The reason I made the trip is because the latest design includes a new feature absent in the original which made it exceptionally hard for me to fully review. Namely, the new Bigscreen Beyond 2 adds independent adjustment of lens placement directly in front of each eye.
“Independent monocular IPD was made for your eyes Ian,” Shankar wrote over email. “It’s not a common need, but we remembered your desire for it.”
After criss-crossing the United States to test the new hardware, and after talking to Shankar for a couple hours, I can write the following sentence about Bigscreen Beyond 2:
I’ve never seen anything like it.
Bigscreen’s elegant solution to lens placement involves the use of what they call an IPD Tool for manually adjusting each lens position. Apple’s $3500 headset automatically moves each lens into individualized placement in front of each pupil, but Bigscreen’s solution is cheaper and lighter.
The lightweight solution in Beyond 2, meanwhile, also makes the headset shareable with others with a quick change that also ensures accidental adjustments don’t occur when handling the device, because there’s no button or wheel to hit as is present on some other headsets.
And really, this is just cool.
I saw fewer distracting internal reflections and, overall, the area of clarity is huge. Bigscreen claims “total edge-to-edge clarity”, and the lenses did seem very clear to the edges. The biggest distraction for me was some kind of tracking jitter I usually associate with SteamVR base stations. This was a pre-production unit I wore, the base stations weren’t in the best position and there were plenty of reflective surfaces in the area that could have caused issues. Still, it was a minor distraction during a short demo, and we’ll need to see how a shipping headset holds up over many hours of wear to make a review recommendation.
The more important thing to convey is to those of you who are just learning about Bigscreen for the first time. This device is built by genuine VR enthusiasts building VR headsets for people who want to spend hours at incredible places. For those who haven’t experienced VR yet, yes, there’s a full theater-sized screen inside that tiny headset, and it could have just as easily been Half-Life: Alyx I was playing in there.
Bigscreen says it weighs just 107 grams, down from 127 grams in the first version. With Beyond 2, this company of less than 40 employees puts the critique that VR headsets are heavy in the past. You’d think it was an FPV viewer but, no, this really is a PC-powered VR headset you can share with family and friends.
Beyond 2 is slated to start shipping in April starting at $1019 with an eye-tracking model to follow for $1219. Bigscreen recommends an RTX 2070 or higher graphics card to drive the headset with a PC.
I was initially very excited by the announcement of the Beyond 2, but alas the continued dependence on outboard tracking stations/towers makes this an automatic hard pass from me. I absolutely cannot have base stations all over the place for my use case, and I imagine an awful lot of other normal people are going to be unwilling to go to those lengths just to play with the toy, either.
My crusty old Reverb G2 can be chucked in a bag and used anywhere, or employed in any location in the house. It can be an enormous virtual monitor lying in bed or in a hotel room, it can be a room scale VR rig in the living room, it can be a virtual cockpit at my computer desk where the back of my chair is 6" from the wall behind me. I can drive it at any location with my laptop, even on battery power if I have to.
Sorry, guys. Not only am I not stringing up sensor boxes all over my house just in case, it would be physically impossible in many of the places I want to use my headset. This is the advantage stupid Meta has with their stupid Quests, and is probably in no small part a factor in why so many people are willing to buy them.
Bulky or not, my next headset will probably be a Pimax for that reason.
Pimax is one of the worst companies in vr. Their quality and costumer service is criminal. Buy anything else but something from them.
I’ll take it under advisement, but I haven’t found too many alternatives. Who else makes an inside out tracking headset with non-shit resolution, broad compatibility, and no outboard tracking towers? I mean, other than Meta…
It’s possible that the upcoming Deckard, whatever it turns out to be, will be inside out because it’s tipped to be a standalone device. But we still don’t know for sure, all we have are speculation and leaks.
Today is freedom day. I finally get to replace my quest pro and move on from Meta.
I just watched the video. Will you go for the halo strap that hangs the headset in front of your face a bit more like the QP?
Yes I am getting the Halo strap. I only keep my headsets for about 2-3 years and then sell them. I need a headset that is easy to use by anyone and can be resold. I also love the comfort of a halo strap. I don’t like pressure on my face.
Congrats! I’ll most likely go for the moohan but i’m not 100% sure yet.
Wow, I didn’t know what to expect when support told me yesterday that I should hold off on purchasing for another couple days, but this seems to solve just about every concern I had about the BSB1.
I share my headset so adjustable IPD means I don’t need to keep my old headset around as a loaner.
Lots of reviews mentioned the tiny sweet spot, it sounds like the sweet spot is massive now reducing the need to get the exact right face cushion thickness
Lots of reviews also complained about the glare when not in the exact right position, also sounds like that is fixed
I was also a little concerned about FOV compared to the index, it appears they’re about the same now. It also helps that I’m used to using the index with the lenses adjusted as far away as possible in order to fit my glasses, so I’m sure the BSB2 with prescription inserts can’t be worse than what I have now.
The only downside seems to be that adjusting ipd still requires manually entering in what you set it to - hopefully it’s easy to accurately read out what your adjustment is because that sounds a little error-prone if you’re passing the headset around at a social gathering (a frequent occurrence for me)
I’m planning on replacing my index with the eye tracking variant when that happens.
I just ordered one it has everything I need. I already have base stations for my trackers so this is an easy buy for me.
Same, I just placed an order for the 2e! I didn’t realize they opened up orders for both when they said eye tracking in Q3, I guess that’ll just be a software update. I’m hyped! I have to figure out what audio solution I’ll use - I like the Index speakers not touching the ears, I tend to quickly get ear pain with even gentle pressure from on-ears so I’m not sure about the official audio strap. If there was a way to attach the index head strap to the beyond that would be perfect for me.
“Without Apple” means I no longer need to scan my face using an iPhone to order it?
Yes if you purchase the halo strap you no longer need to scan your face.
Cool. Then it’s something I’ll consider but I’ll definitely wait to see the Deckard first.
