The Pimax “8K” headset was the result of VR’s most successful Kickstarter campaign, beating out all others, including Oculus, with a whopping $4.23 million raised when the campaign concluded in November 2017. It’s been a bit of a bumpy road over the past year, with some shipping setbacks and several changes made to the final product lineup, but Pimax has now announced that pre-orders are starting today for the “8K”, “5K” Plus, and “5K” Business Edition (BE) headsets.

Update (4:50 PM ET): Controller and Steam VR base stations are now available with a deposit of $300. It’s unclear if these are based on Steam VR 1.0 or 2.0 however.

Pre-order pages are now live, although it appears pre-orders officially start today at 7PM ET / 4PM PT (see update).

Cutting to the chase, here’s the prices of each headset. The prices below are for the headset only, and don’t include motion controllers or SteamVR tracking base stations:

  • Pimax “8K” – $900
  • Pimax “5K” Plus – $700
  • Pimax “5K” BE – $1,000

Pimax is offering a few bundled items including additional optical hand-tracking modules for $170, and both NVIDIA RTX 2080 and RTX 2080Ti for an additional price. All three headsets can be extended with modules including wireless transmission, eye-tracking, a scent module, and a deluxe headstrap with better ergonomics and integrated audio, although these don’t appear to be currently available for pre-order.

Notably missing is any mention of availability on SteamVR tracking base stations or the company’s Knuckles-style controllers. We aren’t sure when Pimax will include these as a purchasable option, as both are required to fully interact in VR games, although there’s a page on the company store (see update).

Image courtesy Pimax

There’s still no clear launch date, although it appears, as Pimax has stated in the past, that Kickstarter backers will receive their units first, with pre-order customers following.

While the final prices are likely to cause some sticker shock—Kickstarter backers originally purchased “8K” at $450 – $500 and “5K” at $350 – $400 through the campaign—to put it into perspective, a Pimax “5K” Plus is $100 cheaper than the HTC Vive Pro, offering a substantially larger field of view (FOV) over Vive Pro’s ~110 FOV.

Image courtesy Pimax

The originally advertised “5K” headset was scrapped just last month in favor of the new “5K” Plus, which uses an RGB-stripe pixel layout with rectangular pixels as opposed to a PenTile-like layout, the former being a better choice for text legibility. Backers who elected for a “5K” headset are being automatically upgraded to the “5K” Plus however—and while it’s pretty confusing, it seems to be a no harm, no foul situation for those who got on board early.

SEE ALSO
Pimax "5K" Plus Breeds Confusion as Previewers Recommend it Over "8K" Headset

Before we get to the specs (listed below): if you’re wondering why we put Pimax’s headsets in quotes, it’s because the company has taken some creative license in their naming scheme. Their names (“8K”, “5K”) reflect the combined resolutions of both display panels; VR headsets are typically quantified by the resolution of only a single display, because when the user puts on the headset the pictures are combined to form a stereoscopic view—you aren’t seeing 8K resolution, but rather something closer to 4K (minus some pixels), which is then stretched and refocused to fit the headset’s ~200 degree FOV. In reality, a measurement based on pixels per degree is a more accurate estimation of the final viewing experience, but you’re probably not here for that, and just want to know the raw specs.

Pimax “8K” Specs – $900

  • Display: CLPL (Customized low persistence liquid)
  • Resolution: 3,840 × 2,160 per display (7,680 × 2,160 total)
  • Input content: upscaled from 2,560 × 1,440
  • Motion to Photon latency: <15ms
  • Refresh Rate: 80 Hz, Brainwarp Support
  • FOV: ~200 degree diagonal
  • Audio: 3.5mm audio jack, integrated microphone
  • Output: USB 2.0/3.0, DP 1.4
  • Tracking: SteamVR 1.0 and 2.0 tracking
  • Content: SteamVR and Oculus Home
  • Fit: Adjustable headset strap (deluxe headstrap optional), IPD adjustment, VR frame
  • Minimum Recommended GPU: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1080Ti and AMD equivalent or above

