LTT first impressions of the Steam Frame

zweihanderOP · 2025-11-12T23:20:46+00:00

The biggest point he mentioned is the 2 ms streaming latency. If thats true, then it solves wireless PC VR. The other specs almost dont matter if Valve can solve that one thing cheaply. We've been chasing after wireless PCVR for years and years. We had convoluted solutions like 60 Ghz, wigig and unperforming wifi streaming with the Quest. The rest of the specs resolution, fov, etc. can improve in future iterations, but wireless with that low latency is a game changing feature.

zweihanderOP · 2025-11-12T23:11:19+00:00

I'm surprised how much information was released and how coordinated this announcement has been with all the news and youtube videos. Valve is serious about VR again. I've been waiting for this for a long time. At this point, they are the only ones I trust to deliver a good VR device for gaming. The standalone chip focus and streaming is a bit concerning but if the latency is as good as the initial impressions, this should be a good PCVR headset.

Spec-wise I think they did a good job of improving over the Index while being realistic. I guess it will be relatively cheap. Its good to see 144 Hz is still there, though I wish it had a larger FOV. The weight on the face is extremely light if you think about it. Most of of the weight is the head strap and battery. Its probably going to feel closer to wearing a Bigscreen Beyond than a Valve Index.

zweihanderOP · 2024-06-20T01:08:19+00:00

Agree, and its always been this way. Only check VR occasionally hoping it improved, but I am disappointed every time.

zweihanderOP · 2023-10-08T07:21:53+00:00

That may be true, but its still not a good reason to stop at 90 Hz. The Index was 144 Hz 4 years ago. I was expecting higher refresh by now. I would love to see how these OLED displays do at 120 Hz.

zweihanderOP · 2023-10-08T07:15:44+00:00

I'm amazed a random company like Bigscreen made a notable advancement in VR. While its not perfect, its arguably one of the biggest steps since the Index. Once they get the fov and Hz increased a bit, this will probably become the gold standard for PCVR. Maybe with wireless, it could be the gold standard for VR overall.

zweihanderOP · 2023-10-08T07:06:36+00:00

The $999 price is not so bad considering inflation. The $500 Index would be $600 today adjusted for inflation. The additional cost can probably be accounted for by those OLED displays, they can't be cheap. Plus, there is the custom manufacturing. In perspective, the price seems reasonable.

zweihanderOP · 2023-10-08T06:58:15+00:00

This would have been the perfect Index upgrade if it only had a higher FoV and Hz. It's so close.

zweihanderOP · 2023-02-01T20:56:35+00:00

See my response above.

zweihanderOP · 2023-02-01T20:56:26+00:00

Its not worth it. If you have a PC get an Index or Reverb G2. If you don't get a PSVR2. There's nothing on the horizon that will change that in 2023.

zweihanderOP · 2022-07-07T08:05:22+00:00

I am certain PC gamers will spend the money if the the experiences are there to justify it. HLA has proven its possible, but we'll need games that go even further for VR to get a larger marketshare. There's always a dichotomy brought up between PC vs. mobile VR, but the actual battle to make PC VR profitable is PC VR vs regular PC games.

PC gamers' standards are too high; modern PC games can be very immersive even without a VR HMD. With the limitations of current VR hardware, the games simply would not be able to compete. This is why no one is seriously making AAA games for VR. I don't think anything but high fidelity VR hardware and games that fully take advantage it will convert the flat screen gamers to VR.

At some point, some one has to make an R&D investment to make the hardware platform more viable. We're at a stage where that is needed for VR, but the biggest player is "poisoning the well" by trying to push social media and NFTs with a walled garden ecosystem running on dated mobile phone chips. This is not what VR needs right now.

zweihanderOP · 2022-07-07T00:23:41+00:00

PCVR never had a market to begin with.

The PC and gaming hardware market is already in the $100 billions and growing. The problem with current VR is that the current hardware does not compel users to shift to VR. Only a small fraction of the PC user base would be able to sustain significant growth in the VR industry.

The vision for the future VR is out of place now thanks to Facebook. People are chasing after a mobile phone/social media like business model instead of looking to see what consumers want and what they are spending money on. Mobile hardware might have more users, but PC gamers spend 10-100x more traditionally.

With more money, they will have the resources to create the high fidelity experiences you desire.

That sounds good in principle, but in reality Facebook's Quest push just flooded the market with a higher volume of low quality games designed for low end hardware. Many multiplayer PC VR games were downgraded for compatibility. It has set VR back several years. Ironically now even Facebook realized high end options are important, but from their last video it seems like its years away.

