Toddy]

I have a G2 and I love it. Recently, I have been having issues with VaM freezing on me after I played a few scenes (approx 6 scenes). I had not had these in the past. So I am assuming that a plugin, Steam VR, or the Windows Mixed Reality Portal update may be contributing to the freezing. I ran across a video that claims to bypass Steam VR for better performance for native openXR headsets like the G2. In the comments of the video it was mentioned that turning off holographicshell could improve performance as well. I would love to eliminate both Steam VR and Windows Mixed Reality Portal if it improved performance. However, I will not be experimenting until I find a solution to my issue.

 

[atani]

I also have a G2, never had a Quest 2 to be able to compare with it.
I can say quality wise it's excellent, even using it for several hours it's quite confortable. There's less weight in the front compared with the Q2, so that is possibly something you'll notice too.

I'll be taking a look at the video above, looks promising, but for a base run VAM you'll need WMR and SteamVR. Sometimes updates with SteamVR have lead me to issues, they're annoying but workable.
There's 2 versions of the G2 cables, hopefully you'll get the updated version that has a button in the cables box where the power connects. The previous version lead to some audio failures for certain controllers. Speaking of other hw annoyances, AMD motherboards had some issues, but I think that got sorted with newer firmwares.

As for the controllers, they take 1.5 V AA batteries. While you can use NiMH 1.2 V AA rechargeables, the most common type of AA rechargeables around, the batteries will not run for long and tracking will be inconsistent. I strongly suggest buying a set of four 1.5 V AA lithium rechargeables, their performance will be immensely better. Pay attention that the lithium batteries require a different charger than the NiMH one, usually micro-usb.

 

[Jocks3D]

but for a base run VAM you'll need WMR and SteamVR

So you need Steam VR to run VaM? I was hoping to get away from that. I deleted Steam VR and my Quest 2 ran much better.

 

[atani]

Quest and G2 are different hardware, they don't need or can do the same things.
From the video it may be possible to skip SteamVR, but I didn't try that yet, no idea. What's so bad about SteamVR?

 

[anistart888]

Gave it a try but couldn't seem to get it to work with the methods in the video. Maybe theres another work around I don't know about or a setting I missed somewhere. I'm gonna have to mess with OpenXR toolkit though and see if that helps any with FPS increases / overall game smoothness.

HOWEVER, stopping Holographicshell actually increased my fps by about 15fps in pretty heavy scenes on average, so that was a great find. Even jumped about 25fps in some simpler scenes. It only effected VR mode (makes sense)

 

[atani]

hi, @anistart888

I didn't try yet the OpenXR changes from the video, but went to check about Holographicshell. Couldn't find the service and was wondering if that's because I'm on Windows 10. Are you on 11?

 

[anistart888]

hi, @anistart888

I didn't try yet the OpenXR changes from the video, but went to check about Holographicshell. Couldn't find the service and was wondering if that's because I'm on Windows 10. Are you on 11?

Nope! Windows 10. Here's the way I found it so you can confirm:
>Start Button >Computer Management >Performance >Data Collector Sets >Event Trace Sessions

Click on Event trace sessions and holographicshell was towards the bottom of the list. Right click, select Stop. Unfortunately it resets after reboot so you'll have to do this everytime you do that. I had to dig a little to find these directions, but i'll try to find that page again - someone smarter than me wrote a script so it's automatically disabled all the time. Haven't tried that out myself though. If this works for you too let me know and i'll see if I can dig it up again.

 

[atani]

Yeah, I went to that same place but there was no Hographicshell in it. Maybe I disabled it in a different way some time ago.
Thanks anyway.

 

[Toddy]

Nope! Windows 10. Here's the way I found it so you can confirm:
>Start Button >Computer Management >Performance >Data Collector Sets >Event Trace Sessions

Click on Event trace sessions and holographicshell was towards the bottom of the list. Right click, select Stop. Unfortunately it resets after reboot so you'll have to do this everytime you do that. I had to dig a little to find these directions, but i'll try to find that page again - someone smarter than me wrote a script so it's automatically disabled all the time. Haven't tried that out myself though. If this works for you too let me know and i'll see if I can dig it up again.

I looked into the script and found this (I copied and pasted the entire post made by a martsum5994 on the flight sim forum).

Hey guys. I’ve also been battling this HolographicShell issue for a while as I was already on insider beta.
I’ve submitted the issue to feedback hub and sent it to a dev on reddit who said he forwarded it on, but please upvote and add comments if you want and I’ll ask him again if there’s been any progress
Please search for ‘holographic shell’ in Feedback hub and upvote that.
For now, I’m using a .bat script to run a few different times to keep it in check. If you want to create one, follow these steps.

1. Make a new text document
2. Paste the following inside:
   @echo off

logman stop HolographicShell -ets
3. rename to vr.bat or something similar
4. Open task scheduler and create a new task
5. General tab: Select Run with highest privileges and Hidden, Configure for: Windows 10
6. Trigger action: At log on, lock or whatever you want (can set up a few different ones).
7. Action tab: Run the program: vr.bat
Done. You can set up a few to run for different instances like log on, workstation lock etc. Or you can simply just run the .bat file quickly to stop the process. Ideally, I want it to run the .bat when Mixed Reality opens and closes but I can’t figure out how.