Pimax “5K” Plus – $700

  • Display type: CLPL(Customized low persistence liquid)
  • Resolution: 2,560 × 1,440 per (5,120 × 1,440 total)
  • Input content: delivered at native 2,560 × 1,440
  • Motion to Photon latency: <15ms
  • Refresh Rate: 90 Hz, Brainwarp Support
  • FOV: ~200 degree diagonal
  • Audio: 3.5mm audio jack, integrated microphone
  • Output: USB 2.0/3.0, DP 1.4
  • Tracking: support for SteamVR 1.0 and 2.0 tracking
  • Content: SteamVR and Oculus Home
  • Fit: Adjustable headset strap (deluxe headstrap optional), IPD adjustment, VR frame
  • Minimum Recommended GPU: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1070 and AMD equivalent or above

Pimax “5K” BE, costing $1,000, has the same specs as the “5K” Plus outside of an OLED display, clocked at 85Hz. The Pimax “5K” BE is said to be a limited time offer.

Update (12:51 PM ET): In a previous version of this article, Pimax “8K”  was quoted as having an OLED display. This is an error, as only the “5K” BE has an OLED. It was also incorrectly supposed the 200 degree FOV was horizontal, when it is indeed a measurement of the diagonal FOV. Both have been corrected in the body of the piece.

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Scott Hayden
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 3,500 articles on the topic. Scott brings that seasoned insight to his reporting from major industry events across the globe.
  • Xilence

    The 5KBE used an OLED panel I thought? Or was this unconfirmed? http://forum.pimaxvr.com/t/the-new-pimax-5ks-with-oled/9443/37

    • Icebeat

      yes it is confirmed, 5KBE is the Business edition with OLED display

  • dogbite

    Not sure but the article got the 8K spec wrong, It is also CLPL not OLED.

  • jj

    “It was also incorrectly supposed the 200 degree FOV was horizontal, when it is indeed a measurement of the diagonal FOV.”

    This is a good example of Pimax’s allowing misguided information to benefit them instead of being clear about specs. This has been an issue for the entirety of their business. Just like the magic leap, they hide controversial information with the intend of leading people on. Their name is a great example of this too, using terms like “5k” and “8k” in quotations or as titles when neither are really 5k or 8k…
    Feel free to buy their product, im happy its actually releasing, but all this smoke and mirrors confusion has pushed me to back out with so many red flags pointing towards pimax being untrustworthy and deceitful.

    • Farzaan Ijaz

      Most users use the 150 Horizontal FOV setting on a Pimax and claim it leaves you wanting almost nothing in terms of FOV. The Vive Pro has a 110 Diagonal FOV…the comparison isn’t even in the same league.

      • jj

        …so 150 to 200 isnt in the same league either

        • Pimax Medium FOV to the Large Fov setting has been talked about by many testers and backers, a tiny jump in expanded view, something like 15 degrees each side (and this is an area at your extreme peripheral) when taking overlap into consideration.

          So everybody that I know of to date has opted for the much faster and reduced outer peripheral distortion setting of the Medium (150 Fov)

          • Leon

            Yes the difference from large to normal was only noticable in that the distortion was gone. I didn’t miss it and wasn’t distracted by it. But compared to the Vive it was huge difference. Also the fov vertically is increased as well even though it isn’t stressed. The medium also increases framerate. Native VR games should run fine in 1080ti and most on 1080. The frame rate issues are with the usual suspects that don’t run great on existing HMD’s.

        • Farzaan Ijaz

          Why are you focusing on this is the real question. 200 FOV would be untenable with a 2080Ti and compared to all other headsets available (literally all), the FOV is 50% higher.

          • jj

            150 5k and 8k is not possible either…. yet here they are selling a product that doesnt even really work like they say it does.

            btw thanks for clearing up the difference between 150 and 200… i guess i dont know my fractions…..

            but your right 200 fov isnt runnable and from what i hear from reviews pretty much everything is laggy on a pimax already.

