Hi everyone, I have spent a lot of time reading and trying and trying even more and googling, but I’m done. I’m about to give up, although I don’t want to get back into pancake, as even if it is ugly and blurry and flickering, VR is so awesome, so you are my last hope, maybe you are able to help me trying to set up my VR for MSFS.
Problems:
Can’t read the planes Instrument board. (DA40 for example, I’m able to read the Autopilot-Buttons only when I bend over and get really really close.)
Everything looks like torn, tearing on rotors, flickering while moving. Everything becomes blurry. Sometimes the only way to differ between runway and a fire vehicle is the color.
Very bad performance in SteamVR, frametime even on very low settings is somewhere between 20 and 30ms, even standing still on an empty airport.
System:
AMD Ryzen 7 5800X
GeForce 3070 (slightly OC by manufacturer)
32GB DDR4
MSFS is installed on a m2.nvme (also tried on a standard HDD, no difference)
Headset: Valve Index - therefore Steam VR
— according to 3dmark the system performs average for the hardware, so no surprises there –
Tries to solve my problems:
Play around with refresh rate (depending on the guide from 80 to 144hz)
Try with activated and deactivatied motion prediction
Reinstall System, apply new Cooling Paste to the GPU (which really was overheating, so at least this point was a good thing)
Several settings for resolution from 100% (steamVR) to 200% (steamVR)
Used openXR-Toolkit and played with a absurd amount of different ss-settings, sometimes I ended up with more tearing, sometimes it got better.. but the instrument board stayed blurry all the time
set MSFS settings to low, DLSS and TAA… no matter what, nothing happens.
change nvidia control panel to different settings - depends on what guide / instruction you read, they differ in some points.
repositioned the headset many times, but I have found the sweetspot and I’m on it.
I even got Glasses to insert into the index, and although it improved my over all experience (never thought that might be a problem)
But I’m about to give up. Is there anything I’m doing wrong? What would you suggest to set up and try? My first priorities would be to be able to read the instrument board and to lower the flickering.
Please help me, experienced VR simmers. You are my last hope. Thank you very much for every hint or guide you might come up with.
it’s a low res hmd, it will always be quite blurry i’m afraid. but others use it quite happily so maybe there’s something amiss in your setup? i’d look for a youtube guide for msfs/valve index, in fact there’s a huge thread on these forums somewhere on this subject too, and follow them to the letter.
ok, i didn’t know VD supported wired connections. i’m wondering what would be the point though?
OP, the huge thread on msfs/valve index setup was created by a user called @CptLucky8 do a search for it, iirc there’s over 1000 replies but the 1st post was a lengthy setup guide that had been constantly updated.
@tykey6 the guide by @cptluck8 is exactly what I followed, as the gpu in this guide is slower then mine I went 100% for it, and then tried to rise my settings. Unfortunatly I still can’t read the buttons, the external view is "ok"ish, nothing compared to other games, but I’d be fine with it. Tried to increase SS and/TAA, I’m still fine, buttons still are not readable. Even my PFD-numbers are washed out, only get clear when I get closer. To sum it up: Things got better, but not as good as it could be. Frametime still is at 20ms.
Your hint to follow those guides “to the letter” was the key to success for today. Somehow I didn’t do that and mixed them up. Thank you!
@Bondjpf
I have tried Virtual Desktop because of your hint and a youtube video I found because of your hint. Unfortunatly there was no improvement for me, things even got worse using Virtual Desktop. I’ll give it a 2nd try with the new settings I made following @CptLucky8 's guide, but I’m not very optimistic.
So 2 people responded, and at least there was some improvement. So far I’m a bit further away from going nuts.
Have you tried to adjust the IPD settings on the Software/Headset? I know you mentioned that you have the sweet spot dialed in, however, when you wear glasses, you may have to move the headset around to try to align the clarity of the glasses with the sweet spot of the headset…just a thought.
Also is there a way to adjust the height of the image coming into each lens? On my PIMAX 8KX there is and you can move the image up/down in each lens to try to align it for best focal quality. The biggest problem I had as a glasses wearer was to get a pair of glasses that had distance only (I wear tri-focals) and using them made lots of areas blurry, when I changed to distance only lenses those problems went away and clarity improved. Take your prescription if other than single focus lenses and get a pair of distance only glasses…mine came to about $140 at the local Walmart Vision Center without insurance and included frames.
