The Official Car Simulator Thread

Smart move, especially with the stable you have. And the time element is substantial….unfortunately I don’t golf (and lefty too) and do astronomy instead.

 

I used to be a very good golfer. Now I drive. It’s addictive.

 

I still golf 1 to 2x per week, sometimes more. Challenge events are monthly and we throw in some practice events here and there. The tracking isn't too bad from a time standpoint, this is only my 2nd year but I have learned a ton. Just need to catch that 277 car.

 

Curious if you finalized your sim choice?

I have been thinking of adding Non motion sim as well to my man cave…

 

Overall are you happy with the cxc system? I'm close to pulling the trigger.

 

Ludicrous price tag on them, sorry. As @JBlack002 already detailed earlier in the thread, going DIY will be FAR better value for money. I build my own rig as well and if I can do it, anyone can. Hell if you really don't want to do it, pay a college student to do it for you, with cable management and everything, pay him a very generous $1000 for his time and work and you'll still come out much better off.


For everyone:


Lets get some things out of the way first: Motion in racing simulators is very much a gimmick. It will not make you faster (if anything, it'll actually make you a little slower): The actuators have to move quite a lot of weight (a full size adult + wheelbase + rig + seat etc, you're looking at moving well over 300lbs if not more in many cases). There will already be a (small) delay from the software talking to the actuators and then actually start moving. It then has to simulate as you brake, go through corners, hit kerbs and so on. The delay is there and is significant. To put it in perspective, a heavier wheel on even very strong wheelbases IS noticable. And we're talking of maybe half a kilo difference between a heavy wheel and a light wheel. You're going to be reacting to things that have already happened.

A Much more accurate (and also, much cheaper) way to get actual feedback is to use haptic feedback, which works very similar to a subwoofer. The feedback is much more accurate. I'd personally go for a buttkicker under the seat. Buttkicker also makes a 4 corner solution that basically simulates each corner of a car. Personally I'd go with the seat based buttkicker and the haptic attachments for your pedals from simagic and run them through simhub software (rather than Simagic's own software, Simhub offers FAR more options), or if you're spending the money, the Simucube pedals which also have haptics build in.

If you drive road cars or GT cars I'd personally go with an aluminium profile rig. Personally I think 8040 is the minimum size I'd go for, 80120 is the perfect middle ground and 80160 is the best solution. The price difference between them is quite little and 80120/160 really is the ''build it once'' solution.

I personally drive formula cars and the occasional prototype exclusively so for me I bought a Formula rig; I bought the Overpower.gg Formula Pro and it easily fits me even at my height. It also has an optional electric pedal box mover which I highly recommend getting if you have friends that want to drive it. The option is cheap, too, and it comes with a powered usb hub which on sim rigs is always handy, either for peripherals or simply to charge your phone, you can't go wrong. More USB ports = always good. It also comes with a Formula Seat which is highly adjustable.

Monitors. I always see the very expensive rigs have 1 thing in common and it's HUGE monitors (TV's). Looks cool but it's not only impractical, much more expensive and typically less responsive monitors, you'll also have the issue of ''large car syndrome'' when the cars you are racing are kinda out of proportion and harder to see, defeating the purpose of having triple monitors in the first place. Also the UI is a pain to access on larger monitors because you can't see what you're clicking on as your rig is in the way, because the monitors tend to go all the way to the floor. Get a triple monitor detached stand so you'll have no monitor shake.

My recommended size is 27'' to 32'', with 32'' being the absolute sweet spot. If you desperately want larger monitors then I'd go no bigger than 42'', you can still get monitors in that size before they become TVs, but the larger your monitors the further away they are, the more of your room/garage whatever you actually see, so it's actually LESS immersive. 32'' and 27''s sit much closer to you therefore the rest of the room you're in can't be seen, you'll be more ''in'' the car if that makes sense.

Wheelbases:

Simucube is the gold standard. If you have the money, buy the Simucube Pro (25nm), with the technology we have it's probably the only wheelbase you need for the next 10 years if not long after that. Ultra reliable, great company behind it, simply perfect. Simucube Ultimate is utterly pointless, no one runs that much FFB. To put it in perspective: Not even Max Verstappen has the SC Ultimate, with the money he makes the difference is unnoticable and the amount he uses the rig, he deemed it unnecessary. So for the rest of the mere mortals we can very much assume, the Ultimate is pointless.

Asetek is very good as well and has a really nice Quick Release system. Some people complain the actual wheelbase looks a bit ''toy like'' but with a proper rig you can't even see it anyways as it'll be hidden behind the mounting plate but whatever.

I personally have the VRS wheelbase (15nm) and Formula Pro wheel, it's the same motor as Simucube and same encoder too, just not packaged inside like Simucube and Asetek, so the Encoder box is next to my wheelbase and 2 huge cables. Not a big deal but I would prefer a simucube at some point. Feel wise: Absolutely no need to change.

Seats:
GET SOMETHING THAT YOU'RE COMFORTABLE IN!!!! Go to whichever race shop near you and test various seats. The last thing you want to buy is buy a seat you're not comfortable in. You don't NEED a racing seat if you can't be comfortable in it, a nice car seat for some people works better. If you're one of those people, just accept it. No one cares about scoring internet points if you can only stomach 30 minutes in your race seat because it's so uncomfortable.