          • Leon

            Seemed to work great when I tried it. What was your experience like that it wasn’t working?

    • funguseater

      And we had the same “controversy” over diagonal TV screen sizes when the format changed and dual GPU’s claiming they had the RAM of both cards even though only half was usable. Its marketing, doutful it will ever change as it keeps working.

    • zolix7508

      Totally agree. One can say that he/she was not able to meet the specs initially set b/c of lack of money, unexpected technical problems etc, but one can’t raise such excuses for not communicating honestly.
      Usually a fruit that is a bit rotten in the beginning will just get rotten more and more as time goes on, and not vice-versa.

    • Da Mo (JFlash)

      jj – Jim Jones

    • Kev

      I tried it and the Pimax FOV is basically my entire view. I can see the edges only slightly on the horizontal edges and a little bit at the bottom. It’s also higher res than my vive pro.

    • G-man

      people dont knwo what 200 degrees even looks like diagonal, horizontal, whatever. its more. a lot more. get over it.

  • Trip

    I also wish someone would talk about the facial interface. I tried a “Pimax 4K” and the facial interface was awful. This looks like it may be the same. Scratchy cheap foam, that IIRC seemed like it was glued on and not washable/replaceable. This is a major issue if it’s the case with these new headsets as well.

    • Trip

      Also concerned about the need to run “PiPlay”, an additional software layer may not cause issues, but it does provide one more thing to potentially cause crashes, reduced performance, or who knows what else. I really hope we get a real Gen 2 “official” SteamVR headset maybe late next year.

    • Zerofool

      This one is removable. You should definitely watch the in-depth, hours-long reviews by Sweviver, MRTV and VoodooDE.

      • Trip

        Thanks for the heads up, that means we should be able to upgrade it which means I’m more likely to seriously consider PiMax. I might check out one of the long videos, I watched several of the shorter ones (mostly Sweviver) and was left a bit skeptical about the objectivity of the reviewers so I wasn’t too inclined to spend hours of my life watching reviews I felt might be very much biased in favor of the product.

    • Raphael

      Should also point out the Vive face cushion is awful as well. Neoprene is not a good material for the face as it traps heat. I replaced mine with vinyl cushions.

      • jj

        i almost posted “what? mines great”, until i realized its great cause i replaced it immediately haha

        • Raphael

          Lol. Unfortunately it took me ages to get around to replacing it. First I modded the original. That worked ok. Then eventually purchased a thin vinyl/foam one.

        • NooYawker

          I don’t remember the original material.. was it leather like? I replaced mine pretty quickly as well.

      • Trip

        The original Vive one is definitely not good (I use thin VR-Covers type), but it’s not anywhere remotely close to as uncomfortable and cheap feeling as the Pimax 4K stuff. That stuff felt like disposable packing material.

  • Zerofool

    These prices are without VAT and shipping.
    In the EU, the 5K+ /w shipping is around 780 Euro, which is way too much IMO. Personally, I’ll be waiting till next year for some discounts. Who knows, maybe the competition will have similar offerings by then.

    • Raphael

      Competition won’t have similar offerings by then. Unlikely even Q4 2019.

      • Zerofool

        Yes, all the information available points to that, especially from the big names. I’ve come to expect nothing groundbreaking or cutting edge from them, but this doesn’t mean that we should dismiss the possibility of surprising announcements from unexpected parties. There have been very few such surprises in the tech industry in recent history, but VR is an area where you don’t really need to have decades of experience and billions of dollars to even hope to be competitive, and Pimax is a concrete example of this. If they managed to pull this off, many others also could do it if they had the will. That’s why I like the wait and see game when the price is not really enticing. Well, if it was 500 Euro in total, I would “just buy it” but it’s not, so waiting it is (waiting and hoping) :).

