RMA Headset + Linkbox Concerning...

[JHong]

Hello, I am not sure if this is the correct place to post this as myself I am quite annoyed, so I want to express my concerns about Vives service centre and product quality. This may be a little long so please bear with me as I need to state everything here.

I have had my Vive pro for around 5 months now. Within the first 1-2 months, 1 of my vive tracker would not charge properly, since 1 of the trackers port is faulty. I went back to my retailer to get it sent to HTC/Vive for a replacement. It came back after 3 weeks and now has been working ever since. 

Forwarding to 3 month mark of owning my Vive pro kit. My vive controllers had issues with buttons not registering properly in games, I noticed this back when I first got it that it went faulty in the first week, but I initially thought it was just the game bugging out it happened in multiple games, after going through all the troubleshooting steps I found out that my controllers were also faulty, since none of my other frineds had the same issues as I had. So I went to vive's support live chat and got my issue escalated, they sent a courier to pick up my controllers and they sent a replacement afterwards with new ones (hopefully not refurbished), so the controllers were working as intended now and had to wait 3 weeks to get back into VR.  I was happy after having 2 issues with Vive/HTC products that I was finally back into the virtual world. My joy didn't last long, the issue didn't stop here.

Going to the 4-5 month period. Now this is where my real issue begins. My headset + link box were having issues. Audio pops randomly, left speakers dying for no reason, speakers/mic making this really loud noises like those old crt tv's and it was both going through my speakers and mic at random times (My friends could hear it too), mic vocals making my voice more high pitched than usual, headset screen would turn grey and therefore losing tracking randomly with 1 of my vive trackers, screen would just go grey randomly for no reason at all, link box keeps disconnecting my headset randomly at times headset cable to linkbox needs to be forced in for it to not disconnect and a whole lot of other issues with both the headset and linkbox, these were just the main ones.
- Yes, I tried all those magical fixes and troubleshooting which has not even helped at all, even getting rid of all my VR/STEAMVR/HTC/VIVE files wiping them slate clean and reinstalling them, and still the issue persists. My PC was freshly installed 7 months ago and I dont do anything on this PC, besides game, music and socialise, nor do I download anything that I shouldn't need to or clutter my PC needlessly. I only use VR to socialise and dance.

I then contacted support once again to state my issues, they got me to go through all of their troubleshoots which I have already done prior to contacting them and I even took pictures, videos and made a mini report on the issue and gave it all to them, they came to a conclusion that it was both the headset + linkbox that was having issues. They then escalated my issue and told me that the headset + linkbox needs to be repaired or even replaced. I cleaned the whole headset and linkbox, Courier came picked up my package on a business day to send it off to them, I remained hopeful through this whole ordeal, and was getting really upset about all these issues I was having and just had to be patient and wait.

Today, I received my package back, I was so happy to get it back and I had very high hopes that everything will work now. To my surprise it did not come back in good shape at all, it was appalling. The lenses were scratched both outside and inside the glass and there were hairs, yes hairs on it, which was not mine and some sort of yellow dust on the inner face rest and covers of the headset. I remembered that I cleaned my whole headset and inspected myself if there were any scratches on the lenses or not and made sure that it was in good condition, before sending it off, least to say it came back even more broken. I also checked and saw on the QSL job listings that the product was not repaired as they could not find any faults, they didn't even list the name of the product I own properly it was meant to be "Vive pro" NOT "Vive Cosmos pro"!!! So how was it that I contacted support with a fault and wasted 3 weeks of my time waiting once again for the 3rd time on 1 of their products to be repaired or even replaced and they couldn't find any faults?! Even came back not in the condition I had it before RMA process???!!! I was in disbelief and got so angry and annoyed at the same time. I even tried to connect the headset and linkbox to go into steam VR home to sit there while I was letting it run and was hit with a BSOD (Blue Screen of Death), never have I had this happen before RMA either. This is starting to raise a lot of questions on what they have done to my headset and the professionalism of their service centre, which clearly did not do a very good job!!!
- I put everything in the box and contacted support immediately once again and requested for a replacement as this was unacceptable.

