On Tuesday the 11th, Valve dropped the 1.21.5 Beta release of SteamVR. Nothing warms our hearts more than some detailed patch notes. With that, we notice the latest SteamVR update improves functionality with Oculus headsets.
SteamVR Beta Update 1.21.5
Oculus:
- When SteamVR starts, if you have a Quest or Quest 2 attached to your PC but have not started Oculus Link, you will be reminded to do so. SteamVR also will notify you to install the Oculus software if SteamVR cannot communicate with the Oculus service
OpenXR:
- Fix for xrGetCurrentInteractionProfile not return anything when xrGetCurrentInteractionProfile is called with a tracker path role, an invalid/no value is returned by the runtime.
- Ensure tracker PoseAction isActive parameter is updated appropriately when xrGetActionStatePose or xrSyncActions is called with a subactionPath.
Linux:
- Fixed web helper crashing in OS’s with recent versions of freetype2.
As can be seen, the update will notify users that they need to start Oculus Link if they are using a Quest or Quest2 headset. This should help the wave of new users having problems connecting to their PC. Something that must have become an issue this Christmas when the Oculus app became the number one app on the app store. While at the same time the Oculus user base on Steam climbed over three percent.
This is the first SteamVR update for Oculus headsets going back to August 19th. In addition to being only the fourth update for Oculus headsets in the past year. The update is a nice reminder that Valve is open to VR as a platform.