Wheels:
The choice is absolutely MASSIVE these days. We literally have wheels now that can be used in real life race cars, the quality is insane. GSI is an extremely good standard and made in the USA. Ascher makes great wheels too. If you need to know if something is good or bad you can always message me. Personally I'm not a big fan of Moza, I think their wheels look a little toylike and their customer service is subpar. Fanatec is good, I know many people that have used them for years, I'm personally not a fan of their higher end stuff...or should I say, their stuff that's priced like higher end: Compared to GSI/Ascher etc the similarly priced products from Fanatec are lagging behind quite a bit, but their mid range stuff is good.

Pedals:

Once again a huge selection. I have the Simagic P1000 loadcells (before this I had Fanatec V3s, also loadcells, and the P1000s are better in every aspect, feel, build quality, everything). Simucube active pedals are the gold standard but also come with a huge price tag. I don't know why people get both the active brake and throttle though, the passive throttle is what I'd get together with the active brake pedal. Heusinkveld has a fantastic name and deservedly so, their pedals and customer service are incredible. I really wanted the Simgrade VX-PRO pedals after my fanatec's broke, but they weren't in stock for forever, so I went with the Simagic P1000s (obviously it was my luck that a) a week after getting them I broke my toe and B) the VX-PRO's where in stock again, but I'm definitely very happy with my P1000s).

RE hydraulic: I would skip hydraulic personally, feel wise I can't see a noticable improvement, and for little more you have the simucube active pedals. On top of that, hydraulic will add maintenance and risk of a leak. Good luck cleaning hydraulic fluid off the rig.

PC vs Console:
I wouldn't bother spending all this money on a proper rig then attaching it to a console. So with that out of the way, what do you actually need:

For CPU these days I'd go with any of the X3D CPU's from AMD. 7800 X3D is a great allrounder
Motherboard: I wouldn't even bother with overpaying for a motherboard that's capable of overclocking. Just introduces more chance of your computer having stability issues for a fractional performance gain (we are talking a few frames at best. Not worth it). Just get something that's compatible with your motherboard and crucially these days, the correct memory.
Memory: DDR5 is the new tech and very quick, but also well priced currently. Get 2 sticks of 16 or 24gb, price difference is quite little so the more the better. Make sure it's compatible with your motherboard (check motherboard list of compatibility). Even though sockets are the same, for some reason certain manufacturers don't work well with others. Never had this issue before but it's become one.
GPU: Dependent on your monitors. I'd go with nvidia always, with iracing nvidia has much better performance on triple monitors due to software they use that AMD just doesn't understand. If you have triple 1080p monitors you can get a 5070ti and get 120hz easily. 1440p triples, you'll need a 4080/90 or 5080.

I nearly fell of my chair just now that a CXC is 75 grand base price. Even the other one linked in the thread, with the formula seats, at 25 grand (starting price), ludicrous. For $13k (depending on location), I could build a system with top of the line PC, triple monitors 32'' 1440p, 5080, active pedals, haptic feedback, simucube wheel, the lot...and for something you'll actually use, you'll be far better off. Just won't have the same wow factor because you don't have triple 77'' tv's or a gimmicky motion platform.

 

Thank you so much for the detailed response. will dig into this today.

 

Pleasure. Any questions, just shoot.

 

Thanks @Bas for the comprehensive guide.

I'm underway building a rig out in my workshop right now. My wife and I are going to be driving some new tracks on a trip in early April and I wanted a good way for us to both get in some virtual laps before we're out there for real. I'm rolling my own aluminum frame rig from Trakracer T160 parts with a Simucube wheel and pedals

Still waiting on two of the active pedals to ship, but I'm up and running with a single active brake and passive throttle right now. I prefer VR for racing, so I just have a single, wide monitor for non-VR sessions. Using a Vive Focus Vision VR headset currently, but it's just a temporary solution and I really don't like it.

No plans for motion, but I will be adding haptics on all 4 corners with the Slip-Angle haptics kit (shipping from Shenzhen, so no telling when it will get here or how much I might owe when it arrives).

I've got it operational now, but it's definitely still under construction and I'm still making big tweaks and adjustments.

 

Awesome. The trakracer T160 is excellent, essentially 40160 so extremely sturdy. I know a few people with it and are very very happy with it.

I have a Quest 2 here; and racing with it does feel amazing, though some things up close such as dashboard are nearly unreadable for me. Stopped using it because it had a habit of deciding not to work when it loaded in to a new session, and the fix and getting back into the sim took quite long every time so I was just missing the first lap or so of a race. Got old pretty quick.

The Pimax apparently are very good, so long you don't have a hardware issue, as their customer service needs improving it seems.

The haptics are subtle but really do bring immersion to it. Everyone I know that has it have said the same "you think you don't really notice it, yet when you forget to turn it on..you'll know something is missing". It's especially useful on ovals.

 

Yes I am. I use it to prepare for every track event.