I contacted support again and a representative said they will need escalate this further and have this investigated, as the item was not meant to be returned in that condition and should have been repaired or replaced. NOW again with the waiting game.... for this to be escalated and request for a replacement or perhaps even something to come with another issue??. I am starting to feel as if I am having so many issues getting stuff RMA'd and waiting waiting waiting and spending more time with RMA and product quality issues than actually using the product. From where I am from, this product was very expensive in my country and one would expect for it to be of premium quality when you are paying $1700 - $2000 AUD... I'm not sure if its just me, but I am having so much bad luck with technology these days its just crazy, has quality control really stopped that low??? I dont even know anymore. I dont even know if the approval for a requested replacement would even go through for both headset and linkbox... and I am worried if it doesn't I would just be sitting here with dead paper weight... I am just honestly tired of sending things back and fourth now and not getting what I paid for.

I will upload pictures here.

 

Edited April 6, 2021 by JHong
uploading pictures

[TomCgcmfc]

Thankfully my Vive Pro Full Kit (also paid aud$2,000 for this over a year ago) continues to work great.  I have since added Etsy Gear VR lens mod and Index controllers and I'm very happy with all this.  Sorry to hear you are having soooo many problems.  Hopefully it will get sorted out eventually.  Maybe in the meantime you should get a Quest 2 as backup, lol! 

[JHong]

11 hours ago, TomCgcmfc said:

Thankfully my Vive Pro Full Kit (also paid aud$2,000 for this over a year ago) continues to work great.  I have since added Etsy Gear VR lens mod and Index controllers and I'm very happy with all this.  Sorry to hear you are having soooo many problems.  Hopefully it will get sorted out eventually.  Maybe in the meantime you should get a Quest 2 as backup, lol! 

I'm happy for you that your device is working properly for over a year! Mine only lasted 4 months until it started to develop issues and having other issues with vive products prior to that. I was thinking of getting a index headset or full kit instead of a quest 2, but knowing valves poor quality control I chose not to.

[TomCgcmfc]

16 hours ago, JHong said:

I'm happy for you that your device is working properly for over a year! Mine only lasted 4 months until it started to develop issues and having other issues with vive products prior to that. I was thinking of getting a index headset or full kit instead of a quest 2, but knowing valves poor quality control I chose not to.

Like everything, most forum posts are pretty negative and if you really believed these you would not buy anything imho.  I have had the Valve Index controllers for about 6 months now and they work perfectly well.  They did kinda cost me a bit too much since I needed to import them in from the US (~aud$700 total) since Steam still does not ship to Australia.  Steam support was pretty good at giving me the free HLA game as well.  In your case you may want to consider the Index headset and controllers, or maybe just the headset since your Vive controllers/base stations should work fine.  Not sure what's best for you.  Your $'s so your decision of course.  Good luck mate whichever way you go.  

Aside; I have a Quest 1 and mainly use it as a backup with Link and wireless w/Virtual Desktop.  It's no Vive Pro, but still a lot of fun.

[JHong]

19 minutes ago, TomCgcmfc said:

Like everything, most forum posts are pretty negative and if you really believed these you would not buy anything imho.  I have had the Valve Index controllers for about 6 months now and they work perfectly well.  They did kinda cost me a bit too much since I needed to import them in from the US (~aud$700 total) since Steam still does not ship to Australia.  Steam support was pretty good at giving me the free HLA game as well.  In your case you may want to consider the Index headset and controllers, or maybe just the headset since your Vive controllers/base stations should work fine.  Not sure what's best for you.  Your $'s so your decision of course.  Good luck mate whichever way you go.  

Aside; I have a Quest 1 and mainly use it as a backup with Link and wireless w/Virtual Desktop.  It's no Vive Pro, but still a lot of fun.

Well thats because you havent had issues yet, since things are going smoothly for you. Me and others like me on the other hand that has issues would be posting around about our negative experiences when things are unsolved, you would understand our frustration.

I actually have the index controllers and actually had issues with them before and valve replaced them when I sent mine back in with no hassles at all. The difference I see here with valve and htc/vive, is that valve replaces things when there are issues with them, even if they can't determine the fault on their end  they still do and hopes that the issues dont repeat itself. Unlike right now where I've waited 3 weeks, only for my product to come back with scratches on them when I am sure I kept my lenses in good condition (cleaning with the supplied micro fibre cloth and checking them everyday) and it was not fixed nor replaced, they even said that they tested the unit (tested how? did they plug it both in and play with it for a few hrs and see what the issues are or not? or did they stick a tool in until it beeps green and says "yeh no problems here"?), is replacing my product so much to ask from them or how many hoops do I need to jump through and run around in circles??? Now waiting for it to be escalated further (or so they say) and the case manager cant promise anything they said. If there were no issues at all, then I wouldnt be trying to get a replacement and stressing over all of this with HTC/Vive. I would be doing something productive... like actually playing VR right now instead of wasting my time with them.