  • MosBen

    It’s great that there are products targeted to hardcore users with money to burn, but I just can’t get very excited about products that wontwsell enough units to move the industry towards mainstream adoption, nor do I have any personal interest in super expensive HMDs that also basically require Nvidia’s ridiculously expensive RTX cards. Competition and different categories of products is a good thing, I just don’t think that much is going to come of this from the standpoint of someone that wants to see VR become a part of everyday life.

    • Misha Barnett

      I have an unpopular opinion, but I think the future of widespread VR gaming is still PC related and it’s still 4+ years away. I predict it will happen when cheap gpus can adequately run the better 2nd gen HMDs and when the prices of those HMDs falls.

      The standalone HMDs sound great, but I feel like the games that are the best VR has to offer will always require more performance than the current gen of standalone will have to offer. The standalones will always be late to the catch up.

      And again, only my opinion, but I’m predicting what will bring popularize VR gaming is a revolutionary MMORPG gaming title and that the standalone HMDs will not be able to run that game well enough

      • MosBen

        I agree with parts of your post, but not all of it. I think that PC-tethered VR is likely to remain an important part of the industry for at least a few years, but that has more to do with the fact that hardcore PC gamers are more likely to spend money on expensive hardware, both PCs and HMDs, which helps fund the development of new technologies that may get incorporated into mobile units as the tech is refined and made cheaper.

        But as for what will cause VR gaming to go mainstream, I guess that it depends on how we define mainstream. The thing about most of the gaming events that have really broken out into the mainstream is that they weren’t expensive and didn’t rely on powerful hardware. Wii Sports wasn’t a beautiful game, even for the time, but lots of people played it because it was compelling and affordable. WoW never required a beast of a gaming machine, but it became even more popular as it became a game that basically any machine could play. I don’t imagine that my parents or non-gaming friends are ever going to buy a graphics card or gaming PC, but they might buy a $400 Oculus Quest if it has some compelling games (please let Beat Saber be released for it).

        If, on the other hand, we define VR going mainstream as becoming more popular among PC gamers, then maybe you’re right. It’s already the case that a large percentage of computers running Steam are capable of running VR, but the vast majority of those users haven’t purchased a VR headset. So maybe they’re waiting for that second generation of PC HMD that improves the specs a bit.

        • Baldrickk

          PCs are going to be needed for the high end for the foreseeable future, with consoles lagging a little behind the top end, along with the more average level gaming PC users.

          Its wonderful how powerful yet efficient mobile devices are getting at rendering these days, but really, they can’t hold a candle to the visual quality of a full gaming PC – just compare a high end PC graphics card to a mobile chipset.

          For the more casual gamer / user? I think you’re right. graphically simpler games can be run well by cheaper hardware.

          I think there is a place for both tbh.

          • MosBen

            Oh sure. Indeed, I’m comfortable saying that PCs will always have an advantage when it comes to high end power. The question is just how big of an audience there will be for that sort of thing as mobile gets better. There will probably always be some group of people willing to pay the cost and deal with the inconveniences of being on the bleeding edge of graphics, but as lower power VR products, like the Quest, draw bigger and bigger percentages of the VR audience I think that the importance of the PC side to the industry will be reduced.

        • Toothlover

          your predictions are pretty accurate!

          • MosBen

            Time to go to Vegas!

    • Kev

      4k monitors, 4k tv’s, high end video cards all sell in the millions. (14.8M TV’s over $2,500 sold last year alone). 5.5M TV’s sold that are over $4,000. The Oculus Go sold just 300k at $199. If the experience is right, people will buy it and yes being expensive is indeed ok. This crazy race to the bottom is just insane for VR.

      • MosBen

        Are those numbers in the US? Even so, not everyone who is interested in buying a gaming PC is interested in also buying and setting up a VR setup. So you’re looking at some subset of a subset of people, and selling a few million HMDs is not the size of customer base that the industry needs to support competing HMDs and dozens of companies producing VR content. It’s not insane for VR companies to want to reach a larger install base than wealthy tech-heads that are willing to spend a huge chunk of money on the latest and greatest gaming gear.

