GOOVIS Pro VR Headset

[Synchg]

part 1

So I received this awhile ago and just held off on writing a review.
I bought this after trying out the Royole Moon 3D, and had to return that because it wouldn't update to latest version to enable 3D frame packing over the HDMI cable.
That being said, I had hopes for the Goovis considering how expensive it was. With Goovis touting it's SONY OLED screens. But I should have been suspicious of the lil to no reviews regarding the blu-ray 3D capabilities it supposedly possessed.

In short, the fact that they spell blu-ray like this says it all

【Blue -ray 3D 4K High Resolution】: Blue -ray 3D movies

I messaged GOOVIS on amazon several times prior to purchasing inquiring if they did indeed support 3D blu-ray frame packing over HDMI and they ensured me they did BUT only with the D3 controller that costs more. I even double checked on that information, so I have 3 replies from them stating ONLY WITH THE D3 controller. Well guess what? The D3 controller does not work with the HDMI in any configuration I tried. The tiny minimalistic manual it came with offered no solution.

The good news is, that it does support Blu-ray 3D frame packing with just the headset itself, but you don't need the D3 Controller. Which I find very very dishonest on GOOVIS's part.
And I could only get the headset to work AFTER I went online and saw the recommended configuration. Because there was nothing in the manual about it.
Although the top positive review from JJ Zhaung on amazon states this...

Power: The headset is powered through the HDMI cable.

...i'm gonna have to call complete utter BS on that. It does not power solely through the HDMI cable, it powers through a USB/HDMI splitter. The USB port being it's only power source. Hilariously enough, it states in the manual "USB/HDMI dong (FREE GIFT)"! When it simply does not work without it, so... it's a required accessory in order to work, not a gift (another red flag)

I had bought a HDMI 10ft extender in hopes I could test whatever new mobile theater headset I ended up getting in the comfort of my own chair, but I found myself uncomfortably slouching 3 feet away from my blu-ray player on the floor because the 10ft cable was rendered moot.

I tried every configuration I could think of with the D3 player in order for it to work with the HDMI input, but no dice.
If the HDMI does infact work with the D3 controller, it'll be great if someone showed me a graph or something. Because when I messaged Goovis about it, they ASKED ME to send them a picture of how I set it up. NO thx an eff off. It shouldn't be this difficult. You get an hour of my time.
The D3 controller is a media player with more picture settings (unfairly) exclusively to it. That's it.
But since I couldn't get the D3 controller to work with the HDMI cable, the only picture options I end up with are the ability to lower backlight on the headset alone.

Getting that headache out of the way, and unto the VR headset 3D blu-ray quality itself. I'm gonna have to say it's underwhelming. The picture quality is slightly better than the Moon headset. But considering that the Moon was initially only priced like $200 less at retail value than the Goovis, I am not surprised.
To be fair, the Royole Moon picture quality wasn't that bad IMO. The Goovis is brighter, but the color temp is way too warm/yellow. There are also digital artifacts present on the screen's I did not see on the Royole Moon.
Some banding/posterization/gradient issues, whatever you wanna call it. And another artifact I can't find the words to describe atm, but I saw a similar effect on my old LCD DLP tv. It'll probably come to me later.
But honestly, the digital artifacts are not as distracting as you would think, and only happen in certain types of scenes when watching a movie.
Surprisingly, this is the least offensive part about the image quality.

Along with that much too warm tone I can't adjust. Those earlier warner bros blu-ray 3D titles that they brightened up for the 3D conversion counterpart (edge of tomorrow/jupiter ascending/batman vs superman), or any movie with a intentional mild black level grade (star wars solo, Suicide Squad), goes to shit on the image processor for this headset. I don't know what it is. It's makes the blacks levels worse. And lowering the backlight merely tames it abit.
no shadow details, no contrast, no impactful 3D depth.

