ALVR v19.1.1

Changes

• Relax discovery protocol for future ALVR versions

ALVR v19.1.0

This release fixes many issues with encoders on Linux and adds a new Vulkan server compositor to support FFR and color correction on Linux, pushing it at feature parity with Windows.

Changes

• Encoder improvements and new Linux server compositor:
  • @deiteris #1227, #1252, #1281, #1287, #1302, #1304, #1318, #1331, #1336, #1368, #1393, #1367, #1397
  • @Vixea #1227, #1254, #1412
  • @nowrep #1251, #1261, #1253, #1267, #1264, #1266, #1273, #1272, #1277, #1280, #1279, #1278, #1282, #1265, #1294, #1295, #1312, #1314, #1316, #1325, #1328, #1326, #1330, #1334, #1338, #1329, #1346, #1350, #1357, #1352, #1348, #1365, #1349, #1361, #1370, #1372, #1393
  • @m00nwtchr #1347
  • @galister #1428, #1429
• Disable Wi-Fi scans (by @zarik5)
  • This fixes stutter experienced by some users (in particular Quest Pro users)
• Show client IP in the headset and dashboard (by @zarik5)
• Add trigger/grip threshold (by @sctanf)
• Controller fixes (by @Timocop #1236 #1241)
• Vulkan layer fixes (by @nowrep #1291, #1293, #1324, #1339, #1376)
• Reduce lag after loading screens (by @zarik5)
• Fix server debug builds (by @nowrep #1288)
• Don't spam stdout on Linux (by @nowrep #1317)
• Fix recentering on Linux (by @nowrep #1353)

Compatibility note

You need to update your Nvidia driver to version 520.56.06 or greater.

ALVR v19.0.0

Changes

• Fix UDP stutter and image corruption in most circumstances (by @zarik5)
  • This is fixed by increasing the receive/send buffer size of the socket. Advanced options available in the Connection tab.
  • Huge thanks to @xytovl for the idea!
• Reduce image jitter (by @zarik5)
  • Increase maxBufferingFrames (Settings -> Video -> Enable advanced options) to reduce jitter caused by network and transcoding, at the expense of more latency. It cannot mitigate frame drops on the server side.
• New more accurate latency and FPS statistics (by @zarik5 #1061)
• New AppImage packages on Linux (by @m00nwtchr #1181)
• Better audio support on Linux (by @makomk #1065 #1066, @zarik5, @m00nwtchr #1068)
  • Audio on Linux is still hard to make it work. There is ongoing work to change this
• Add Oculus foveation options (by @zarik5 #1079)
• New advanced controller tracking options (by @zarik5 #1103)
• Improve controller support (by @Solexid #1076 #1078)
• Add 10 bit encoding support on AMD (by @deiteris #1223)
• New advanced encoder settings for Nvenc and AMF (by @zarik5, @deiteris #1220)
• Add “Force Software Encoding” option (by @Vixea /formerly @ColdIce1605 #1073)
• Reorder encoder initialization tests (NVENC->VAAPI->SW) (by @m00nwtchr #1032)
• Improvements to adaptive bitrate (by @sctanf, @GryPr #1141)
• Do not disconnect client when an audio device is unplugged (by @algologarithm #1124)
• Force dark mode on the client (by @zarik5)
• Fix some sources of crash in the client (by @thisleo #1064, @Solexid #1110 #1163)
• Extensive refactoring of the client (by @zarik5)
• Set TCP_NODELAY (by @korejan)

Thanks also to @daggintosh, @ImUrX, @toomuchcodehelp, @HookedBehemoth, for some other smaller changes.

Caveats

• Some users report issues with controller tracking. If you feel tracking does not feel right you can tweak a few parameters to get the exact feel you need. Go to Settings -> Enable Advanced Options -> Headset, the parameters to tweak are clientControllerPredictionMutlitplier, trackingLatencyOffsetMs, steamvrHmdPredictionMultiplier, steamvrCtrlPredictionMultiplier. Changing these values requires a headset sleep/wake cycle (press the power button two times) but not a restart of the server.

