CES (Consumer Electronics Show) 2018 is now underway and major product announcements are underway across the electronics industry. HTC, makers of the VIVE VR headset announced a major update to the VIVE in the form of the VIVE Pro today.
Higher resolution
One of the biggest issue that IL-2 and DCS VR players have reported in various public forums is the poor resolution of VR headsets causing what is popularly known as the “screen door” effect.
This effect is caused by your eyes being so close to the displays used in the headsets that they can see the spaces in between the pixels. The solution is more pixels and higher pixel density to remove the gaps. And that is the stand-out update for the HTC VIVE Pro.
Dual AMOLED 3.5″ displays with a 90 Hz refresh rate are at the heart of the updates to this headset. They have the same 110 degree field of view but the resolution bump is very good. 1440 x 1600 pixels per eye (2880 x 1600 pixels combined) is an upgrade from the VIVE’s 1080 x 1200 pixels per eye.
Untethered if you want
The other new feature is the VIVE Wireless Adapter (using Intel’s WiGig low latency networking) which makes using the set a lot easier if you’re playing the kind of VR games where moving around is important.
The adapter is a separate expense should you want one but for flight simmers I can’t see it being a must have. Unless you play other VR games that is.
Flight sim support?
I’m fully expecting that this updated HTC VIVE will continue to be fully supported by IL-2’s VR support and I know some people have been trying DCS with VR as well. IL-2 in particular has Steam VR support and VIVE Pro appears to be continuing with support for that standard too.
The higher resolution will certainly be welcomed by many making the screen door effect go away or at least by minimizing it. It will also hopefully make spotting aircraft an easier proposition and require less use of the zoom feature and/or icons on mode to play.
Coverage
Some good videos summarizing the new features have of course cropped up from the usual sources such as from The Verge.
And from Engaget too.
Check em out or visit HTC’s VIVE Pro product page.
I don’t have any personal VR experience so I’d love to hear from all of you. What do you think of this announcement? Leave your thoughts in the comments.
Stormbirds 
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