How to use SteamVR on the Intel Arc GPU with the Quest 2 and ALVR (Video Encoder Error)

Tired of the Video Encoder Error? Tired of waiting for Valve and Oculus to support the Intel Arc GPU for VR? Thankfully there's a solution to make the Quest 2 work on your Intel Arc GPU

Introduction

As of 2/19/24, the Intel ARC series of video cards is currently unsupported in both the Meta Oculus PC app and Steam Link. Either the Quest 2 cannot be seen by the system, an unsupported GPU error will cause Air Link to not work, or you'll get a "Video Encoder Error" telling you that there is no HEVC encoder (despite the GPU having one[www.intel.com]). This is due to Steam and Oculus currently not supporting Intel GPUs.


However; there is a workaround that does not require buying anything. It's called ALVR, and it can be installed via the SideQuest app on your PC.

Setting up SideQuest

To set up SideQuest and ALVR, there are a few things you will need to do first. What you will need are:

• A USB C-C cable (this should have been included with your Quest 2) or a good quality USB A-C 3.0 cable. You'll want a decent USB C port if you are doing the former, for some reason the USB C port on my desktop didn't work but the one on my laptop did.
  
• An Oculus Developer account[developer.oculus.com], obtainable online after providing a credit card or phone number if you are using a Quest 2/3.
  
• Microsoft Windows
  
• The VR headset you want to stream from (while this guide focuses on the Quest, this also works on the Pico 4/Neo 3, YLVR, Vive Focus 3/XR Elite and Lynx R1 according to the ALVR Github page)

While there are other headsets SideQuest works with (the Pico 4) and other standalone VR headsets ALVR works with, I'm only going to cover the Quest 2 given how popular and easily available it is.

To get SideQuest working, you will need to obtain an Oculus Developer Account first. This is required to allow installation of unauthorized APK files.

You will then download SideQuest from https://sidequestvr.com/setup-howto. While I used the advanced installer (which gives you far more flexibility), there's also an "easy installer" too. I'm linking the advanced installer tutorial because it shows you how to set this up far better than I ever could. Be sure to install SideQuest on the Quest itself so you no longer need to connect it to the PC to install apps.

Once SideQuest is installed, you will search for ALVR and click "Download this app".

Installing and launching ALVR on the PC

Now that you've installed ALVR on the Quest, the next step is to install ALVR on the PC. To do this, go to the Github releases page[github.com], then the exe, and install it.
When this is done and you start ALVR for the first time, you will also be asked to install VB-CABLE[vb-audio.com]. Do this by right clicking on the setup_x64 exe and clicking run as administrator. This will require you to restart your PC when it is done.


Loading the app on the VR headset is harder, you have to go to the apps area and then click "All" next to the search bar to show unknown sources. Once you do this, you will then be able to launch ALVR on the headset.

Go to ALVR on your PC and there will be an option to add the new client to trusted clients. Do this and ALVR will start working with SteamVR.

You will probably need to tweak the video encoder settings (mine is somewhat blocky), but now ALVR should be fully working and you should be able to do VR on your Intel ARC GPU.

[Астра]

that actually worked...?! thx, bro

[WhatDeFish]

Thx, but i have the Problem that the most of the games i load into, just the first frame is loading and its not updating or i dont get into game, even its already running.

[Flareblaze]

Can confirm this works, just set bitrate to adaptive and set then encoder as AV1 since QSV on intel arc supports it and you should be good

[iJotaMax]

Hi there, I already got it working with ALVR, and thanks for your comment on my post, but the problem I had is that the image quality is very bad, very blurry, I played with the settings and it improved a bit but the quality is not good, so there is no choice but to wait for them to make it compatible with Intel or sell the Quest 3.
(Sorry for my english, is not may native)

[king_frog]

YAYAYAYAYAYAYAY

[danny1m]

Having trouble hitting 90 FPS on any game with the alvr I run iracing and assetti Corsa mostly even if the games are unviewable the frame rated are still low I bought virtual desktop and have an issue in that I live right next to main road and every car the passes has WiFi and Bluetooth and causes interrupts in my WiFi speed so stuck with only able to use alvr as I can't get the virtual desktop to run on usb though I've seen 1or 2 posts about it is it just my bad luck to have bought a graphics card the can't get goog FPS in direct x 11 games really struggling to get anything playable to be competitive.

[Luctins]

Thanks!
Worked fine for me after setting all of it up, though the tutorial itself is a tad light on details.

As for my settings, currently I'm using ~200mbit for streaming to avoid blockyness, A770 GPU

[Lucifur]

Runs a bit low quality but works very well if you dont want to buy virtual desktop