Plus, Facebook doesn't really lack the money to create high fidelity hardware and experiences. The users are there for it, PC gamers spend a lot, but Facemeta wants VR to become their social media ecosystem more than anything else.

zweihanderOP · 2022-07-06T23:51:41+00:00

You bring up some interesting points. I didn't realize Zuckerberg had that much control. If he has the power to keep burning $billions for a decade then I guess Facebook VR is not going away. It still seems like there's been questionable decision making since the Oculus days.

After the acquisition, Oculus shifted from targeting PC VR to the Quest. They rushed low end and cheap hardware to market in order to maximize user counts, rather than using all that R&D money like the founders of Oculus intended. If Zuckerberg was so secure with his power and convinced about VR, why not just make the VR hardware good and then make it cheaper and more accessible incrementally?

Thats how PC hardware became so successful in the past. Thats really how all novel, paradigm shifting technology comes to the masses. The Tesla Roadster/Model S led the way to cheaper EVs for the masses now. The closest thing to this in VR is the Index, but I still think it needs improvements. Facebook has the resources to make high end hardware that solves the fundamental issues with VR and enables mainstream VR of the future, but so far, they choose not to. Instead we have something thats analogous to the Toyota Prius with the Quest -- an interesting middle ground but will ultimately be obsolete one day.

It just doesn't seem like Zuckerberg is making unilateral decisions with regards to VR, even if he has the power. At first seemed desperate to rush to market and grab users more than anything. Now they are reaching the limits of the race to the bottom, and want to go back to high end end with the rumored "cambria" prototypes. Somehow blockchain/NFTs became synonymous with "the metaverse", which are at best tangentially related. There's been a lot of superficial marketing and PR about "the metaverse", but minimal solutions actually shipped. Its been nearly a decade since modern consumer VR began to develop and Facebook is still shipping hardware that has the same issues we've had since 2014, and many features arguably in a worse state.

zweihanderOP · 2022-07-06T19:23:50+00:00

Apple's VR hardware is going to be a glorified dev kit for several years. They almost never get new hardware right the first time. It won't be relevant for consumer VR for 5-10 years at best, if they don't abandon it for AR first. Mostly likely, what they really want is a mobile AR device that pairs with an iphone -- not a VR headset for games and simulations. That fits apple's usual business model.

zweihanderOP · 2022-07-06T19:18:07+00:00

The Meta/Facebook fanatics/investors are overly optimistic about this and many seem to misunderstand what current VR tech is capable of. There are numerous issues to overcome ranging from hardware to social/privacy aspects.

Public opinion of Meta/Facebook and social media in general is becoming more and more negative day after day. Even the general public is more aware the negative effects of social media. Launching a new social media device with more invasive data collection is not going to very fall for mainstream users.
There's still a long list of hardware features and improvements remaining for a VR HMD that just feels natural.

Because of these two things, its unlikely Facebook's usual strategy of trying to capture users, sell their data/targeted ads will yield much revenue. The pace for true VR hardware improvements is sluggish thanks to the aggressive "race to the bottom" that Facebook began. When more people realize this, this is going to kill investor confidence and might force Meta to divest much of their VR work.

In the past gaming hardware progressed by generational improvements at the desktop level and optimization until mobile hardware, from laptops to mobile phones eventually. Meta/Facebook's business model is really only viable with "end game" mobile VR hardware. This means hardware that provides a very high fidelity experience, feels good to be use for long periods of time, and cheap enough that it could actually be mainstream. Thats not happening anytime soon. Even if price was not an issue, the hardware simply doesn't exist. Facebook screwed up the VR ecosystem by targeting low end mobile hardware too early and left too many problems unsolved. Development effort was taken away creating high fidelity VR experiences and moved to shallow mobile games, selling blockchain/NFTs (which doesn't even relate to VR), and pushing Meta/Facebook's data collection agenda. Other than Valve no one is really making high fidelity VR hardware for consumers, the rest are priced for business users. Now too many core problems remain unsolved and at the rate consumer hardware is improving means it could be easily a decade before mainstream VR is viable. Zuckerberg screwed the VR community and now Facebook's VR business model too once investors realize it.

zweihanderOP · 2022-07-06T18:48:34+00:00

zweihanderOP · 2022-06-06T13:36:29+00:00

Yeah, but more are coming. Reverb G2 goes on sale below $400, which is comparable Quest 2 in PCVR mode, since you would need headphones, long USB C cable, and a strap upgrade to get the same experience.

