which SDK to use for HTC Vive?

[mast]

Hi I'm new to developing for Vive devices and was wonder which SDK do I use if I'm developing on Unity for the HTC Vive and all I want is the controller motion

[Alex_HTC]

Hi @mast

We offer two solutions 

wave - our own xr sdk
openxr for cross-device compatibility

Given that you are using only our devices: wave sdk would be my suggestion. 

The wave sdk usually has the most recent features as sometimes it takes a while to get those into the openxr versions
 

[auspayday]

To develop applications for HTC Vive, you can use the SteamVR SDK, which is available for download on the Steam website. The SteamVR SDK provides a set of tools and APIs that allow developers to create VR experiences for the HTC Vive and other SteamVR compatible devices.

The SteamVR SDK includes support for tracking devices, rendering, input handling, and other features required for building VR applications. It also provides sample code, documentation, and tutorials to help developers get started.

Additionally, you can use the Unity or Unreal Engine game engines to develop VR applications for the HTC Vive. Both engines have native support for the SteamVR SDK and provide an easy-to-use interface for developing VR experiences.

Before starting development, make sure to review the system requirements for the HTC Vive and the SteamVR SDK to ensure that your development environment is properly configured.

[Alex_HTC]

While we're compatible with older sdks (like the one mentioned above which uses the older deprecated openvr)

Most recent unity versions no longer support that - so we suggest using the wave sdk
https://developer.vive.com/resources/vive-wave/tutorials/installing-wave-xr-plugin-unity/

[Lacota]

Is wave what you would recommend for new Unity development for the Vive XR Elite? If so, I can not get that even remotely working. Still struggling with OpenXR but much further along than with Wave. Position and orientation of controllers is a problem for me with OpenXR but I can't even get Wave samples to run. 

[mast]

I actually managed to fix the issue by using the Steam VR Unity plugin from the Unity store, the reason why I was getting the error was that because of the old packages we had in the project once that removed, it started working like a charm

[Dan Lauer]

I am developing a VR simulation in Unreal.  My target is for a limited number of users, all using Vive Focus 3 headsets.  The previous reply from @Alex_HTC would indicate that I would be better off using the Wave SDK over OpenXR.  But the Wave has not been released for UE 5.1 (or 5.2 for that matter).  When I asked about it back in February on the Wave forum, I was told the new version would be available in March, but it still has not been release.  When I asked again, I was told to use the OpenXR plugin, so I have.

My question is should we expect a performance difference between the Open XR and the Wave plug-ins?  I ask this because my performance with OpenXR is abysmal.  My sim that runs at 70 fps as a stand-alone windows app, runs at about 10 fps on the Vive and will frequently lock up the headset.  Even after spending a week trying to tune things be reducing geometry and simplifying shaders I was only able to reach 15 fps with lots of stuttering.  Profiling on windows shows frame times of about 9 ms for the game threads and about 5 ms for the GPU.  On the Focus I'm seeing about 10-11 for the game threads and around 65-70 for the graphic draws. 

Any help of advice is appreciated