        Also, according to my quick googling, the Oculus Go sold about 300k units in Q2 2018 alone. I don’t know know what they sold in Q3 or what they expect to sell to end out the year, but it’s probably more than what you’ve reported. That said, I see the Quest as the real intro product for consumer VR. We’ll see how that does next year.

        • Kev

          My point is if VR was good enough yet it could easily compete with all sorts of media consumption devices. VR is conceptually better in every way almost like LCD monitors vs. Tube monitors or SSD’s vs. Hard Disks.

          This race to the gutter only *increases the gap between media devices. Imagine a personal screen at home that is far higher quality than your Samsung top of the line TV and allows the screen to be perceivable at *any size. Or a computer monitor where your usable work area is expanded dramatically. Want to work or play with friends, poof they are sitting at the table with you.

          Instead of attempting to compete with TV’s, monitors and a myriad of other things that sell for thousands of dollars and move in the millions (companies like Oculus) are trying to compete against of all things ***sunglasses. For pete’s sake how crazy stupid is that.

    • nipple_pinchy

      Exactly. The elitists don’t get it. The future of VR isn’t the most expensive experience possible; it’s the most convenient, most accessible experiences possibly.

      It DOES NOT MATTER how awesome a VR game is if only a few hundred-thousand people on the planet can conceivably afford to pay for it.

      If the future of VR is relegated to being tethered to a PC with the most powerful GPU on the planet to run it, VR will never ever grow beyond a niche hobby for people with lots of disposable income.

      VR needs to ape the smartphone model and not the high-end PC model. Race to the bottom. Standalone units, push the mobile hardware to be more powerful by funneling hundreds of millions of consumers into it who will demand constant evolutionary improvements in every facet of VR.

      The PC gamers think that if it isn’t the “high-end” then it shouldn’t exist. They live in a bubble, don’t understand basic economics and aren’t helping VR as an industry.

      • MosBen

        And the thing is, some manner of high end market will always exist. There are plenty of people that use Steam and have more than high enough specs to run tethered VR, and there’s no reason to think that that will change. And that group will always be willing to pay lots of money and put up with lots of annoyances in order to be at the bleeding edge. But VR needs widespread adoption in order to support the industrial infrastructure (hardware development, supply chains, software developers) to innovate. And another thing is that while mainstream audiences don’t necessarily care about the same issues that the hardcore audience thinks are super important, like super high resolution, they do care about things like ergonomics that the hardcore audience may not think about a lot, but will appreciate when it improves.

  • gothicvillas

    $499 for 5+ would sound almost reasonable… but 699 hmm

    • Luke

      is in the moment I saw the prices my mind said ok, next, goodbye. I wasn’t even angry, deleted.

    • Sofian

      Tell us more, how is $400 “reasonable”, and why it should be priced less than a vive pro?

      • gothicvillas

        Vive pro should be priced the same imo. I ain’t specialist in this field :) all I’m saying, I have psvr and original Vive. For me 499 would be acceptable price tag and I think it would shift way more units and get some traction. Otherwise 699 for headset alone and knowing it is Pimax (their 4k unit wasn’t too great), just doesn’t sit right. I’m curious what are the manufacturing costs.. I know there are R&D costs, but what is the cost per unit? I’m thinking they have 100% margin.

        • Sofian

          I agree that VR is too expensive right now, but Pimax makes their price based on what the market is not what it should be.

          • Pimax have based their price on the Vive Pro (which is expensive) and not what people are willing to pay (the Kickstarter)

        • Jack Frosterton

          Vive pro should be priced the same as these? Is that what you’re saying? No. The Vive pro is a stunning ripoff, much worse than anything we’ve seen in VR to date. The pimax’ screens are 20% taller than the Pro’s screen’s _width_. There are more and better reasons, too:

          The Samsung Odyssey has the exact same screen as the VP, but its lenses are of considerably higher quality. Since it has inside-out tracking, it is fully portable and self-contained, requiring no base-stations (it is such a treat with my laptop, taking plug-and-play VR with me n my backpack). Odyssey has sold for $500 over the past year, but it hasn’t been hard to find for $400. The portable, plug-and-play version with better lenses is a little over 1/3 the price of the Vive Pro, all told.