And I know it's the VR headset that is the problem, because the black levels of other movies that I was able to test like Resident Evil: Retribution/How To Train Your Dragon/Valerian/Avatar/The Martian etc look just fine. Although another mystery title that wreaks havoc on this set is Beowulf. It was always a dark grade on the blu-ray but it's the opposite of highlighted blacks, just black levels crushed to shit on this set. Daytime shots look fine though.

Would I say it's worth the 1k price tag though? No
Maybe If it dropped by $400-300. Naturally I returned it because I didn't appreciate being lied to by Goovis about the D3 Controller.

[Spectra]

Thanks for taking the time to give us your impression of this headset as I recently came across these and was curious to see if they would be any good for use with frame packed 3D format and Blu-ray 3D playback.

[Synchg]

continued part 2

I'm still trying to think of the term for the 2nd digital artifact that shows up on the head set, i want to say "dot crawl" but dot crawl tends to hang around the edges of an image, and is much more severe. But what I pretty much saw were brightened dots that are the same color of whatever image they are displaying. It was quite common on DLP LCD tv's. I'm wondering if anyone knows what I'm talking about or knows the word.
But like i said, it wasn't distracting when watching a movie, but I still expected more for SONY OLED displays on this headset.

The diopter and inter-pupillary distance knobs also have more varying degree's of adjustments and are of higher quality, but sadly, much like the Royole Moon, still cuts off both sides of the image abit, but not as much as the Royole Moon. This may have been remedied if the D3 controller had pass thru for HDMI input and I was able to shrink down the picture size. Which is only an option when connected to the D3 controller.

Since there is no immersion mask, light slips through, and the foam around the viewfinder is rather stiff, but not uncomfortable. But I do wish it was soft because that way, my skull could press closer into the viewfinder.
This is where the Royole moon also wins, because it is able to retract back and forth/up and down around the user's head, creating a tight snug, minus that godawful painful nose bridge.
The Goovis pro only secures around the upper forehead. No support for eye level, so it hangs abit, which is responsible for light leakage and feeling like you are too far from the screen. The impact of the image was the best when I literally pushed the headset unto my face with one hand while watching a movie, but I don't want to keep my hands up for 2+ hours
I don't know what they were thinking. The CINERA HD looks promising in this area because it appears to tighten around ear/eye level, which again the GOOVIS does not.

The Royole Moon and Goovis both have a sensor, so when you pull away from the headset, it shuts off. Probably to prevent the screens from accidently being left on and creating burn in or just wearing out.
When I would just use the D3 controller, the screen would automatically come back on. But whenever I was playing a blu-ray 3D, it wouldn't detect the signal after putting the headset back on. I had to manually unplug/plug in the HDMI cable on the dongle every time this happens to get the image back. I'm assuming it does this because it's blu-ray 3D frame packed signal, but you end up taking off the head set alot more than you think or pull away too far and it becomes cumbersome after awhile.

As far as the 3D immersion, it's hard to say. I wasn't able to test out the Royole other than a SBS 3D clip. But the sentiments others have pointed out regarding mobile theater headsets is about the same. There is not much 3D popout, but lots of depth, but I dont know if the depth is because the screen is so close to your eyes.
Would have been great to shrink the picture size to give a more honest comparison. I'm trying to recall which 3D titles I tested before packaging up the item to send back.
I had some idea in my head what the 3D immersion might feel like prior to testing it, but I have to say it didn't live up to expectations.

I do remember the Beowulf "spear in your face" being a very obvious example of 3D popout on my js8500, but on here, the character holding the spear seems to fall back further into the screen, with the spear no longer in my face, which wasn't bad either. Nice depth of course.
I tried out captain marvel and any IMAX spaceship shots did look pretty damn good, more appeasing than my JS8500. I was very curious to see how dark/foggy/smokey 3D shots looked on here compared to an active 3D tv set, and they felt only marginally better.
Kylo ren confronting palpatine on exogol for the first time, via that rock elevator of sorts also only looked slightly better than my Js8500. Still impressive considering dark scenes are a ***** in 3D.

