The lead up:
It was working a couple months ago. The headset was just sitting on a stand with the cable loosely looped back and forth in like usual so I’m hoping it’s not a cable issue.
I decided to play around with it today and the Meta Quest software updated automatically and after that I was getting weird disconnect messages, a black screen, and static. Now I am getting no signs of life from the headset in terms of LEDs or other lights; only chimes that something is being connected and disconnected to my computer.
I previously had issues getting my Rift S headset to work likely due to some kind of power related issue on my old PC. A couple months ago it would work fine with no issues.
Most posts seem related to “Port Reset Failed” errors.
My troubleshooting steps so far have been:
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I swapped around the DisplayPort and USB connection (USB 3.2 and with a PCI-E USB expansion card) and reinserted the connector on the headset
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I went into Device Manager and uninstalled “Unknown USB Device (Device Descriptor Request Failed)” and “Rift USB Hub” before plugging the USB cord back in.
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I plugged the USB cord in and waited before plugging in the DisplayPort cable.
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I tried reinstalling the drivers using the oculus-driver.exe found in ./Oculus/Support/ and the Oculus software all together.
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Downgrading the drivers using instructions from the Oculus subreddit doesn’t appear possible because it requires the Rift S to be recognized during the Oculus setup process.
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Straightening out the cable and feeling for any irregularities.
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Rebooting multiple times during all of this.
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Verified the ports on my computer are working.
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Disconnecting the headset end while the other side is connected to my computer
Steps that might help but I would like to avoid:
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Verifying the headset works using a different PC. As mentioned at the top my old PC had it’s own set of issues with the Rift and I don’t have friends to reach out to borrow a PC.
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Purchasing a new cable. They are proprietary and cost more than the headset by itself and aren’t sold by Meta.
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Reaching out to Meta support. They seem to recommend the same steps of reseating the cable, reseating the headset, rebooting the PC, and uninstalling things in Device Manager. In a few posts they seem pretty dismissive and refer to the Rift S as old. There’s a lot of unresolved posts on the Meta community forums.
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Reinstalling Windows. It sounds like this rarely works and it would be a hassle.
If it does come down to spending $100 on the cable I might just consider getting a new headset that doesn’t have anything to do with Meta. If you can think of one that it isn’t crazy expensive let me know. The Meta Quest 3 looks neat and decently priced but I am real tired of dealing with Meta and how they handled the Rift S.
Meta Quest software updated automatically and after that I was getting weird disconnect messages, a black screen, and static
Did you tell that to Meta support? 😬
No I have not. I’ve spent a lot of time browsing the help pages and pretty much every suggestion is the same and when it proves fruitless and the poster and several other people mention the issue still persists they don’t respond.
For driver problems, I’ve always had good luck with Glenn Delahoy’s Snappy Driver Installer Origin but I don’t know if the packs have VR drivers. Your problem could be USB drivers, too… I believe it uses BitTorrent to get the driver packs, just so you are aware (use a VPN like ProtonVPN if that worries you).
I saw newer Nvidia cards have a USB port designed for VR, you probably would have tried that, if you have it…
Power issues: Make sure your USB card has its power supply cable plugged in if it needs one; may not be getting enough power through the PCI-Express port alone (although in that case it probably wouldn’t have worked before…)
Rant: I fix electronics for a living and have something of a retrocomputer museum, many machines my age (40+ years) and the majority still work with only minor expected repairs (capacitors). Feeling vested in fighting against throwaway culture and forced obsolescence when realizing how environmentally taxing electronics are.
Meta’s a multibillion dollar company, keep harassing them until you get your money’s worth! 😅