          But why bother with the Odyssey when the “Odyssey+” is now in stores for the same $500? It has updated tracking with the bluetooth chip now housed in the HMD, is lighter, with better, squishy pads (better than the Odyssey’s pads and also better than the Pro’s) The new controllers made sturdier than before. They still have both a track pad and a joystick on each controller.

          But none of that matters. What matters is that the Odyssey+’s new display is the prettiest on the market, bar none. It doesn’t have the awesomely wide FOV of the pimax, though. It’s just 110 degrees like the Pro and all the rest. But for $300 on Black Friday, you can get the O+ with its new technology that makes the screen-door imperceptible unless you seek it out in situations where you are also looking at solid-white, or similar. Do you see the way I rewarded those who chose to read my essay? I’m sure they will sell out, so be careful about posting this information all over the place.

      • johngrimoldy

        He said $499, not $400. You can’t discount his statement by 20% as any part of your argument. Anything you say after the misrepresentation is moot.

        • Sofian

          “You can’t discount his statement by 20% as any part of your argument”

          Just an error, but you are missing the point here.
          It was about costing less than a vive pro not how much less.

    • NooYawker

      Don’t forget the price doesn’t include controllers or lighthouses. So it essentially doubles the price if you actually want to use your Pimax

  • Andrew Jakobs

    But it was expected that the final consumer price would be much higher than the kickstarter price.. Now you’ll smack yourself in the head if you waited for the consumer price..

    • NooYawker

      No one is going to smack their head over this.

  • Konchu

    So I am a backer in the 500’s and just last week I asked if I could switch the the 5K Plus as evidence is pointing to that being the better headset and was told I would be given an opportunity to choose when they got to my number. See to be this is odd because I feel I am still a fairly early kick-starter I would imagine 500 units should be fairly simple for a company that is supposed to be in the manufacturing process now. I personally feel it is also odd they are pushing people to consider the 5kPlus and not getting a survey out a soon as possible so they can get the units in production more efficiently. But the rate they are getting these out you would think they are being made one at a time by them and not in a factory.

    It makes me feel the shipping to backers was a PR move they were not ready to ship. Perhaps they are hoping to get some more pre-orders so they can make a big production run to save money. Maybe they ran out of cache and they are dragging it out and hoping to get money to finish this.

    • Leon

      Robin told me they are getting a component based produced and when it comes in they will be able to ramp up production quickly. I tried to get a more definitive timeline but was unable other than very soon as my number is high 400’s. Let’s hope it’s correct. I tried it and it’s sets the new standard. (5k+)

    • Farzaan Ijaz

      I doubt they have money issues. I am betting lots of lenders would lend to Pimax today. A year ago…that was probably tough.

  • Prices are in line to what I expected. What I didn’t expect was the website was down the same day of launch…

  • NooYawker

    2 controllers + 2 lighthouses is about $560. Controllers and lighthouses are about $130 each.

    These prices are absolutely ridiculous.

    • G-man

      if you buy them from rip off htc yeah. but lighthouses 2.0, from valve are $60, sold to developers. and that was a year ago, they might even be cheaper by now. if valve ever actually sells them to the public.

  • For us that have a Rift or are new buyers then the price is a big ask when you consider the missing parts.

    2 x Lighthouses (preferably 2.0, can’t buy these yet)
    2 x controllers (preferably knuckle style, not available yet)
    1 x Deluxe audio head-strap (not available yet unless you rig a Vive DAS to it)
    1 x Delivery from china (approx $70)
    1 x 2080 Ti GPU (if you want to hit close to native frame-rates)

    We are talking over £1200 for the 5K+ excluding new GPU and any tax/customs.

    The entire package is also not competitive (software, support, logistics, build quality etc) so I assumed the price would be a steal. It’s not.