The one saving grace about the headset that I do applaud and like, is that it does feel like a theater viewing experience. I have a 75 inch screen and I thought that replicated that theater viewing 'sweet spot' cinemascope depth of immersion etc etc really well . If someone can help me with what word I'm looking for, that would be appreciated.

But this headset beats it. It creates a nice curve theater screen immersive experience.

I was watching Solo on the headset with my blu-ray player then sync'd it up with the dolby stream on my TV and was switching back and forth very quickly (taking headset on and off) and without a doubt, the faces on TV screen were more horizontal.
I actually stretch the image vertically on my js8500 when watching movies, because i can do it in increments, and it kinda pisses me off I dont have that control on my Sony 950h. Damn near considering selling it for that reason alone. I dont know why no one talks about TV's doing this. And no i dont have the picture size setting on my 950H wrong.

I can't stress how much this felt like a theater screen, and i reeeealy liked it.

I would buy again if it dropped down in price ($600-) and I would just use it with my PC only, that way I can adjust the black levels on those messed up titles. And hopefully find some way to change the warm temp it's set on by default through my video card.

I knew there were going to problems the moment I picked up the headset though, it's surprisingly light and compact.
I just have more confidence in a product when it's heavy so I know they are using higher quality materials. Which concerns me about the CINERA HD looking so compact, maybe enough time has passed that fit superior hardware in such a small set, but we'll see.
I wrote both these posts on a whim btw

[Synchg]

Originally Posted by Spectra

Thanks for taking the time to give us your impression of this headset as I recently came across these and was curious to see if they would be any good for use with frame packed 3D format and Blu-ray 3D playback.

depends how important image quality is to you. For 1k, I want every blu-ray title i toss in my player to be displayed as intended, with more picture options. Headache free out of the box.
Blu-ray 3D capabilities seems to be an afterthought for these headsets, causing many playback problems.
I spent my day off trying to make the Royole Moon work, I refused to do it for the Goovis, primarily because it cost more.

one thing i didn't talk about was the response time. i was also surprised to see how little it affected the 3D effect, maybe my js8500 has such a good response time that i was already used to it, but again, only felt marginally better than my TV set. which did retail for like 3-4 grand on release date (i paid $800 for it brand new in 2017). Was definitely more smoother and natural but not by a very large degree. If you come from a cheap 3D LED TV, then it just might be a revelationary experience owning this, for ya

I would still prefer the mobile theater headset route for 3D viewing IF only some company did it right and fixed the problems I have already mentioned or lowered the price.

Goovis actually had the nerve to report me to amazon about how I shipped the item back not in its original packaging. Well no shit! I had to test it out to find out it wasn't as described in their listing. Which I also put in the reason description for return.
But I DID send everything back that was originally included in mint condition, minus the small plastic bags for accessories (like the free gift HDMI/USB splitter!) that I had to cut open. Even the plastic film around headvisor was still on. They are shady af and I'd advise you stay clear of GOOVIS. And if amazon wants to ban my account for returning items from dishonest sellers, then i guess im not shopping at amazon anymore.
when i realized i didnt need the D3 controller for blu-ray 3D playback, the initial plan was to actually send it back, and just re-purchase the headset only for 1k, but then the image quality (elevated blacks) really bummed me out and lack of setting controls without the D3, so I didnt bother.

I really don't mind if these mobile theater headset companies made the product bulky so there would be no shortcomings in the quality control department. I definitely believe the glass lenses area NEEDS to be larger. It was surpassingly similar to the coverage area of the Royole Moon.

[Spectra]

Originally Posted by Synchg

I would still prefer the mobile theater headset route for 3D viewing IF only some company did it right and fixed the problems I have already mentioned or lowered the price.

Something like an Oculus Quest 2 with 3D frame packed format support would work for me. Plug in your Blu-ray player via HDMI insert a disc and hit play...

