TrackIR Problems

[Beerthirty]

Hi All,

Have encountered TrackIR problems.

One time I can go into the Sim and all is fine. The next time I will have problems getting TrackIR to work, (No green lite) or it will give me incorrect views in relation to head movemrnt, or it will be choppy and erratic when changing head position. It is problably something that I am doing wrong or I do not have it set up correctly.

I checked out what was written regarding TrackIR on the OFF Forums.

If anyone has any idea of what is wrong I would appreciate the help.

Thanks

Beerthirty

[HomeBoy]

Hi BeerThirty,

You have not specified which TIR unit (TIR3, TIR4 w/trackclip, etc) you have so I will assume it is TrackIR4 with the standard baseball cap reflectors.

 

First, make sure you have the latest TIR driver from NaturalPoint.

 

Setting up a good profile is a slow, tedious process. I spent a couple of months getting mine just the way I wanted it. If you would like to try my profile, you can grab it here. I originally designed it for Aces High (WW2 combat game) but find it works perfectly in OFF.

 

Also, it is very important that you check the lighting and movement in the TrackIR utility. Bring up the "Tracking Window" (where you see the three green dots reflecting back from the reflectors on your head). If you see ANY red anywhere in that window you are going to get erratic behavior. There are two ways to deal with that problem. One is to make your unit less sensitive. This only works to a point. Bring up the "Tracking Settings" window and select the "Light Filtering" box. You can move the slider until the red blotches are gone from the Tracking Window. If you have too much background light (and it doesn't take much) then you will not be able to filter it out enough to help. In that case you will simply have to adjust your environment (shades on the windows, moving your computer around, etc. to get away from the light source. The bottom line is, you must have NO red anywhere in the Tracking Window. If you do, TIR simply WILL NOT WORK!

 

Use the "Heads Window" to watch the "actual" head movement compared against the "amplified" movement. If you are not satisfied with how your head moves, this is the place to fix it by adjusting things using the "curve editor." I recommend you err toward the "aggressive" side. Common sense will try to get you to go less aggressive and "smooth" but I have found just the opposite is really what you want. My profile is very aggressive. You may find it too much so and can tone it down a bit but you REALLY want your head to move around quickly. Trust me, you can learn to control the head movement and in time it will become second nature. I compare it to learning to wear progressive glasses. At first they drove me crazy but after a while I never even thought about it again.

 

Finally, spend a little time reading through the manual. There is not a ton of info in there so you could easily read through it in a half hour. It is well worth spending the time on.

 

TrackIR, IMHO, is the second most important device next to a good joystick that you can own when playing flight sims. I think it's especially important in a WW1 sim as there are so many things blocking your view and everything about flying these crates is visual.

 

Good luck. Contact me directly (my email address is in my sig) if you need further help. I've been around the block a few times with TIR so I'm sure I can help.

[+Polovski]

Thanks for the help for Beerthirty, maybe this will move go to the knowledge base when Beerthirty has read it.