Valve Index not Detected or Connecting

[Majusa]

Just got my fresh valve index this morning and thought this would be a fairly easy setup, but boy was I wrong.

I install SteamVR, plug in the base stations, charge the controllers and connect the headset to the appropriate ports, everything hooked up. I check the cable going into the index itself in the top left, make sure it's nice and snug. Finally I launch SteamVR and..... "Please plug in your VR Headset" - my index lights are blue so I think, it's on standby, I'll try turn it on. I turn on both controllers and nothing happens.

Ok, sure, sometimes happens. So I try to:
1) Reconnect everything. Nothing
2) Restart PC. Nothing
3) Remove all SteamVR USB Devices, unplug all cables, restart pc, replug cables, restart SteamVR. Nothing
4) Set dev settings to Direct Display Mode to off. Nothing
5) Restart and set the Direct Display Mode back to on. Nothing
6) Disable Power Management, restart. Nothing
7) Press in the able in the headset, restart. Nothing

At this point I take a break and go through a sanity check: I go into device manager.... There's nothing remotely describing a Valve Index in there.

I check online for a tool called USBDeview and try to look for vendor ID 28de, to my surprise there is nothing there, even after a restart where Windows is supposed to detect the headset.

I then have an idea to just plug a usb into the frunk of the index and that works! So there is a connection there, but nothing past that.

Current hard/software I'm running: 3080 TI with a 3700x on Windows 11 (recently got the upgrade).

If anyone has any idea how to get this to work, please let me know as I'm just all out of ideas and would love to avoid having to send it back to Valve.

[theringmaster55]

Maybe the valve index isn't compatible with windows 11. Check the hardware specs. I have windows 10 and probably will for a long time but I don't own a valve index myself though. Good luck

[Majusa]

Have seen lots of examples of people on Reddit using Index with Win 11 without any issue, so I hope this isn't the case.

Last thing I would want to do right now is reinstall my entire machine.

[temps]

Skip Windows 11 and install Linux instead. There are a lot of free Linux distros that are fully featured and have similar layout/appearance and functionality as Windows, but offer more privacy to the user. And most of your games will probably work fine with it too since we have Steam Proton now.

[Majusa]

I use Windows as my dedicated games partition, would rather not have to set everything up on my work partition (arch)

[--ranXerox--]

unplug usb, uninstall usb drivers in developers section, reboot, replug. sometimes drivers need an update and steam will provide/windows screws with this.

[Majusa]

Originally posted by --ranXerox--:

unplug usb, uninstall usb drivers in developers section, reboot, replug. sometimes drivers need an update and steam will provide/windows screws with this.

Tried this, same result unfortunately :(

[Majusa]

Has anyone else experienced none of the drivers required for the Valve Index showing up in device manager or under USBDeview?

[--ranXerox--]

You also need to make sure the power is connected. make sure its properly seated at the headset as well. unplug, replug that split connector on the cable.

[--ranXerox--]

what motherboard are you using and operating system?

[Majusa]

So lights are always on and blue at the front of the headset, so power doesn't seem to be the issue. have reseated the cable several times now.

I'll try replug it again though just to be sure.

My mobo is the Aorus X570 I Wifi and OS is Windows 10 - I rolled back from Win 11 to see if that would help, it didn't.

I'm currently backing up all valuable data and will do a fresh system reinstall to see if that works.

[--ranXerox--]

x570 chipsets are known to have issues with usb/amd. It's driver based problems especially with windows installing it's own drivers. try grabbing usb drivers from gigabyte. Install that and retry. if that's not working, disable usb 3.0 and try usb 2.0 setup in bios. see if that works.

if not, get a recommended VR PCI-e card for usb use. Sometimes this works.

I have a asrock x570 steelseries. Rock solid.

[Majusa]

Just nuked my OS and did a clean install, still not detected, will try your suggestion now

[Majusa]

Thanks for the suggestions! Turns out however, gigabyte doesn't provide USB drivers for my board specifically and there is no option in the bios to change from USB 3.0 to just 2.0, all the USB ports are 3.1/3.0 by default unfortunately.

Also as I'm running an ITX build, I don't really have any space to add any more PCIE devices other than my 3080, so that's out the window.

I've contacted Steam support, hopefully they'll get back to me tomorrow.

[--ranXerox--]

one last suggestion is not to use pc case usb. use the usb slots on the motherboard directly.

[Majusa]

So things I've tried since yesterday:

1) Front IO USB - Not detected
2) Clean Windows 10 install from USB - Not detected
3) Clean Windows 11 install from USB - Not detected
4) Created a separate archlinux partition on suggestion of @temps, set it up for VR, connect - Not detected

During all of these, I reseated cables and power cycled the system. I'm beginning to think I just have a broken index, which is a shame considering how much it costs. Wonder how often this happens, been a complete waste of one whole day trying to get this to work.