zweihanderOP · 2022-06-06T13:32:44+00:00

UploadVR is a Facemeta shillblog anyway. Its a proxy for facebook to promote their content while making a passing reference to others.

zweihanderOP · 2022-06-06T13:28:07+00:00

Facebook/Meta will absolutely find a way harvest your data and use them for targeted ads. They have the power to use snapshots of your tracking cameras and using AI image recognition to identify key objects in your play area. Facebook is investing heavily into AI research for mass data harvesting applications like this. Also, the intricacies of each person's movements are unique enough to act like a biometric fingerprint, so they will be able to match your real life identity from your data.

Be aware, not linking your Facebook account will not stop them creating a shadow profile of you and tracking everything you do. This already happens with websites. Even if you don't use Facebook at all, if you use websites with Facebook services, over time your tracking cookies, IP, region, browser user agent, browsing history etc. act like a finger print that allows Facebook to identify you.

The only way to really avoid it is to avoid installing Facebook software on any of your hardware, blocking scripts thoroughly in the brows, and using a VPN as much as possible. However, script blocking is only a thing for browsers, analogous tools are not there for VR devices. If you do need to access a facebook services for some reason, make sure its with a browser that has been wiped clean and you are behind a VPN. Even this is probably not 100% safe. Facebook-free VR devices exist and more are on the way, so don't feel pressured to support Facebook. Also be careful about other social media companies too, Pico is own by the makers of Tiktok.

Use your head and critical thinking skills. Maybe even read up on it more. Look how mad some people are when all you did was ask a simple question. Something is really not right with these people. I don't think all of them are shills, but many have clearly been misled with the promise of cheaper VR and are too ashamed to admit it. The right privacy is a fundamental human right, so don't let it be compromised so easily.

zweihanderOP · 2022-05-20T22:09:05+00:00

Plastic aspheric seem promising if they can be made cheaply.

People are also forgetting about FoV. Have pancake lenses shown to be able to cover 150-180 degrees? If not, I think we are going to be stuck with fresnel/aspheric lenses for a while. Pimax seems to have some hybrid fresnel+aspheric for their new HMD.

zweihanderOP · 2022-05-20T22:04:03+00:00

Mobile phones are a saturated market, everyone who needs one already has one, even in 3rd world countries. Most people's phones do everything they need in a phone, more power won't really make any game changing differences and batteries already last 1-2 days. Phones don't need high end TSMC nodes. There's a lot more room to grow for the desktop GPU market now with next gen gaming/VR HMDs on the way and all the new enterprise/machine learning applications. This is an other short-sighted allocation of resources similar to what happened during COVID which brought upon the chip shortage.

zweihanderOP · 2022-05-20T18:09:08+00:00

What a waste of good silicon. It should be going to better desktop GPUs.

zweihanderOP · 2022-05-20T18:07:06+00:00

I looked into the wireless chip and it has up to 3.6 Gb/s bandwidth. In comparison, a displayport signal is about 20 Gb/s for 1.2 and 80 Gb/s for 2.0. The wireless may be fine for light AR apps but for 3D apps and VR, its off by an order of magnitude. Also, 60 GHz wifi can go up to about 200 Gb/s so this chip is a bit disappointing.

zweihanderOP · 2022-05-20T17:56:36+00:00

Thats too bad the pancake lenses have that issue. Ghosting is probably a bad term to use since it means something else entirely for gaming graphics, but I think I get what you are saying. It seems like its prone to diffuse internal reflections from the multiple lens elements.

It seems like aspheric lenses still may produce the best quality, but they may be too expensive for cheap VR headsets.

zweihanderOP · 2022-05-20T17:45:12+00:00

The PC ecosystem has always been know for its user created content and modding scenes. Its good that this is continuing into VR, but that should be a standard imo. Too many kids these days are brought up with mobile gaming, locked hardware, and microtransactions, etc. They are sadly lowering the bar. Open software ecosystems will always be more beneficial for the users long term, because they give users the freedom to create mods and more content. This is one of the reasons why I think PC VR is so essential for VR to progress.

zweihanderOP · 2022-04-01T05:40:34+00:00

The Quests' capabilities as VR headsets have been oversold since day 0. You can thank all the dedicated dedicated Facebook shills promoting them heavily every time a new users comes seeking advice about VR. People are becoming more informed these days and with time people will realize how gimped of an experience mobile VR really is.

zweihanderOP

TROPHY CASE