Initial Impressions of the Super 50ppd coming from the PCL

Reviews
1

Credit: Nikolai_Volkoff88

Review: https://www.reddit.com/r/Pimax/comments/1p0pisx/initial_impressions_of_the_super_50ppd_coming/

Today I got my Crystal Super 50ppd headset. I ordered it from Walmart last week. I had the Dream Air ordered but I cancelled it because I didn’t want to give Pimax a free loan until next spring or summer. I have been using the PCL for the last year and I also have the quest 3. I have owned a ton of other VR headsets, just about everything under the sun including a recently returned BSB2 that I did not like much at all. Here are my initial thoughts.

My PC:

HP Omen 45L with 5090 and intel ultra 9 285k with 64gb of ram @ 5600mhz.

Pro’s:

  1. Super Lenses are much better than the ones on my PCL. Bigger sweetspot and E2E clarity but with a bit more Chromatic Abberation. Still little to no glare.

  2. Super has much better local dimming, a literal night and day difference. The local dimming on the Super in Dungeons of Eternity is very close to the black levels of the BSB2. BSB2 seemed like it didn’t have true OLED blacks to me, kind of like the Rift CV1.

  3. Super’s resolution is soooooo sharp. In games that aren’t very demanding like DoE and Forefront, this really cranks up the immersion. I feel bad for people playing at 2160x2160 or similar. Even my PCL was very high res compared to my Q3 which is nice.

  4. In other games that are more demanding I will definitely need to tweak settings to run this headset, No Mans Sky for example was very stuttery at full resolution and I will need to spend probably 30-45 minutes just to dial in that one game. I am confident I will get a better result than with the PCL after tweaking settings.

  5. DMAS headphones were included in the box which is a nice bonus because I ordered from Walmart. I now have DMAS on my PCL and Super and I will be selling the PCL with DMAS so it adds to the value.

  6. The controllers, which I never had with PCL because I bought the Sim racing bundle with lighthouse faceplate and no controllers, are surprisingly good. When I first turned it on they were very jittery but they updated themselves and are now rock solid. I haven’t extensively tested tracking volume yet, but I was nailing shots in Forefront. I’m glad to have a true grip mechanism again instead of pressure sensors from Index Controllers.

  7. Colors on the Super are a bit better than on the PCL and I liked the colors of the PCL much better than the BSB2. QLED is nice to look at color wise. Real Sony OLED screens will be even better I’m sure.

Cons:

  1. Biggest thing is I do not have the connector for the Light House faceplate and this might be a deal breaker if I can’t get either a fix sent to me or compensation of some sort.

  2. Mura is definitely worse than I expected. In Forefront Siberia Map where everything is white it’s very noticeable. With that being said, even with the Mura I think this is much better quality than the PCL so I would still keep it over the PCL, but I might try to get another module sent out because it’s very noticeable. In games that are dark or even just busy scenes with lots of color it’s a complete non issue. Dungeon’s of Eternity is unaffected by Mura.

  3. Comfort is almost exactly the same as the PCL for me, which was my biggest problem with the PCL. More testing is needed for me to figure this headset out and see if I can make it better.

  4. Right Controller Trigger keeps getting stuck in and I have to mess with it for 2-3 seconds to free it up, hopefully there is an easy fix for this. I actually really like the controllers.

  5. Same as the PCL, the wire is just a bit too short and I actually may look into extending it because I recently re-arranged my man cave and now I do VR a bit further from my PC than I did before.

  6. Some features are super Beta and not ready to use really. Such as the wide FOV in pimax play, it just simply ruins the profile and makes everything crosseyed. Also Auto IPD I have not even figured out how to use it or set up, but this could just be a me thing.

Overall I really like this headset and I think it’s a big upgrade from the PCL. Time will tell if it is usable in the very demanding games or if the resolution is just too much for my 5090. Also the lighthouse faceplate connector missing is a huge problem for Pimax so hopefully we get clarification on that ASAP.

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