Headsets support

• The Meta Quest Pro is supported without any particular changes on our side. Eye/Face/Body tracking is currently unsupported; support is planned.
• The Oculus Go support is dropped. Due to internal changes, ALVR now only supports Android >= 8.
• New GearVR and Google Cardboard ALVR clients are almost ready. We need your help with bug fixing and testing. Nightly builds are provided.
• The nightly builds include a alvr_client_core SDK to create new ALVR clients! If you are a developer and you are interested in helping support new headsets tell us in the ALVR Discord Server.

ALVR v18.2.3

• Fix missing x264/5 shared libraries for xtask --bundle-ffmpeg/portable builds (by @korejan)

ALVR v18.2.2

• Enables v2.0 Hand Tracking on Oculus Quest (by @Incuh)

ALVR v18.2.1

Changelog

• Revert force controller connection. This caused lag on Linux (by @sctanf)
• Add Extra->patches settings section with a flag for disabling the sync popup on MS Edge (by @zarik5)

ALVR v18.2.0

Changelog

• Add portable linux tarballs for stable releases (by @m00nwtchr)

ALVR v18.1.1

Changelog

• Fix wgpu panic message (by @zarik5)
• Fix Debian script (by @Trae32566)
• Connect virtual controllers at startup (by @sctanf)
• Fix battery levels not getting sent to SteamVR properly (by @sctanf)

ALVR v18.1.0

Changelog

• Add support for the Oculus Go controller (by @zarik5)
• Enable async reprojection setting by default, but ignored on Nvidia GPUs (by @zarik5)
  • This ensures the best compatibility on every hardware by default. AMD users will still have jitter but only on the void room and SteamVR menu.
• Fix software encoder crashing on Windows (by @ev1lbl0w)
• Fix server accepting mismatched client version if the client was already trusted previously (by @zarik5)
• Add FFmpeg GPLv3 license in the server folder (by @zarik5)

ALVR v18.0.0

In this release we reached two important milestones! We have software video encoding on Windows and a fix for the jitter on Linux.

Changelog

• Add software encoding on Windows (by @ev1lbl0w)
  • Used as fallback when the GPU does not support video encoding.
  • Useful only if the CPU is powerful and recent enough.
• Fix video jitter on Linux (by @zarik5 with help from @ColdIce1605 and @ev1lbl0w)
  • On Nvidia GPUs this fix works out of the box.
  • On AMD GPUs you need to downgrade Mesa to 21.0. If you can’t downgrade Mesa and want to keep the previous behavior (jitter) you have to enable async reprojection in Settings->Video->Advanced options. Failing to do so will result in SteamVR crashing with error 307.
• Remove hand tracking pinch gestures (by @zarik5)
  • Not very ergonomic and often activated by mistake.
• Fix chaperone rotating 180deg (by @zarik5)
  • The chaperone shape will now always be rectangular and the center of the play space will be the center of the rectangle.
  • The Tracking space setting is gone and local/stage tracking can be chosen by just setting a standing only/room scale guardian on the Quest.
  • To choose the forward direction with the room scale guardian, redo the guardian setup and select “Confirm” when facing the preferred forward direction.
• Add JACK audio backend on Linux (by @zarik5)
  • Select the backend under advanced settings.
  • You may need to use Catia to configure JACK.
• Fix display timing for better head and controllers tracking (by @zarik5)
• Update scripts for Linux build (by @Trae32566)
• Remove dashboard warning banner (by @zarik5)
• Offer some features conditionally (by @zarik5)
• Many internal changes for future OpenXR support (by @zarik5)
  • Official OpenXR support is getting closer, but in the meantime you can use this fork which is based on ALVR v17.

LICENSING NOTICE: From this release and forward, Windows binaries are distributed under the GPL license. If you want to build ALVR as MIT licensed do not use the —gpl flag, which will disable software encoding support. FFmpeg binaries are fetched from https://github.com/BtbN/FFmpeg-Builds