    Ah well. Will see where we are in 6 months I guess.

  • kimdacosta

    20K, 100K, 200K, 300K, 1000000K….

  • AmazingTechVR

    https://www.pimaxvr.com/

    Pimax VR headsets are going to be ready for pre order very soon.

    So a lot of people are probably still confused as hell with Pimax. The website hasn’t been working for a long time. It was hacked, taken offline and started to direct visitors to porn sites and adding a virus to their PC’s. I heard a few stories where people had to format to get back up and running. 5K+, 8K or 5K BE. The Business Edition was sprung up on the website without any introduction, apparently it’s OLED and apparently it has PenTile pixel matrix (not the most desired compared to RGB).

    The website has popped online, lots of broken links, broken English and lacking a lot of information. It started to be updated and more has been added.

    1/ No details about warranty – ordering from China, what happens if it breaks?
    2/ Couldn’t add the Shipping Address to your account.
    3/ No option apart from Credit card, which many are reluctant to add due to the site recently being hacked and unsecrure. PayPal was finally added which saves having to enter card details.
    4/ Prices appeared, but no stock.
    5/ A countdown clock at 0:0:0 appeared, then started counting down on the Chinese version.
    6/ English version isn’t loading currently, have been getting 502 Bad Gateway errors since it came online
    7/ More options appeared, now the option to order each HMD with a RTX COLOFUL graphics card (Chinese brand), then the site went down again.
    8/ A flicker of the long awaited Basestation(lighthouse boxes) and Controllers appeared, but I never managed to get the screenshot. Site offline again.
    9/ Countdown timer disappeared, would have been due around about now at time of posting this.

    Launch day and the site isn’t finished. Lots of people asking questions and confused or dubious about this whole process. Pimax have the best intentions and the best HMD’s for VR right now, but this launch has been insane.

    Discussion threads:

    Reddit https://www.reddit.com/r/Pimax/comments/9qzzz4/pimax_vr_hmds_are_showing_on_their_website_now/
    Pimax Forums http://forum.pimaxvr.com/t/pimax-pre-order-will-launch-soon/9534/146

  • Yoshi Kato

    For me, the price is a bit too high for me to pre-order without a firm launch date. Of course, HTC or Oculus haven’t announced a headset that could compete with it so the pricing isn’t too big of a surprise.

    However, I’m excited to see a truly next gen VR head set coming in the near future. By the time it launches, I’ll be ready to upgrade my PC hardware with the latest graphics card, etc.

  • Jose Ferrer

    The Pimax8K panel spec is false. Pimax doesn´t recognize that but the panels are not 3840×2160, they are 3840×1080 if you count 3 RGB subpixel per pixel.

    https://forum.il2sturmovik.com/topic/31215-pimax-8k-5k-vr-headsets-coming-to-kickstarter-this-month/?do=findComment&comment=672888

    I understand that RoadToVR just report the “official” specs. But it would be also worth to mention that the Pimax8K panel are not really 3840×2160.

    You can verify that when a Pimax8K is in your hands.
    That´s one of the reasons why the 5K+ shows crisper images.

  • Dave Graham

    I’m interested but there is zero way I’m parting with cash until I can try one.. It’s going to have to be a fairly hefty quality jump from my trusty Rift to get me to pull the trigger. plus I have buy controllers and tracking stations ffs. Think I’ll wait a year or so for a price drop and hopefully knuckles, or I hear some news about true gen 2.

  • fuyou2

    Well done to Pimax! You’ll have to wait 2 years for Oculus to catch up. I can tell you they make both vive and rift look like a joke, yes the price might be a little high but well worth it. 200 degree FOV is insanely cool.

    • jj

      its more like a trade off, yes other hmd devs will be behind on pov but at least theyre going to come with quality, better help, and warranties

    • MW

      On paper. In reality Pimax 8k is a not existing product. You words will be true when somebody can actually buy working Pimax 8/5k with controllers and tracking. And when (if) this will be possible, you can write those words…

  • FriendlyCard

    aaaaand the obvious problem with all of this: these headsets will be nearly useless on nearly all current high end gaming systems. If a 2080 can’t run simple VR games like Arizona Sunshine or Space Pirate Trainer on a 5K, what does that say about the 8k?

