Pimax is continuously tweaking their lineup of wide field of view VR headsets in effort to hone in on a finished product. To that effect, the Beijing-based company has just issued a new statement detailing some material refinements coming to new “5K+” and “8K” headsets, and some news on the long promised accessories too.

Pimax says in a forum post today that its line of headsets are getting a minor overhaul in ergonomics, bringing with it a new fabric head strap, a more comfortable face cushion with “best viewing distance”, and a different nose pad that aims to improve comfort while reducing light leakage.

Image courtesy Pimax

The quality of life updates however aren’t the biggest changes coming to Pimax’s line of headsets. Serious hardware concerns such as fractured exterior shells, sub-par cabling, and weak headphone jacks are all getting a makeover.

The company is aiming to reduce the incidence of flickering pixels, or what they call the “snow effect”, by introducing a new cable with enhanced shielding. Pimax says they’ll be rigorously screening and testing the cables moving forward. The company has also automated their screening process for optical issues such as dead pixels.

Pimax mentions that they’re bringing improvements to the 3.5mm headphone jack by increasing the soldering strength, something the company says can now withstand “more than 3,000 insertions and removals.”

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The headsets’ housing has also been cause for concern, although Pimax says it doesn’t have anything to do with its remarkably thin plastic exterior. Pimax says that microfractures in the housing mating points were “a low probability issue” caused by the cooling and deburring process, and they’ve reviewed these processes to ensure a more reliable output.

The headsets’ shipping material is getting an overhaul too, with the company stating that they’ve uncovered issues caused during transport and have developed a new packaging design in response, something they maintain is “much more resilient and passes a higher standard shock drop resistance test.”

Pimax Accessories

Pimax says the latest controller prototypes will arrive next month, the Valve Index-style controllers called ‘Sword’ and ‘Sword Sense’. The company says they plan on manufacturing both of these variants—one with a thumbstick and the other with a touchpad—for many years to come.

“Because of this it is important these devices are more than competitive with other marketplace offerings,” the company writes. “As always with Pimax we take into account feedback we see across the VR marketplace and we realize how important it is we get our Pimax controllers ‘right’.”

Image courtesy Pimax

While the floppy head strap is getting an update, the optional Rigid Audio Head strap is now undergoing ergonomics testing too. Still no ETA, but it’s nice that it’s gotten a mention.

Although we thought Pimax was going to beat Valve to the punch by finally selling SteamVR 2.0 base stations on their lonesome, the company says they’re currently in production, but that they’re bundling the base station with their controllers “due to shipping costs.” The set, which includes two controllers of any flavor and two SteamVR 2.0 base stations currently costs a $300 deposit. Again, no ETA on these ones either.

Kickstarter Accessories, Image courtesy Pimax

The headset’s Hand Tracking Module is on a bit of a bumpy road. Promised back in the Kickstarter days, Pimax says that it’s been delayed due to Leap Motion’s acquisition by ULtraHaptics. UltraHaptics is however reportedly restarting production of the module, although Pimax says “this transition has taken some time.”

There’s still no word on when the eye-tracking accessory will arrive, although the company did show it off this year at CES 2019 in January.

Pimax’s continued work on their line of headsets is commendable, but it’s hard not to feel like a beta tester when the company is constantly retooling their product every few months. Even we have a hard time keeping the myriad of hardware updates straight, although Pimax is decidedly still delivering their headsets to consumers and directly responding to criticism.

What’s missing in all of this is an identifiable timeline, but we’re keeping our eyes peeled for concrete info on when prospective users can expect to see these updates in future Pimax headset iterations.

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Well before the first modern XR products hit the market, Scott recognized the potential of the technology and set out to understand and document its growth. He has been professionally reporting on the space for nearly a decade as Editor at Road to VR, authoring more than 4,000 articles on the topic. Scott brings that seasoned insight to his reporting from major industry events across the globe.
  • JesuSaveSouls

    These guys need a standlone with big fov.Jesus is mankinds sole hope !

    • get lost

      keep your imaginary Jesus gay out of this thread, delusional idiot

      • Jarilo

        Annoying Religious pusher VS Annoying Fedora Atheist. 3…2…1… FIGHT!

    • Jistuce

      Who’s making the Jesus™ headset, and when will it be available?

    • MAGA Man

      Trump is our only hope!!! MAGA!!!

    • Leon Jimenez

      Imagine if they were working on one… but first things first.

  • superdonkey

    the pimax is a “cracking” headset

  • Andrew Jakobs

    Well, it’s great ofcourse they refine the headset, but not so great if you bought one already. But then again, you can always try to claim warranty if something gets ‘broken’….

    Whatever happend to OSVR?

    • Hivemind9000

      Mine’s been pretty solid so far – no cracks or chips. The things they have improved – headstrap, nose/face padding – really did need improving as they aren’t great. I had to do my own mods on the nose (using foam out of my Vive box) to stop it cutting in and to block the light. I guess that’s what you get for a first generation Kickstarter headset. Still, I’m not disappointed, though I really want to get the controllers and basestations as I paid for them over 1 1/2 years ago…

      I think a lot of manufacturers have jumped ship from OSVR to Khronos OpenXR but I don’t know the details. Seems there’s more than one open standard out there.

    • Jistuce

      “Whatever happend to OSVR?”

      I think Razer ran and hid once it became obvious VR wasn’t the overnight sensation everyone was expecting after the Oculus kickstarter explosion. And as they were the primary force behind it, the whole thing imploded.

    • Leon Jimenez

      If it doesn’t have cracks it won’t develop cracks. That was from the deburring process. It should have had higher control standards but the microfractures were not detected until they had shipped. And those fractures got more pronounced after delivery.

  • MW

    This company is a joke. Buying anything from Pimax is more risky than being drunk in Las Vegas cassino. After months (or years) from payment you never know are you will get something, or will it work? No thanks.

    • Zantetsu

      Pretty sure people who participated in the Pimax kickstarter or ordered devices directly did will got something.

      • Schadows

        Yes we did (backer here) and like most (if not all) kickstarter campaign, there are delays and disappointment on some parts.
        Still the headset beats my original Vive hands on, but it is clearly not perfect on every front. Glad to read they are taking feedback into account … but how will it translate to backers and early buyers, that’s still something to see.

    • Kev

      They sell them on Amazon my neighbor got his in 1 day. I was a backer so yeah it took a really long time but the headset itself is really good.

      • Ethan James Trombley

        You’re free to think what you want, but I sold my Vive Pro once my Pimax arrived…it’s that good.

    • Moe Curley

      You didn’t order one, so haven’t gone through the order process, don’t know anything about delivery times and don’t have one so can’t comment on the user experience, so maybe stop trollin and STFU.

  • The Bard

    All currrent customers should get it for free now.

  • Ratm

    Not a word for the halo.

    • Leon Jimenez

      The halo? You mean the rigid head strap? It’s mentioned.

      • Ratm

        There was a halo style headband with sound in the Kickstarter photos!

        • Leon Jimenez

          Yeah that’s the rigid head strap. It is being finalized. I haven’t tried it but going the headphones don’t break off easily like the Deluxe Audio Strap.

  • Kev

    Pimax makes the best headset available. Even the index is far lower resolution and less field of view and Pimax was able to release this thing last year. Personally I like they at least try to push the envelope where others sit on their hands for literally years and when they do release something it’s barely different from the previous one.