[Synchg]

Originally Posted by Spectra

Something like an Oculus Quest 2 with 3D frame packed format support would work for me. Plug in your Blu-ray player via HDMI insert a disc and hit play...

isnt that only like $300? could be more expensive methinks

[BossTweed]

Originally Posted by Synchg

isnt that only like $300? could be more expensive methinks

Depends on which Quest 2 version you purchase. plus having compatible pc orlaptop with the Quest 2.

[cdx47]

Originally Posted by Spectra

Something like an Oculus Quest 2 with 3D frame packed format support would work for me. Plug in your Blu-ray player via HDMI insert a disc and hit play...

It does exist....kinda

Oculus quest running Virtual Desktop connected to a PC/laptop. It requires some PC software so there is some initial setup to do but it is worth it. It's how I watch all my 3D films and it works very well.

[Spectra]

Originally Posted by cdx47

It does exist....kinda

Oculus quest running Virtual Desktop connected to a PC/laptop. It requires some PC software so there is some initial setup to do but it is worth it. It's how I watch all my 3D films and it works very well.

I have watched a 3D SBS movie using an Occulus Quest 2 connected to a PC via USB and we tried to get an MKV rip to work but it wouldn't play back the file.

Are you using remote desktop in Windows to "network" to the headset and then initiating 3D Blu-ray playback on a Blu-ray drive using software like Cyberlink PowerDVD? Not quite sure how you are getting frame packed 3D format working...can you provide some more info....

TIA

[cdx47]

Originally Posted by Spectra

I have watched a 3D SBS movie using an Occulus Quest 2 connected to a PC via USB and we tried to get an MKV rip to work but it wouldn't play back the file.

Are you using remote desktop in Windows to "network" to the headset and then initiating 3D Blu-ray playback on a Blu-ray drive using software like Cyberlink PowerDVD? Not quite sure how you are getting frame packed 3D format working...can you provide some more info....

TIA

On the PC use software like Stereoscopic Player, MPC or maybe MadVR to convert the frame-packed rip into SBS or OU on the fly while playing.

On the Quest use Virtual Desktop (Check out vrdesktop.net) which converts the SBS/OU stream to 3D. VD is basically a remote desktop and VR steam gaming software which has a small agent running on the windows PC. This is why the Wifi spec is so important. Optimally the PC should be connected to the router by wire leaving the headset using Wifi. Wifi AC is the recommended minimum but you might get away with N.


There are two versions of VD, the one mentioned above is the most supported version and works great for over 99% of films I've watched. This is how I started out running VD using my Nvidia 2060 gpu laptop and for the most part I was very happy But the compression algorithm for wifi transmission can cause pixelation in very low light scenes. The Steam version of VD runs directly on your PC and uses very little compression so there isn't the same issue with low light scenes.

These are the basics. HtH

[Spectra]

Originally Posted by cdx47

On the PC use software like Stereoscopic Player, MPC or maybe MadVR to convert the frame-packed rip into SBS or OU on the fly while playing.

On the Quest use Virtual Desktop (Check out vrdesktop.net) which converts the SBS/OU stream to 3D. VD is basically a remote desktop and VR steam gaming software which has a small agent running on the windows PC. This is why the Wifi spec is so important. Optimally the PC should be connected to the router by wire leaving the headset using Wifi. Wifi AC is the recommended minimum but you might get away with N.


There are two versions of VD, the one mentioned above is the most supported version and works great for over 99% of films I've watched. This is how I started out running VD using my Nvidia 2060 gpu laptop and for the most part I was very happy But the compression algorithm for wifi transmission can cause pixelation in very low light scenes. The Steam version of VD runs directly on your PC and uses very little compression so there isn't the same issue with low light scenes.

These are the basics. HtH

Okay thanks for the description of your viewing experience on the Quest but if you are converting the frame packed format MKV on the fly you are basically throwing away half your resolution aren't you as SBS & OU format is only 540P per eye I thought?

