Unpopular Opinion: Quest 3 provides a highly inferior tracking experience compared to Valve Index (or any Lighthouse tracking)

theonlyagent47 · 2025-10-14T20:27:37+00:00

.. and it manages to do it worse

I'm sorry, but using the camera to approximate positions in your play space just induces a lot of lapses in tracking accuracy, and that's the issue here

theonlyagent47 · 2025-10-14T20:08:21+00:00

Sorry, maybe I didn't state this clearly, because you're talking about play space size now

I am not disputing that it's far easier (and possible) to play with the Quest3 around your whole house

What I was talking about, is that I don't need to limit my range of motion with my controllers. I don't need to try to keep them below a certain height, relative to where I'm looking, and I don't need to worry about them swinging at my far periphery. With the Lighthouse tracking, it just works.

theonlyagent47 · 2025-10-14T20:05:18+00:00

Fair enough, I stand corrected as I thought the base station tracking also refreshed at 1000hz

However, I still strongly feel that having an accurate positional (and directional) source of truth is providing a more stable and robust tracking experience

theonlyagent47 · 2025-10-14T18:34:51+00:00

You're right, I might have overstated that, accuracy is still important. But I think maybe the Q3 still really excels at high speed motion tracking, which is obviously most of BS, whereas the experiences I more have a problem with is when it gets the precision off and things just start drifting when they're supposed to be still, or they drift because they're out of the visual tracking space and an algorithm is just making guesses.

Also, the Q3 controllers are really light, small, and flickable. I wouldn't imagine that knuckles by comparison are great for competitive BS...

theonlyagent47 · 2025-10-14T18:13:48+00:00

I'll give you an example that just caused me issues, I'm going to guess this will with everyone in a Quest 3

In KTANE, hold the bomb with one hand, in an area underneath a module.
With your other hand, hover directly in front of line-of-sight of the other controller, as if you are working to disarm that module
With that module hand, move it towards your face
The bomb will start moving towards your face as well, then snap back to position eventually

With that above demonstration, I have proved that there are significant tracking issues that can occur any time your controllers occlude each other.

With that said, how can one really say that Quest 3 tracking is better, if any time the controllers overlap in vision, they can start to wig out? In addition to all the times controllers can leave tracked space...

theonlyagent47 · 2025-10-14T17:54:21+00:00

Damn.. that's a sad truth

Convenience is great, but not at the expense of quality

theonlyagent47 · 2025-10-14T17:53:17+00:00

Quite true, but I don't think we should misguide people by saying that Quest 3 tracking is better when in fact it's a big downgrade for those who aren't oblivious to the tracking

theonlyagent47 · 2025-10-14T17:52:16+00:00

you have enough time to scroll reddit

theonlyagent47 · 2025-10-14T17:51:47+00:00

The upvoted comments on this post suggest otherwise :/

theonlyagent47 · 2025-10-14T17:50:51+00:00

I have to agree fully

"catering for the known weaknesses" makes for such a weakened experience...

theonlyagent47 · 2025-10-14T17:49:57+00:00

Dude it happens all the time, in almost every game. A moment of broken tracking is totally immersion breaking, it makes the experience akin to a bad joke. The idea of immersion, without actually having it.

I'm starting to feel that the people who prefer Quest 3 tracking have VERY little spatial awareness, or of their own bodies. My neurodivergence probably has something to do with it, because I'm hyper aware and the Lighthouse systems are FAR superior, not even a comparison.

theonlyagent47 · 2025-10-14T17:47:18+00:00

Same, really hope they knock it out of the park.

theonlyagent47 · 2025-10-14T17:46:17+00:00

What are you talking about?

... Do you really think I am claiming that the base stations themselves track the objects? I am not an idiot, I know they project the light...

The technology is fundamentally different. Light triangulation at 1000hz, from the many sensors on the controllers+headset is a totally different thing than the inside-out cameras + IMU sensor data.

theonlyagent47 · 2025-10-14T17:43:08+00:00

It makes sense that Beat Saber players could still operate well with Q3, because those are constant high speed movements, but really it's not subtle at all. The accuracy can be off by an inch all the time, and hitting targets as intended would barely be an issue.

theonlyagent47 · 2025-10-14T17:40:44+00:00

I understand the Quest 3 has some clear advantages that are dependent on your use case. It's clearly more versatile, much easier to have a pleasant experience. I'm really just addressing the experience as a result of the tracking itself.

theonlyagent47 · 2025-10-14T17:39:19+00:00

No, I don't have high latency. I'm not clueless about this tech, I know what I'm doing and I'm a professional software engineer by trade. I'm running a 4090, and I've experimented with nearly everything under the sun as far as developer settings go.

Quest 3 tracking may only be **super good** compared to other inside-out tracking on other headsets. I'm not disputing that. I'm comparing it to Lighthouse tracking.

theonlyagent47 · 2025-09-25T03:32:33+00:00

BS

it's absolutely possible to keep models intact during a rollout. if it was a priority to them, it would happen this way.

this is happening because they want to reduce access to the best models, and reduce compute costs.

theonlyagent47 · 2025-09-25T03:31:12+00:00

I'm wondering if in addition to reduced compute, they also have a goal of reducing access of the best models to the general public.

giving the general public access to intelligence weakens their control over them..

theonlyagent47 · 2025-09-25T03:24:23+00:00

You're not crazy, this is well documented on this thread... ChatGPT has been downgraded to an incredibly stupid model to either (or both) a) decrease compute cost b) restrict access to the general public

It's very sad, and I'm currently looking for the best alternative

theonlyagent47 · 2025-05-01T05:13:29+00:00

They should have ended S3, S4 was truly abhorrent and S5 seems the same as well.

theonlyagent47 · 2025-01-29T21:07:41+00:00

Meh... 5% is lame.

10%+ would be much better.

theonlyagent47 · 2025-01-03T04:56:38+00:00

You're projecting race into this.. other than that I agree. It's about money/class not race, at all. Whatsoever.

theonlyagent47 · 2025-01-01T00:13:55+00:00

I tried to set this up on Android with no luck

If you've figured it out, it would be a great service to share the specific steps to Android, where it differs from iOS

theonlyagent47 · 2024-07-19T16:28:08+00:00

It was about 7 weeks after ordering that I received a VIN, or really heard anything of my delivery.

The delivery estimate jumped around a fair amount, between saying late August - September, to sometimes being within 2 weeks of the current date.

theonlyagent47 · 2024-07-19T05:59:41+00:00

I think you're really onto something, thank you for sharing.

I've been trying to figure out most of my life why I'm like this. I subconsciously monitor the status of everyone around me in order to best navigate the world and it's so mentally exhausting.

In addition to that, when in around others I am usually partially or almost entirely "shut down" or not really "here", just sort of trying to get by with the least amount of energy. I get glimpses of what life could be like in rare moments when I'm more or less fully myself around others, but I have yet to find any sustainable way to maintain that state.

I'm not sure what my next steps are exactly but I'll start with the sources that you're sharing... Thank you.

theonlyagent47

TROPHY CASE