The glasses I have made are sets I’m able to put directly onto the index lenses, so they are lenses put onto the HMD-Lens to provide the same effect as my glasses. (I don’t know if a link is allowed, but if you google vr optician you might the company on a first hit.) They were made according to my glasses prescription, and in Beatsaber, SteamVR home and Half LIfe Alyx I was able to notice a significant improving. Unfortunatly that didn’t go for MSFS. My IPD is set up to the distance measured by the company who prepared my real life glasses. (Learned that on day 1, when I tried to find out if I’m to stupid to use a hmd, or if mine is broken. ^^)
I am not a VR veteran, but I’ve been on a similar journey over the last month since I upgraded to a 4080 from my 1070ti and was able to start my VR journey for the first time. I use the Index with a much worse cpu (i7 8700k with slight OC) so don’t lose hope you can get there.
First, do you use the FPS VR steam app to see your timings? That was huge for me to start really dialing in on what is going on. My setup is always heavily cpu limited, but I also learned through this that my gpu was sometimes dropping the frames despite only being lightly loaded. Below are my key takeaways that worked for me (your mileage may vary, unfortunately).
Your 2D settings bleed over into the VR settings (crazy right) - In 2D settings, TAA 100%, Low Latency to On + Boost, DX 12 worked best for me.
HAGS off was best for me.
Anisotropic Filtering cut completely off in MSFS - In NVIDA control panel enable x16 Anisotropic Filtering. No idea why this helped, but someone suggested and it did help my gpu stutters, and you get the Anisotropic Filtering still.
Use RTSS to lock in frame rate - I personally use 30fps locked, with motion reprojection forced and 90hz on the Index. With your better cpu, you could maybe try locked 40fps with RTSS and 80hz on the Index to get you to 1 real + 1 “fake” frame if you will.
Resolution set to 100 TAA in MSFS (both 2D and VR settings) and set to 150% in Steam VR. The Index is a lower resolution so don’t expect wonders. I can mostly “see” the important things like speed, altitude, and heading on the PFD and MFDs, but also make use of the VR zoom function in controls.
Watch your TLOD setting closely. I get 110 right now with steady frames, but it’s a cpu hog so pay close attention to your timings when you mess with it.
Terrain Pre-Cache set to Medium - Again no idea truly why this helped, but I’m incredibly CPU bound so maybe that helped with stutters?
If CPU bound - I use ProcessLasso now to disable hyperthreading for MSFS alone. Helped stutter for me.
Hopefully one of these might help, and hopefully, you haven’t already tried everything I listed
Is this your first try at flight simming in VR? What is your previous experience in other sims if any?
Just trying to get a feel of what you are used to or expecting.
I had a very similar set up to you a while back, I had a 2080TI which isn’t a kick off your 3070, you have a better CPU than mine at the time. I also had the Index.
The reason I asked the first questions is the fact I had a similar experience to you, PFD’s in any sim MSFS, DCS etc were a no no for me. Steam gauges are your friend at the minute unless you don’t mind zooming in with the right mouse button to read buttons / displays. Picking out airfields (especially bush strips) another pain.
You are limited by your headset display presently. On the plus side the FOV is pretty good on the Index especially the vertical FOV (I miss that very much).
I have a VERY similar setup to you. Although I have a slower video card RTX 2070.
But I have come to the conclusion that the devs don’t know how to write proper VR code. That might be a bit harsh. More likely is the game was not developed with VR in mind. Since the VR was a post release feature. I suspect the entire code base is just not optimized to work with VR headsets. If you have played VTOL VR, you can see how great a game can be that is designed from the beginning with VR in mind.
With the lowest detail settings and all of the DLSS, anti-aliasing, etc turned off I get about 55 ms per frame with the render scale set to 100. If I crank the render scale down I get slightly better performance of 44 ms per frame. But then I can’t read anything. It also locks up on me about 50% of the time when I try to switch to VR mode.
I really like MS Flight Sim 2020 and am a private pilot, so I had high hopes for the VR. But it is a steaming pile of garbage (with respect to the VR) at this time. I would stop spending time trying to “optimize” your settings and just enjoy the game as it was meant to be played. On a 14" 640x480 VGA display.
