New TrackIR Owner & Review

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Jonesyy
Posts: 11
Joined: Thu Aug 18, 2011 6:02 am

New TrackIR Owner & Review

Post by Jonesyy »

Hey guys, just thought I'd give my opinion and a big thanks to Natural Point.

Truly, never before in my life have I been so excited to try a new piece of hardware. I bought the X52 PRO to enhance my Flight Simming experience, it was good but nothing to call home about. I bought a HD 6950 2gb to tide me over until Maxwell comes along. Huge jump in performance from my 1gb 4870, but still I get used to it after a day or 2 and it becomes what I expect of my PC. I bought a new monitor and headphones to enhance my visual pleasure from 19" and 900p to 1080p and 23" and audio experience from 2.1 speakers to Sennheiser HD 598's. But now these are the norm, and even my monitor feels quite small again.

Yet my TrackIR waits infront of me, begging me to take it home to use and I cannot remember being this excited over a new product since my first online-gaming experience with Halo 2 for the XBOX.

The ability to add a new dimension to first person shooters, to effortlessly look around the cockpit and map in fight sims is something I never even considered, as its very conception sounded a good few years of tech away. In-fact, I only looked into it after using a Kinect, and imagining the hardware being now possible. To my horror, you guys have been pros in this for years, and people have been loving your products for years.

I may not yet have had a chance to use it, and see my next post for my initial impressions/review but I can already tell I am going to actually love dogfights now, instead of finding them frustrating as it is impossible to look around.

The irony is I used to wonder how people managed to look around so seamlessly while dogfighting over youtube. I think I may have discovered the culprit.

I want to say a big thank you for giving me this product, as well as a good luck for future integration. I would imagine the potential is only limited by money, and if this could become implemented into CoD and BF 3, revenue would undoubtable jump as people demand this new advantage. Post this, there may be a chance to emulate the software onto XBOX/PS further increasing revenue.

This is only a guess of what could happen, but if it did I think it could be a revolutionary product for gaming.

Thank you again,
Dan
Jonesyy
Posts: 11
Joined: Thu Aug 18, 2011 6:02 am

Re: New TrackIR Owner & Review

Post by Jonesyy »

Review coming sooooooon
Seth Steiling
Posts: 1365
Joined: Fri Jun 27, 2008 11:29 am
Location: Corvallis, Oregon

Re: New TrackIR Owner & Review

Post by Seth Steiling »

Thanks for sharing your enthusiasm, Dan. Hope you have a blast!
Marketing Manager
TrackIR | OptiTrack
Jonesyy
Posts: 11
Joined: Thu Aug 18, 2011 6:02 am

Re: New TrackIR Owner & Review

Post by Jonesyy »

So I've set it up tonight and the first thing I noticed when unboxing it was how small the unit actually was. I proceeded to plug it in a install the software, a process that was relatively straight forward.

I recognised the smoothness and speed settings corresponding to their functions and tested it out until I found my sweetspot, something I still haven't done.

The game I have tested it on so far is Wings of Prey, and I will be giving IL-2 a go tomorrow. Straight away it felt weird. It is obviously something I haven't experienced before and it took me at least 1 minute to get used to moving my head at all. I tried to tweak the settings a bit to make it act a bit less erratically.

When I entered a dogfight I noticed trying to zoom in made the camera swivel and face backwards. Annoyance. Eventually I realised it would probably be a good idea to turn the light off, which made it slightly better. It instantly was, although I was still not quite used to the movements.

My main concern atm is when I am looking at my left and right I have 2 problems. The first is I have a personal tendency to rotate my joystick at the same time as it is quite an odd sensation. I will get used to this. My second problem is, on WoP at least, when I am looking at the enemy my camera shakes like it is pulling back. I will turn down the speed tomorrow, although the smoothness was onto 4 so I don't think it was that.

So far I think, when I get used to it, it will be a fantastic product to use. It has already enhanced my game 10fold but it will take some time to adjust. I cannot wait until I do. I was to be able to sub-conciously look around without almost nose-diving each time.

Thank you again Natural Point.
Seth Steiling
Posts: 1365
Joined: Fri Jun 27, 2008 11:29 am
Location: Corvallis, Oregon

Re: New TrackIR Owner & Review

Post by Seth Steiling »

I would honesty stick to a speed of 1 and a smoothing of about 10, and get adjusted on that level. Then, as you find that you need to tweak (speed up some motions, slow down others, insert a deadzone for some axes), get into the motion curves and start playing around.

The default profile should treat you well. If you'd like to try my own preferred flight profile out, you can find it here:

http://forum.naturalpoint.com/forum/ubb ... #Post38620

Also, you mentioned a light--make sure that you don't have direct sunlight, reflective surfaces, or and IR-emitting light in the background. All of those can cause issues for the TrackIR, which uses IR to track your head.
Marketing Manager
TrackIR | OptiTrack
Jonesyy
Posts: 11
Joined: Thu Aug 18, 2011 6:02 am

Re: New TrackIR Owner & Review

Post by Jonesyy »

Thanks, I'll try again tomorrow. I think the speed was just too high, being on about 5. I want it to feel more natural, so will probably go for settings close to what you just described as a starting point.

I'm not sure about deadzones, surely just better to make it a bit more smooth so it still responds a tiny bit for intricate movements?

My room is pretty much black when I close the blinds/turn the light off. I don't think that will be an issue. I am looking forward to getting my headphones so I can use the Pro Clip, unless you have any suggestions on how to wear it without. Right now I have simply selotaped the normal reflectors onto my hat.
Seth Steiling
Posts: 1365
Joined: Fri Jun 27, 2008 11:29 am
Location: Corvallis, Oregon

Re: New TrackIR Owner & Review

Post by Seth Steiling »

That hat clip shouldn't need to be taped onto your bill... simply bend the outer prongs beneath the bill to clamp it on.

Regarding your settings--I would definitely decrease your speed quite a bit. I think the default settings offer a great departure point for you. You might not even need to tweak them at all. Downloading and testing my own Flight profile would be a second suggested option. Beyond that, I wouldn't tweak much for a week or so, until you really get the hang of things. After that, you'll know better whether you really need to adjust the settings. Often times people don't. :)
Marketing Manager
TrackIR | OptiTrack
Jonesyy
Posts: 11
Joined: Thu Aug 18, 2011 6:02 am

Re: New TrackIR Owner & Review

Post by Jonesyy »

I only realised last night in bed but when I was playing I was watching the enemy (as steadily as I could) without really thinking about changing the camera. it was only when I thought of how I would have done it before that I realised the benefit of being able to keep an eye on my target. It is also the first time I have got a kill relatively easily.

I can't wait to try it in a real flight sim. WoP looks nice but I prefer dynamic campaigns and a slightly more 'simmy feel'. I hope turning down the speed helps as currently when I move my head it doesn't feel fluid because I genuinely worry that trying to see out of my window will (as it can do) make my head spin and face the seat.
Seth Steiling
Posts: 1365
Joined: Fri Jun 27, 2008 11:29 am
Location: Corvallis, Oregon

Re: New TrackIR Owner & Review

Post by Seth Steiling »

Sounds like you're getting the hang of it. I definitely do find that it's best to start out more conservatively with your settings, and then ramp things up only when you feel like it becomes necessary (e.g. you're acclimated to the feel of motion control, and you want more aggressive responses to speed up your reactions).
Marketing Manager
TrackIR | OptiTrack
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