(Work-Around Available) HTC Vive Wireless stops working after 10 minutes

[Ophaque]

I know SteamVR released update 1.10.23, but it doesn't say anything about this issue in the patch notes.

When using the HTC Vive Wireless accessory, the headset will stop displaying video 10 minutes after connecting to SteamVR. The headset is still tracked in-game (I could tell because the desktop view was working flawlessly), but it stops displaying video altogether.

Lots of other people have this problem. We need to make the development team more aware of this issue.

Edit: THERE IS A WORK AROUND!!

In the SteamVR controller settings, there is an option that says "turn controller off after (x) amount of time" Just turn that off. Apparently, it thinks the headset is a controller as well.

[bendotcom]

Are you saying you put the controllers down and then the headset stops working (because controllers turn off)? Or do you mean you use both HMD and controllers, but the HMD turns off?

[Swawa3D]

Originally posted by bendotcom:

Are you saying you put the controllers down and then the headset stops working (because controllers turn off)? Or do you mean you use both HMD and controllers, but the HMD turns off?

A lot of people (including me) had the same exact issue and fix. It has nothing to do with the actual physical controllers. You could be actively using the controllers or you could have no controllers turned on at all. After this update (with default settings), if you use the Vive wireless adapter, your HMD screen will go black after 5-10 minutes. Please see this thread for several people having the same problem and fix. Luckily setting the controllers to never turn off fixes it.

https://steamcommunity.com/app/250820/discussions/3/1751275905571203425/

Originally posted by Mайcrosoft Excel:
Vive+wireless; Display turns off after 5 mins. I figured out a way around. It's a setting in steam vr in a "startup/shutdown" heading. In there set "turn off controllers after" to "Never". Probably steam vr thinks vive displays are a conroller too. This is a bug.

[bendotcom]

We can't reproduce this internally, so any details you can provide about your actual usage are useful for tracking down the issue.

[Macha]

Originally posted by bendotcom:

We can't reproduce this internally, so any details you can provide about your actual usage are useful for tracking down the issue.

Ive been having this issue but it seems to happen in Pavlov VR and not in VRChat so its situational

[Revisionary]

I am also experiencing these symptoms on an original vive headset, but only when I use the vive wireless adapter.. When i convert my headset back to wired, it is fine. It happens in any of the games I regularly play - boneworks, beat saber, or pistol whip. It also seems to fail at exactly the 5 minute mark, but I haven't been timing things with a stopwatch...

[Krogenit]

Same. It's old issue. I posted a lot info about wireless crashes\black outs in this thread: https://forum.vive.com/topic/6667-vive-pro-wireless-adapter-screen-goes-dark/
Valve please fix(

[Ophaque]

Originally posted by bendotcom:

We can't reproduce this internally, so any details you can provide about your actual usage are useful for tracking down the issue.

I'm glad to see this issue is recognized. I used the headset to try and play Drunk'N Bar Fight VR, and it turned off before I could enter the bar every time I opened up the game. I was actively using the headset, but the display turned off. When I looked on my desktop, the headset was still being tracked, as if nothing had happened. Having the headset on in the home menu also does the same thing. I could try and recreate the issue by re-enabling the "Turn off controllers after 5 minutes" option and recording my experiences, if it helps.

[theo]

Same here, using vive pro wireless, replace the usb to battery cable with no change. The problem happens at exactly the 5 min mark. I did change the timeout setting for the display in the recent past since I found that the display appeared to drain the battery and didn't time out but I don't think I changed the controller setting. Switching the controller settings to never has corrected the problem for me.

[idbirch]

Thanks OP, this has been driving me crazy for a while. I can't remember exactly when the black screen issue started but since I disabled the "Turn off controllers after..." option, it hasn't happened once!

Do Valve understand yet how or why this option would cause the Vive screens to go black? Internally, it obviously thinks the controllers aren't active but the odd thing is, they are - the frequent black screens I've had recently always occur while playing and while using both controllers normally (Index controllers if that's relevant).

As described by others, when the screens go black, the game continues to run and tracking of the headset continues to work. Once it happens, I usually have to power cycle the HMD or worst case, restart SteamVR. As you can probably imagine, this was incredibly annoying and has actually stopped me playing VR much recently because of how frustrating it is.

There are plenty more examples/reports of this issue to be found on /r/Vive

[bendotcom]

> Do Valve understand yet how or why this option would cause the Vive screens to go black?

Unfortunately, no.

Can anyone in this thread who has experienced this problem set it up so you will see the bug (turn the timeout back on), reproduce the problem, and then immediately generate a system report? This might help us track it down. Simply repeating your steps on our own wireless Vive does not cause the problem.

If you don't want to post the report publicly, just open a support ticket and mention this thread.

[XCLR8]

Can confirm the Turn Controllers off set to NEVER has fixed it for me as well. I cannot believe this is not impacting more people. But I am so glad I came here. I thought my VIVE PRO displays had finally given up on life.
Strange thing is I see no errors in the Wireless app logs , but what I do see when it happens is that the HMD button goes to RED sometimes othertimes stays green.
My game continues HMD tracking and audio as well but on the SteamVR settings menu after a min of this I get an exclamation point next to HMD saying that it needs a FW update.
Running the above update seems to do nothing at all, screen continues to stay black until a full steamVR restart and HMD power off/on cycle.

[Zukabazuka]

Have the standard HTC vive and use wireless.
It did happen to me, but after I changed the settings to have the controllers never turn off it stopped happening. But I tried to recreate the problem by turning the settings back on and it didn't happen again. played for 1h and 30min

Would love to do a bug report but can't replicate it. It was very consistent when it happenend.

https://content.invisioncic.com/n286256/monthly_2019_12/597211704_usbnode.PNG.aad2ac96646b9d17639c6407b8ce230f.PNG
Not sure if this is related to the bug happening or if its something else. It was in a thread on another forum with same issue, could be something related to it.
https://forum.vive.com/topic/6667-vive-pro-wireless-adapter-screen-goes-dark/

[Mайcrosoft Excel]

Maybe Valve moved too many developers onto Valve Index?

[Mайcrosoft Excel]

I do like the new curved layout though

[Mайcrosoft Excel]

Anyone else using "OpenVR-AdvancedSettings"? Maybe it's causing these issues? I got a ton of other stuff to do.