Im actually considering also getting the index headset now, as vives customer service/service centre is not even helping me one bit. I was actually planning to buy the 3.0 vive trackers from them, but considering how they conduct this whole process, I will not be giving them anymore money from here on out and in future, until they sort my issues out.

[TomCgcmfc]

@JHong I do feel bad for you mate and hope I never need to deal with Vive Support for my Vive Pro.  If it makes you feel any better I had a pretty poor response when I tried to send back my pre-ordered OG Vive Cosmos.  I got talked into keeping it because Vive promised me that they were about to update the very poor tracking.  Of course, this has never happened, although it did improve a little.  Waiting took me outside the 10 day return for refund period.  At least I got a years subscription to VivePort which I have found very useful.  Shortly after I bought my Vive Pro full kit and also the Vive wireless adapter.  So my total investment with Vive over the past 1.5 years totals ~ aud$4,000 (Cosmos 1,300, wireless 700, VP 2,000).  The wireless adapter worked ok but it was too much of a CPU hog (even with a i9 9900k) for my VR flight sims.  I feel pretty fortunate that I've been able to afford all this.  I recently spent aud$2,900 for a nice new rtx3090 gpu, lol!  The only good thing with all this c.virus thing is that I've saved a lot of $'s over the past year that I would have spent on overseas holidays, lol!

Now, both my OG Cosmos and wireless adapter are back in their little boxes hidden under my pool table, lol!  If Vive ever manages to fix it's inside out tracking I may pull both out and use them for gaming (not sims) with my current PC if and when I build a new one (maybe in ~2 years time).  I guess I could buy the Cosmos Elite faceplate for aud$400 and use it with my Vive Pro base stations/controllers but I don't see the point right since I much prefer my Vive Pro Headset.  Might still be an option if my Vive Pro ever fails though.

[JHong]

5 hours ago, TomCgcmfc said:

@JHong I do feel bad for you mate and hope I never need to deal with Vive Support for my Vive Pro.  If it makes you feel any better I had a pretty poor response when I tried to send back my pre-ordered OG Vive Cosmos.  I got talked into keeping it because Vive promised me that they were about to update the very poor tracking.  Of course, this has never happened, although it did improve a little.  Waiting took me outside the 10 day return for refund period.  At least I got a years subscription to VivePort which I have found very useful.  Shortly after I bought my Vive Pro full kit and also the Vive wireless adapter.  So my total investment with Vive over the past 1.5 years totals ~ aud$4,000 (Cosmos 1,300, wireless 700, VP 2,000).  The wireless adapter worked ok but it was too much of a CPU hog (even with a i9 9900k) for my VR flight sims.  I feel pretty fortunate that I've been able to afford all this.  I recently spent aud$2,900 for a nice new rtx3090 gpu, lol!  The only good thing with all this c.virus thing is that I've saved a lot of $'s over the past year that I would have spent on overseas holidays, lol!

Now, both my OG Cosmos and wireless adapter are back in their little boxes hidden under my pool table, lol!  If Vive ever manages to fix it's inside out tracking I may pull both out and use them for gaming (not sims) with my current PC if and when I build a new one (maybe in ~2 years time).  I guess I could buy the Cosmos Elite faceplate for aud$400 and use it with my Vive Pro base stations/controllers but I don't see the point right since I much prefer my Vive Pro Headset.  Might still be an option if my Vive Pro ever fails though.

Woah, $4000 on VR stuff and + $2,900 for a rtx 3090 to go along with it. Consider me jelly right now, but I am happy with my rtx 2080ti still, so still good for a few years or so!

Do you think I should get the valve index headset as well? I know that I will be needing to go through my own pocket in sending it over for RMA to the EU or US if anything goes wrong since its not officially supported in Australia so they wont do pre-labels without charge, but I will know for sure that it will replaced guarantee with valve. What is your opinion on this?

[TomCgcmfc]

10 hours ago, JHong said:

Woah, $4000 on VR stuff and + $2,900 for a rtx 3090 to go along with it. Consider me jelly right now, but I am happy with my rtx 2080ti still, so still good for a few years or so!

Do you think I should get the valve index headset as well? I know that I will be needing to go through my own pocket in sending it over for RMA to the EU or US if anything goes wrong since its not officially supported in Australia so they wont do pre-labels without charge, but I will know for sure that it will replaced guarantee with valve. What is your opinion on this?

