It took me several frustrating hours to figure out how to manage to launch anything in HelixVision on my Oculus Quest 2, despite being very familiar with 3DVision and a longtime fan of all the good work being done over at HelixMod. But once I did get it working, I was really pleased that I stuck with it. This guide is a polished version of my notes, uploaded in the hopes that I can save other Quest 2 owners those several hours of wasted time and frustration.
 
 

Using HelixVision With the Oculus Quest 2

1) Reset your PC. (Optional, but a solid idea if you’ve failed to launch several different “listed” games in a row or if you ever hit a point where you had to install software.)
 
2) Launch Steam, or confirm that it’s already running and online without errors. (Do NOT launch SteamVR, but it should be installed on the PC. If it isn’t, do that now.)
 
3) Connect the Oculus Quest 2 to a USB 3.0 or higher port on the computer with a high quality cable.
 
4) Launch the Oculus program on the PC if it isn’t already. (If this isn’t already installed, do that now and start over from the top.)
 
5) Confirm that the Oculus program sees the Quest 2 and shows no status issues. If the device is seen but there ARE reported issues, probably try a different USB cable and/or port first. Troubleshoot this until all status items are fixed before moving on.
 
6) Put on the Quest 2 headset and take care of all the chores in there. (Allow data access, confirm Guardian settings, confirm Link, etc. This headset is NEEDY, geez.)
 
7) SteamVR should NOT be running yet! If it is, close it.
 
8) Launch HelixVision. It’s fine (necessary actually, but it should happen automatically) if SteamVR launches at any point during or after this step. (If you haven’t already, navigate to the “Drivers” tab in HelixVision and verify that you have nothing but green checkmarks for everything there. If not, fix that, then close everything and start over.)
 
9) Put on the Quest 2. The PC desktop should now be visible in there.
 
10) Navigate to the game you’d like to play in HelixVision and click “Play in VR.” Start with one of the “listed games” until you know you can get at least one or two of those working. (It’s ok to do this from the screen you can see inside the Quest VR.)
 
11) At this point, the headset should briefly show the HelixVision logo, then maybe a small “Katanga” logo, then often some visual gibberish as it sorts out the screen and resolution. If it briefly flashes a fullscreen error about incompatibility, and then maybe a few seconds of scrambled graphics from the game load screen, that might be totally fine. The game should now load.
 
12) If the Quest shows the “Recent Apps” page at this point, something has gone wrong. Close everything on the PC (Katanga, HelixVision, SteamVR, and Oculus) and start over from the top.
 
13) If the headset shows a black screen for a long period of time at this point, it’s likely that you need to take off the headset to click past a game settings window or something similar that’s holding up the full game launch. This is also fine, just put the headset back on after you do.
 
14) Once the game is fully loaded, it seems to be common to be unable to see your mouse cursor from the headset. It may be necessary to take off the headset to get past the game’s main menu by looking at your monitor, where the cursor is more likely to be visible.
 
 
Things that seem bad or like they might be dealbreakers but are actually fine:
 
–The game displays on your monitor but it’s in red/blue 3D.
 
–Your PC monitor/primary display is incompatible with 3DVision (aside from red/blue mode).
 
–Your PC monitor/primary display is set to some obviously-not-going-to-work-in-the-Quest resolution before launching the game, like 4K, etc.
 
 
Things that are genuinely bad and mean you should probably start over:
 
–Letting the Quest 2 go to sleep by having it off for too long between steps. Wake it up if you step away for a second before moving on to a new step, or you may need to start over from the top.
 
–The game displays on your monitor but the Quest 2 is showing you the “Recent Apps” environment.
 
–After you click “Play in VR,” the Quest 2 launches Katanga but nothing much happens. You continue to see your PC desktop, and Katange is minimized in the taskbar. Clicking on it lets you look at a window with an “infinite mirrors” effect.
 
–After you click “Play in VR,” the Quest 2 briefly shows the HelixVideo logo, but it’s super shaky and then loads into the “Recent Apps” environment. This one might mean that you’re trying to push an incompatible resolution/refresh rate to the headset, but I have not confirmed this.
 
 

 
 
Here we come to an end for HelixVision Using Oculus in Quest 2 + User Manual Guide hope you enjoy it. If you think we forget something to include or we should make an update to the post let us know via comment, and we will fix it asap! Thanks and have a great day!