VR Before PC Upgrade?

[Pie Mine]

I have been thinking about buying a HTC Vive. With the times I have used it, I loved it. I have played Super Hot, Beat Saber, Job Sim, and Tilt Brush. I can not explain how much I love the Vive and VR.

The Rift did not stand out as much as the Vive, but it's good too.

For a used Vive running at $440, It is right about the price of the upgrade I have in mind. (Click here for the Vive amazon page)

 

I plan to upgrade from;

AMD FX-6300

8GB DDR3 Memory at 800MHz

Some Mobo I don't know anything about, except it's buy Gigabyte

 

To;

Ryzen 5 2600

16GB Trident.Z RGB Memory at 3000MHz

MSI - B450 TOMAHAWK

(PC Part Picker list here)

 

I will be keeping my GPU, which is a GTX 970, and is on the list of GPU's for the Vive.

 

On one side, I should upgrade my PC, as it's showing its age...

But on the other side I love VR, and I think my PC can handle it for the time until I upgrade.

 

I am ether going to upgrade, or buy the Vive first, but I will do both in the end.

 

I have done the steam VR test and never dropped below 90FPS. I also ran VRMark, and got a score of 5,503 (Avg FPS was 119).

 

 

So, my question is;

For someone who loves VR, should I buy the HTC Vive then later upgrade my PC, or should I upgrade my PC, then get a Vive.

[lmeneses]

I mean, if your pc can handle VR and the games you play within VR, then just get VR now. However, with the holiday season coming around the corner (black Friday and cyber Monday) and if you care about money, then it may be smarter to upgrade your pc first 

[Pie Mine]

Just now, lmeneses said:

I mean, if your pc can handle VR and the games you play within VR, then just get VR now. However, with the holiday season coming around the corner (black Friday and cyber Monday) and if you care about money, then it may be smarter to upgrade your pc first 

Oh, I completely forgot! I will think about that, thanks for your input!

[lmeneses]

1 minute ago, Pie Mine said:

Oh, I completely forgot! I will think about that, thanks for your input!

[i_build_nanosuits]

you'll be disapointed of the performance of a GTX 970 in more demanding VR titles though...just want to let you know.

[Pie Mine]

18 minutes ago, i_build_nanosuits said:

you'll be disapointed of the performance of a GTX 970 in more demanding VR titles though...just want to let you know.

Alright. I do plan to upgrade some day, it's just a now or later kind of thing. Thanks for you input however!

[Paul Rudd]

1 hour ago, Pie Mine said:

For someone who loves VR, should I buy the HTC Vive then later upgrade my PC, or should I upgrade my PC, then get a Vive.

Upgrade PC first. VR gets old FAST.

[i_build_nanosuits]

1 hour ago, A Random Dude said:

Upgrade PC first. VR gets old FAST.

it does not, it's absolutely fantastic and there are a ton of good games for it...and racing sims and flight sims are breath taking...it's worth every penny...at least it is for me.

[Paul Rudd]

29 minutes ago, i_build_nanosuits said:

it's worth every penny

Buy mine from me then, it's practically brand new.

[WereCat]

2 hours ago, A Random Dude said:

VR gets old FAST.

I disagree. I still play almost every day after several months of getting Rift.

 

OP you may be able to play before upgrade but I highly doubt that you can maintain stable 90FPS with that CPU. 

The SteamVR Benchmark is very bad. You do however have a capable GPU for many VR games. 

 

I also recommend Jet Island game if you havent tries it yet (it's very new) 

[Paul Rudd]

1 hour ago, WereCat said:

I still play almost every day after several months of getting Rift.

What games do you play almost every day on the Rift? I have had my Rift boxed up since I got it back in December of 2016.

[i_build_nanosuits]

9 hours ago, A Random Dude said:

What games do you play almost every day on the Rift? I have had my Rift boxed up since I got it back in December of 2016.

i play onward, pavlov, project cars 2 and DCS on a daily basis.

it's a great time to unbox it and start enjoying it there are so many amazing games that have come out in the past 6 months or so it's insane...

i got my rift almost 2 years ago now and i still use it everyday.

[WereCat]

9 hours ago, A Random Dude said:

What games do you play almost every day on the Rift? I have had my Rift boxed up since I got it back in December of 2016.

Beat Saber, VRChat, Onwards, Pavlov, Moss, Dirt Rally, Jet Island, Lone Echo.

Beat Saber I play by far the most though.

[Paul Rudd]

53 minutes ago, i_build_nanosuits said:

i play onward, pavlov, project cars 2 and DCS on a daily basis.

it's a great time to unbox it and start enjoying it there are so many amazing games that have come out in the past 6 months or so it's insane

Nice, these games look better than the ones I used to want to play. I have Project Cars 2, it was actually amazing in VR. 