I'm pretty sure that you can RMA Index headsets/controllers ok in Australia but you will need to pay shipping charges to their service area.  I believe they will ship it back directly to you but I'm not sure whether or not you are going to have to pay for this or not.

I'm not sure whether or not you should get an Index headset.  However, I do know that it's always a good idea to have backup.  I personally have a 3x VR headset setup.  I mainly use my Vive Pro with all my flight/racings sims, My Oculus Rift cv1 for all my Oculus Store games, and my Oculus Quest 1 for standalone mobile VR, watching media, and for a bit of pcvr wireless fun w/Virtual Desktop.  Thanks to the VP Link Box on/off switch and the Oculus Tray Tool switching options it's very easy to go back and forth.  I don't currently use my Q1 with the official Link cable but I have tried it and it works ok, just not a good as my Rift cv1.  The main advantage of my 3x headset setup is that even in the worst case any one of these headsets is capable of good pcvr.

Aside;  your 2080ti should be fine for at least a couple more years imho.  If I had that gpu instead of my 1080ti then I would have probably waited for the next gen nvidia gpu's (rtx series 4000) in a couple years time.  With nvidia gpu's I try not to upgrade on every new release, just every second one (eg Series 1000, to Series 3000 for me).

If you want a backup headset to use while your VP gets sorted out (hang in there with them and ask them to reconsider things) it sort of depends on what you can afford to spend.  If $'s are not a problem then the Index might be worth considering.  I think with taxes and shipping you are going to look at ~ aud$1,400 for just the headset.  Another option worth considering is to buy a Cosmos Elite headset-only.  This is listed at aud$1,099 on the Vive Australia Store.  The Oculus Rift S may also be worth considering.  Oculus has now stopped production of these but will continue to support it for some time to come (incl warranty).  These are still currently available on au Amazon (I recommend buying from Amazon because refunds are more easily available than from the Oculus Store) for aud$499.  I have used these and I think that this is a very good pcvr headset and its inside-out tracking works very well.  Another option would be to get an Oculus Quest 2.  These are listed on au Amazon for aud$479.  Adding the official Link cable and Elite headstrap (I recommend both of these) will bring the price up to aud$592.  I have also used this headset and it works very well, and is soooo versatile.  While the Oculus Link interface works well I think that the Rift S pcvr performance is a little better.  I guess the HP Reverb 2 might also be worth looking at.  These are listed at aud$999 on the HP Australia store.  However, these are still WMR headsets and I'm not a big fan of WMR, plus there still is some compatibility issues which their controllers.

Anyway, your $'s so your decision.  I don't think I can add much more to this so good luck whichever way you go mate.  Cheers. 

[brunopato]

Weird thing that HTC don't know about their own stuff. Some time ago I reached them via chat and after doing some tests and sending them some logs they asked me to send my equipment, as they told me that my equipment had an issue. Question is I'm from Brazil and it would take lots of time to send it and have it back. So I started an investigation and saw that lots of people were having the same issue as me.

I tried everything. Formated my PC, unplugged all USB PCI-e cards, my AVerMedia card - which I'm still not using as I still don't have a mirrorless camera and I'm still using my Logitech Brio - installed fans on the top of vive wireless, switched the WiGig card to every free slot and I still kept having the disconnection issue. I started messing with everything that was possible, even disabling the anti virus and everything you can't even imagine - for months - and nothing worked.

Then I searched for the folder in which the exe to start vive wireless is found. There are some extra exe files over there and I started running every each of them. Then I found a file called PCIeGenConfig.exe. I ran it and it opened a window with an option to enable PCIeGen setting. And then... ta-daaaaah! My disconnection issue was simply gone!!! It seems the WiGig card has some problems regarding the PCI-e gen from some motherboards, and that's what I'm talking about when I told you that it seems HTC doesn't know about their own stuff.

Lots of people struggling to maintain connection with their Vive headsets, and it can be simply resolved by running this exe and enabling this PCIeGen thing. The weirdest thing is that when I searched on Google for this exe file I found only 2 pages mentioning it! That gives me the creeps! It's a simple fix that even HTC doesn't have a clue about! It would be good if you could report my case to them, as they could just give people this instruction instead of asking guys to send them their equipment that's actually in good shape! End of story lol with a happy ending! I hope my experience and resolutions can help more people that are suffering because of the lack of knowledge of a company that doesn't understand their own devices! Regards from Brazil!