Anyone have any recommendations for the best VR HMD has has Linux support? I know Valve index does but I’m wondering if there is anything with high FOV as I’m used to my Pimax 5k Plus? Any information would be appreciated 
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For high FoV have not heard much. But from what I recall HTC at did have Kernel support added for at least one or more Vive hmds. Have t9 do a search.
There is a project called OpenHmd as I recall if you could get enough details of the pimax headsets you might be able to get it supported.
Mirage335 in OpenMR was looking into tjis and trying to get pimax onboard.
I would be curious if pimax’s sdk actually has improved? With Oculus I recall when they stopped looking into linux support ppl used the sdk to fill in blanks to get it working.
Here is one topic where he mentuons in part.
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So I found https://monado.dev/ which can use OpenHMD has a backend (but also has other backends including it’s own) it seems to be the VR equivalent of Mesa while OpenHMD seems to be the VR equivalent of something like AMDGPU. I joined their Discord and it seems that they have some issues with even starting to get Pimax to work (a while ago) even with a firmware dump. I wonder if we can get Pimax to provide them with what they need to get Pimax HMDs to work. Maybe like protocol documentation/spec sheet. Both OpenHMD and Monado is backed by Collabora so they’re not exactly nobodies.
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it is worth.a try at least. For the moment moved Topic to XR Hardware. Once we tag the XR Software category can move it back. That being saud feedback on tags fir the Software section is an idea.
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I asked them what would be needed to add support for a headset with out reverse engineering and I was told this “A specification, or just some sort of docs on the protocol needed to talk to the device. And the algorithm to turn the lens distortion calibration into a values that can be used by the compositor.” so perhaps we could get pimax to give us/them this. How do you think the best way to ask them for this is?
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Well We could try forwarding this to @calvinyau aka Pimaxquorra and possibly @JaapGrolleman abd PimaxUSA. But as yoybknow the dev team at times us hard to get details from on there own sdk. I recall 1 dev was simoly toldvto use OpenVR instead of there sdk 
And we saw them have SweViver and Armin shelf there Pimax Experience indefinitely which was generating real positive hype and have yet to provide a worthy replacement for in VR settings changes, launching etc…
One of there dumbest mistakes imho.
Calvin & Jaap please review.
From this Post On expanding pimax support with not needing to divide resources or ip secrets.
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This is the opposite of the SDK. It’s the interface between the API (Pimax SDK/OpenVR/OpenXR) and the hardware. But It’s not like this stuff is like super secret, and would diffidently provide Pimax adoption. It’s also used by qualcom and the like for their mobile VR stuff so Monado might help them with that and they could kill two birds with one stone.
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That is awesome. Just be a matter of selling the idea’s benefits. With this would pimax need to split dev resources? As imagine thatvis one hurdle. If not then might be easier to get them on board.
Mirage335 has been mia for a bit but he might be able to help with selling this as well. Mbucchia maybe of help on that as well.
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Pimax wouldn’t have to split dev efforts. All they would have to do is provide “A specification, or just some sort of docs on the protocol needed to talk to the device. And the algorithm to turn the lens distortion calibration into a values that can be used by the compositor.” for each headset (and a lot of that is shared between their HMDs) and then Monado could do the rest on their own. But if Pimax wanted to provide support for an indev product (i.e. standalone HMD) they would need to do that themselves but Pimax’s existing stuff doesn’t work on Linux so they would obviously need to split their dev efforts between mobile and desktop already. If they used Monado on mobile it would handle a lot of stuff for them (not saying it’s perfect and they woudn’t have to fix things themselves if they wanted to use it in a commercial product but it would be far less work then starting from scratch) and as long as the provided the aforementioned stuff for the desktop only HMDs then Linux users could use Pimax HMDs on desktop. Essentially Pimax only needs to provide some information and they can be as hands on or hands off as they want while at a minimum getting Linux support and at maximum getting a runtime for their mobile HMDs.
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Just the Valve Index. It’s not great either, honestly. SteamVR isn’t particularly stable in Linux and valve seems fine with that.
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The Monado OpenXR linux runtime might help change that. Have to wait and see how it goes.
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This looks a bit promising
Still early days but looks like Monado is working on getting some support going. Maybe @mirage335 may have some insights as he has been working with the OpenHmd as well
Here is the link on Mondo info still Alpha ATM
Here is a link for OpenHmd that Mirage335 has been contributing to
@calvinyau please forward this to the team. They might be able to contribute info to Monado for OpenXR Linux support.
And additional Linux info
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The Valve Index is the only option, but it’s not great either. SteamVR on Linux is unstable, and Valve doesn’t seem to care.
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Welcome Haser23!
Yes unfortunately things are still slow on the Linux support. It was ashame FB bought Oculus and put Linux support on hold. With the og Oculus hmd support had been able to move forward on the open-source side using the Oculus ask and so to speak filling in the gaps with an Open driver.
I think even OSVR had some Linux support but at that time Linux content for VR was almost non existent.