Valve Index

VALVE HAS THE BEST HARDWARE, BUT STEAM IS HOLDING IT BACK.

BUT THE FUTURE of VR is inevitably expensive and before we hail Valve’s hardware as our VR savior, it’s worth pointing out that it’s not without issues (see: a lack of compelling VR games on Steam and SteamVR’s problematic troubleshooting process).

But are any of those issues deal-breakers for Valve’s VR headset? Not at all.

DESIGN

It’s easy to write off the Valve Index as another nondescript VR headset in the same vein as any Oculus Rift or HTC Vive headset – but the devil’s all in the detail here: on the front, there’s a glossy plastic faceplate above two front-facing cameras that can be used for passthrough video and, potentially, AR applications. Go to put the headset on and you’ll feel the stone-gray pads that line the inside; it’s a similar Halo design to what Oculus is doing on the Rift S, and it feels both comfortable and snug.

To keep it that way, there are two dials you’ll need to use – one on the left side that changes the physical distance from the lens to your eyes, and the one on that back that makes the headband tighter or looser. While the second is definitely important, it’s something we’ve seen before. It’s the first dial that’s actually groundbreaking, as that’s what allows the Index to achieve its industry-leading field of view spec.

In terms of hard numbers, the Valve Index uses a dual LCD display with a 1440 x 1600 resolution per eye. Unlike Oculus, which has actually dropped the refresh rate of its displays for the Oculus Rift S, the Valve Index has a 120Hz display, with the option to bump this up to 144Hz. For comparison, the moreexpensive Vive Pro has a lower refresh rate and smaller field of view, so this actually feels like a big upgrade.

Inside the box you’ll find the headset itself, the new Valve Index Controllers (colloquially referred to as ‘knuckle’ controllers), and the Version 2.0 Base Stations, which need to be set up around your room. Now, if you have a Vive or Vive Pro headset already, the first-gen base stations are compatible with the Valve Index, but you’ll probably want to start with the second-gen stations if you don’t have a pair already.

Its reliance on external trackers puts the Index behind the Oculus Rift S, which does room-scale VR without any external tracking sensors that need to sit on a shelf. It’s a trade-off you’ll make by choosing the Valve Index over the Oculus Rift S, but it’s a worthwhile one.

PERFORMANCE

Amazingly, while all these features would seem to require extra horsepower under the hood of your PC, they actually worked fine with our much older Nvidia GTX 980 GPU. That’s a boon for folks who don’t have the money to upgrade their GPU after buying a $1,000 VR headset, and it could allow for more people to get into VR.

That last bit is important, because as more people adopt VR, more developers will see a business case for making VR games – right now, Steam’s VR selection is a bit bare compared to the ever-expanding main store, and even the top titles selected by Valve to show off the new hardware are really just a lot of old titles that play better with the Knuckle controllers (see: Space Pirate Trainer, Fruit Ninja, Beat Saber and Arizona Sunshine).

That said, when we played some newer titles, like Valve’s Moondust demo, we couldn’t help but smile. Not only do the games look great on the high-resolution screen, and play without any hitches even on our less-than-ideal

hardware, but they feel more interactive with the Index Controller. Being able to release items by opening your hand – a completely natural experience here in the real world – feels unnatural at first after using regular VR controllers for the last two years, but once you adapt to it, it once again becomes second nature.

When talking about virtual reality, there’s also sound quality to consider. The Valve Index uses a built-in solution that, to all intents and purposes, works incredibly well. You’re able to hear a great number of details without distortion, and even though it’s an inch from the ear, it can still get reasonably loud. It also feels a bit more hygienic when it comes time to pass the headset to another person – as your ears never make contact with the pads, although that’s a fairly minor detail.

Over the course of several sessions we were able to get a lot accomplished - we played a bit of Beat Saber’s campaign, chopped some fruit in Fruit Ninja and wrecked some robots in Space Pirate Trainer – and through it all the controllers held their charge. At the end of the last day the controllers dropped down to a single bar of life, but a safe assumption is to expect around five hours of playtime before you need to recharge the controllers, and about an hour on the charger to bring them back to full juice.

SETUP AND STEAMVR

The biggest fault we found with the headset after using it for more than a month is that SteamVR can be capricious… and, occasionally, a malicious, dastardly platform.

As anyone who’s used an HTC Vive or Vive Pro can tell you, SteamVR doesn’t always like running properly the first time, telling you that something is disconnected, or that your firmware is out of date despite just being updated, or simply telling you the hardware can’t be found. And that’s frustrating when you just want to jump in and play this week’s latest release.

This happened to us a few times throughout our testing, and it gave us a real sense of deja vu – we can remember testing the Vive Pro just over a year ago and having the same problem. Friends and readers have also complained about the original Vive’s lengthy and unwieldy setup process, only to find a number of errors the next time they go to play it.