And then on top of the resolution loss you also get compression artefacts via WI-FI transmission as well?

Seems like there would be obvious loss of quality compared to the original 1:1 MKV Rip or Blu-ray source material which are both 1080P per eye resolution....

[cdx47]

Originally Posted by Spectra

Okay thanks for the description of your viewing experience on the Quest but if you are converting the frame packed format MKV on the fly you are basically throwing away half your resolution aren't you as SBS & OU format is only 540P per eye I thought?

And then on top of the resolution loss you also get compression artefacts via WI-FI transmission as well?

Seems like there would be obvious loss of quality compared to the original 1:1 MKV Rip or Blu-ray source material which are both 1080P per eye resolution....

Hi
I spent a lot of time worrying about the per eye resolution and other such things but for the most part it doesn't affect actual viewing experience. I've seen very watchable 9GB SBS files with issues only in certain types of scenes. Never mind the full blu-ray rips I watch using Full OU at 1080x2160. But coming back to the actual viewing experience, there doesn't even seem to be a huge difference between watching Full vs Half OU. I personally upscale to 4K and tinker around a bit to wring every last bit of picture quality I can, but that's just me being me lol. It really isn't needed.

As for wifi, for the most part compression is not an issue because H.264/H2.65 are excellent codecs. Compression artefacts are mostly seen in very low light scenes when using VD Quest. On VD Steam those artefacts are almost non-existent.

So while resolution is important, contrast and color are actually more important. That's why the 720p Pioneer Kuro was widely regarded as the best TV on the planet well into the 1080p HD era.

[Freakyguy666]

Originally Posted by cdx47

Hi
I spent a lot of time worrying about the per eye resolution and other such things but for the most part it doesn't affect actual viewing experience. I've seen very watchable 9GB SBS files with issues only in certain types of scenes. Never mind the full blu-ray rips I watch using Full OU at 1080x2160. But coming back to the actual viewing experience, there doesn't even seem to be a huge difference between watching Full vs Half OU. I personally upscale to 4K and tinker around a bit to wring every last bit of picture quality I can, but that's just me being me lol. It really isn't needed.

As for wifi, for the most part compression is not an issue because H.264/H2.65 are excellent codecs. Compression artefacts are mostly seen in very low light scenes when using VD Quest. On VD Steam those artefacts are almost non-existent.

So while resolution is important, contrast and color are actually more important. That's why the 720p Pioneer Kuro was widely regarded as the best TV on the planet well into the 1080p HD era.

Unless your vision is below average any honest viewer would notice the inferiority of the VR image versus a large (70”+) 1080p image on a quality 3D display.

I have the same set-up and and the lack of sufficient resolution via VR (aka “the screen door effect) is incredibly noticeable and distracting.

If you have the means to purchase a large quality 3d display, Avoid VR until the technology improves.

[robert kaplan]

I hope to buy the GOOVIS PRO for ONLY viewing 2d and 3d blu rays. Do i need to buy the D3? Thanks.

[Synchg]

ffs

u mean i wrote all that for nothing

[robert kaplan]

When spending a thousand bucks + i would like to read more than one source who actually dealt with the product....and some of the observations differ from what others have posted. Thanks

[Synchg]

well good luck with that

[robert kaplan]

Is it possible to wear regular eye glasses be worn under the Goovis unit and still watch movies??

[Synchg]

Originally Posted by robert kaplan

Is it possible to wear regular eye glasses be worn under the Goovis unit and still watch movies??

you dont need to, thats what the Built-in Hyperopia & Myopia Lens are for. it even states it on the product page.
but i can see you're not a fan of reading.

[robert kaplan]

Thanks for the considerate reply. But,my for glasses question relates to my rather severe astigmatism, rather than the built-in adjustments of pupil distance and far sightedness (at least as far as i can see). Taking care of astigmatism (from what i have read?) involves contacting the company and waiting for their reply....and someone's comments that i read mentioned they are difficult to get results.