    Read this review of the 5K: https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/pimax-5k-m2-headset-vr,5818-2.html

    • NooYawker

      What do you expect from a company calling their device 5k and 8k???

      • FriendlyCard

        Yes, PImax is bold-face lying about 8k actually. Read on:
        “Hopefully, the manufacturers will come to a realization that such
        marketing statements (“8K”) will only provide a target for critics, and will
        ultimately lead to a self-sabotage. An 8K monitor
        typically displays 7680×4320 pixels. The combined display resolution of
        Pimax 8K is 2*3840×2160, or 7680×2160. This is a full 8K display
        horizontally, but only half the pixels vertically, so per eye, you get a
        2K*4K display, or combined 8K*2K.” Source: Vborg

        • G-man

          stfu about 8k. it’s a pixel width, not a resolution “an 8k monitor typicall displays…” yeah, except for an ultra wide monitor that isn’t 16:9.

          its 8k pixels wide. now stfu

  • AmazingTechVR

    The launch went pretty badly. Nobody could really preorder and a post went out saying they’re going to need to hire somebody to update their website. This should have been constructed a year ago, not on launch day.

    Also in addition to this, I’ve constructed a spreadsheet of different VR HMD’s that require a beefy PC to run them as comparison. Hope it is of use to someone.

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/841652c9a3acffb9ff4495647996f973306f30c6db6d313af938623b6d0e6608.png

    https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/fe655e5cd9194b7584cdec3846e6a8f13b85ac44402ab3d3480205eee3fe052c.png

    • Baldrickk

      nice summary of the market / prices, thanks

  • CHRIS

    I hear the pimax 5k SDE looks about the same as the vive pro, reason why i opted for vive pro with wireless. I’m still considering a pimax 5k due to the wide FOV.

    • Leon

      I didn’t hear. I saw that the SDE on 5K+ is nmuch better than Vive Pro.

  • kakek

    The pimax are just uninterresting products, or super niche products for the wealthy enthusiast who can’t wait.

    Because it’s not inovative at all, it dooesn’t bring anything new to VR. It just brute force it’s way to a higher FOV, without caring for the cost of how practical it is torequire a 2080 to just run current games at a decent framerate.

    They could have worked on screens that reduce scren door effect without needing higher resolution, like samsung.
    Or a variable focal, like occulus is preparing.
    Or eye tracking and foveated rendering.

    THOSE techs might allow VR to move forward, by actually allowing better experiences.

    But the Pimax, they’re just bigger screens with more pixels, bigger lense, and that’s it.

  • Of course the price is higher… this is a premium product and will be sold at a premium price… more or less the same choice of HTC

  • Callsign Vega

    This is a joke. I ordered a 8K-X some 13 months ago and there hasn’t been a SINGLE PEEP about it ever since. And now they are talking about retail sales, before they even update FREAKING BACKERS.

  • Mr. Goldfinger

    I have to say that I can no longer play games on a flat screen monitor after enjoying them in VR, even with lower resolution and screen door effect. There is no turning back from VR, and the current tech is just the beginning. It can be pricey when you include the high end PC, but this is always the case with any new technology that comes to market. I’m looking forward to this and future headsets.

  • Tom

    If I was to buy the Pimax “5k plus with hand motion”, what games out there would be playable with this? What’s the point of the “hand motion”?
    Or would I be better off just getting the basic 5k plus package, with the “base station”?
    Or is it worth getting all three?
    I’m finding that the support contact for pimax is highly unreliable…

  • LouenLencour

    I just want to know if this brainwarp thing works the way the reprojections for the vive and oculus work, if so thats great, if its just some kind of marketing crap then running a headset like this at 90fps is literally not possible for the games I play.