[Paul Rudd]

31 minutes ago, WereCat said:

Beat Saber, VRChat, Onwards, Pavlov, Moss, Dirt Rally, Jet Island, Lone Echo.

I remember VRChat was an upcoming game just before I shelved my Oculus. I fiddled around with similar games and they were actually very good but mostly unfinished. I remember one game where you can sit at a campfire and talk to people but everyone was so damn awkward for some reason. I need to get those controllers for the Oculus, I bet they make it a much better experience. Beat Saber does look like fun but I hope it doesn't make me feel sick. That was one thing I don't like about the Oculus was the motion sickness.

[i_build_nanosuits]

2 hours ago, A Random Dude said:

I remember VRChat was an upcoming game just before I shelved my Oculus. I fiddled around with similar games and they were actually very good but mostly unfinished. I remember one game where you can sit at a campfire and talk to people but everyone was so damn awkward for some reason. I need to get those controllers for the Oculus, I bet they make it a much better experience. Beat Saber does look like fun but I hope it doesn't make me feel sick. That was one thing I don't like about the Oculus was the motion sickness.

You absolutely need to get the oculus touch indeed...they are SO SO nice...it's really nowhere near the same experience that you can get without them..

Also, unfortunately a 3rd sensor is pretty much mendatory purchase as well if you play 360 games like onward for example and other FPS type games and stuff...to avoid any dead zone where the controlers loose connection...but once you get that going it's EPIC. A good racing wheel for dirt rally and project cars 2 is also really nice to have and racing is by far my favorite VR activity..i use a logitech G25 i bought used for 140$CAD it won't break the bank and it has a clutch, stick shift etc...all you need really.

 

As far as motion sickness goes...i can say for me personally it went away really fast, your brain get used to it in a matter of a couple of sessions...i can remember the first time i did a roller coster i had to lay on my bed for an hour after only 5 minutes of it...i was not feeling well...i tried again the next day, and by the 3rd time i was able to do it for as long as i wanted without any issues...now i can do anything in VR for hours on end...racing, flying etc. no issues. Your body has to learn VR and if you do it in short burst it goes great in no time...at least it did for me.

[Paul Rudd]

50 minutes ago, i_build_nanosuits said:

i bought used for 140$CAD

If I'm spending $140.00, it's definitely not on some racing wheel. Hell, I paid $165 for my brand new 1TB Xbox One S a year and a half ago off of eBay just before they practically doubled in price since you can upscale games to 4K on them. Project Cars 2 should play nicely with just a controller.

[WereCat]

3 hours ago, A Random Dude said:

I remember VRChat was an upcoming game just before I shelved my Oculus. I fiddled around with similar games and they were actually very good but mostly unfinished. I remember one game where you can sit at a campfire and talk to people but everyone was so damn awkward for some reason. I need to get those controllers for the Oculus, I bet they make it a much better experience. Beat Saber does look like fun but I hope it doesn't make me feel sick. That was one thing I don't like about the Oculus was the motion sickness.

Well yeah, VR without VR controls is definitely nauseating in many instances but even with the proper controllers, movement can still make you sick in some games if not done properly. 

But you can most definitely also get used to it. I had big issues with motion sickness myself and I struggled in VR at first but I got used to it so quickly that I can play games where I got sick in seconds for hours now. 

 

Beat Saber definitely does not make you sick. 

[Pie Mine]

18 hours ago, WereCat said:

OP you may be able to play before upgrade but I highly doubt that you can maintain stable 90FPS with that CPU. 

The SteamVR Benchmark is very bad. You do however have a capable GPU for many VR games.

What about VRMark? I have also seen some videos of people playing VR with a FX-6300, and they seem fine.

Also, I could overclock my CPU.

 

If I seem a little bias to the VR, that's because I am! However I don't want that to get the best of me, so I thought I'd get a few more opinions.

Anyway, I will do some more research and thank you for you feed back!

[WereCat]

1 minute ago, Pie Mine said:

What about VRMark? I have also seen some videos of people playing VR with a FX-6300, and they seem fine.

Also, I could overclock my CPU.

 

If I seem a little bias to the VR, that's because I am! However I don't want that to get the best of me, so I thought I'd get a few more opinions.

Anyway, I will do some more research and thank you for you feed back!

I never tried VRMark so I cannot comment on that one. 

Don't get me wrong though, I'm not saying that you cant play VR games with that CPU, just that you may experience FPS drops in some games during CPU intensive scenes. 

[i_build_nanosuits]

11 minutes ago, WereCat said:

I never tried VRMark so I cannot comment on that one. 

Don't get me wrong though, I'm not saying that you cant play VR games with that CPU, just that you may experience FPS drops in some games during CPU intensive scenes. 

most VR games aren't very CPU intensive i would say though...it's usually well optimized...most games actually hammer the GPU a lot harder.