It seems that Pimax has advanced its presentations of the Pimax 8K, deciding to make a presentation in Tokyo before those that will take place at the end of the month in Berlin.
Pimax has made a presentation of its Pimax 8K in Tokyo, notifying some of its sponsors by mail with less than 24 hours in advance, thus anticipating the demonstrations announced in Berlin, with this text:
On August 28, between 16: 00 and 18:00 hours, there will be an event – experience of a new device, the Pimax 8K, organized by the Pimax team.
If you are interested in this event, do not hesitate to request it at https://signup.com/go/EquYUai8
Time is limited, so there are only 15 places available on a first come, first served basis. Please show this mail upon arrival.
Time: 16-18:00
Location: Hotel Shinagawa Prince 10F Hall.
Once registered, the backers have received an image as a mail note:
The event took place this Tuesday, August 28 at four in the afternoon in Japan, nine in the morning in the Iberian peninsula. The fifteen guests were supposed to have two hours to test the device, but apparently, according to one of the attendees, until five thirty Pimax has passed them some slides “very boring”.
Two of the attendees, understanding that they have not signed any confidentiality agreement, have decided to give their impressions on social networks. The two have tried the Beat Saber game, which is strange, since it is not a game that takes advantage of the wide field of view (FOV) offered by the Pimax 8K, since the action takes place in a corridor and is not the most suitable to validate the quality of the images, being dark, with frenetic movements and walls that distort the images.
It is not yet confirmed that they have used the Pimax 8K M2 test units, but Pimax told attendees that they were the newest devices, and the M2 are the newest test units, which are supposed to be teaching at these new meetings with backers in various cities.
The two attendees also went to demonstrations of the Pimax 8K prototypes that took place in mid-November at the fair 2017 Edition.
These comments are a mixture of those that appeared today in Twitter and Facebook:
The current images are blurred, definitely not as sharp as the ones I saw last year at the CEATEC fair, is this problem because of the current arrangement of the lenses? but there may be differences between each person, it could be because I had just tested the Samsung Odyssey; the image of the OLED panel [en el Samsung] it was so sharp and clear that the faint contrast of the [panel] LCD [de las Pimax 8K] could have been the reason [por la que no notaba la imagen enfocada].
New unit comes with interpupillary distance controller [IPD] inbuilt.
The field of view is undoubtedly wide; however, the periphery is terribly distorted compared to the unit I used in CEATEC last year. As long as you don’t move your head, it’s not a big deal, but it’s really obvious that the edges get distorted once you move your head (especially the bright areas [de la imagen]).
I think this distortion is the biggest problem we have now.
According to one interpreter, they are still working on peripheral distortion.
With Beat Saber I didn’t notice any worrying SDE [SDE es el efecto de mosquitera, la vista de la separación oscura entre píxeles], but peripheral distortion was even visible at the nose edges of the lenses (which I confirmed by closing one eye at a time). This could be the reason why I didn’t notice it as if it was properly focused. (Although after playing with the IPD setting, it could have been the IPD that caused it… maybe)
Light is also filtered through the nose hole, as it has been adapted for Western countries.
We find out with these comments that they are comparing the Pimax 8K with the Samsung Odyssey; they already said that they would compare the Pimax 8K M2 with other virtual reality glasses, still to be decided at that time.
The other assistant is one of the first 99 backers; he says that they could not access the device until half past five in the afternoon and that, despite the request not to say anything until September 2, the last day of the demonstrations in Berlin, he does not believe he is bound by any legal impediment.
Your comments are more positive:
The demonstration was with Beat Saber and the guy at the booth said that the demonstration unit was the mass production one, so I assume it was the M2 unit.
There was only one base station lighthouse v1.0 and we used the drivers of the HTC Vive.
The overall tracking was fine and the frame rate looked good on a laptop (maybe with a GTX1080).
I have to say that the distortion of the lens really improved; previously, in the CEATEC, I saw like a bright ring in the center and, at the edges of my field of view, I could definitely see distortion and extreme brightness. That wasn’t the case this time, but I felt it looked a bit blurry (somehow I couldn’t get the IPD fit to match me…). And if I looked carefully at the bottom right and left of my FOV, I saw some rainbow effects [aberración cromática]but I doubt anyone would notice it with regular use. Overall, I was impressed by the improvement in the lens.
I only had 5 minutes with the unit, so nothing else I can deal with here.
Pimax shared more information with attendees:
Looks like Pimax sponsors will start receiving their units around November and at the same time they will go on sale for common customers. However, sponsors will have priority.
Knuckles controllers won’t be ready this year, so it is very unlikely that they will ship together and will surely ship in the first quarter of 2019.
Of course, these statements have caused quite a lot of concern among the backers of the Pimax 8K, 8K X and 5K, who are waiting to see what happens at the meeting in Berlin, which promises to be interesting.
