TRACK IR 4 PRO - Screenshots & Review By Paul Loch

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Overview & Background

After debating for a month and reading reviews and watching YouTube videos, I too the plunge and shelled out some hard earned money to get a Track IR. I almost made the mistake of ordering directly from Natural Point in the USA, thinking it was cheaper, but after some currency conversions and seeing they where going to charge $76 USD to freight it to New Zealand I revisited the New Zealand web sites. I ordered online from VR Concepts www.vrconcepts.co.nz at a cost of $229 NZD for Natural Point Track IR 4 PRO which is the receiving unit and at the same time ordered a Track Clip PRO for an additional $69 NZD.

For those who aren’t familiar with the system I’ll explain how this works by copying an explanation from the web site: “The TrackIR™ device is a high-performance headtracking system that enables hands free view control. A slight turn of the pilot's head causes their in-game view to pan in any direction, independent of mouse, keyboard, and joystick commands. Look out windows and around the cockpit as if you were in a real plane!” There is a unit called Track IR Pro. This unit measures about 45mm x 35mm and sits on your monitor at head height using a cunning design that will sit on any monitor. It sends and receives infrared signals, this IR signal is bounced off 3 receivers on the users head and the software measures the movement in 6 dimensions (left, right, up, down, closer or further away).  It then converts this into movement on your view on the screen.

Traditionally the receivers have been put on a baseball cap or something similar, but I don’t like wearing caps unless it is sunny and I’m outside in the sun (call me old fashioned). I figured for multiplayer Friday Night Flights I would be wearing a headset, so also don’t want anything else on my head. Enter the Track Clip Pro. This device (I’m guessing) is not a receiver but a transmitter since it requires USB connectivity. It clips to your headset using another cunning design. They claim it will connect to just about any headset. This sits on the left side of the head using the clip to snap onto the headset. And the cable has an adaptor that the Track IR plugs into also, so it only uses one USB port for the two devices. This Track Clip Pro is not essential as a basic Track clip is provided with Track IR Pro as it ships. The track clip is a lightweight black powder coated spring-steel clip has 3 built in reflectors.

The order took two days to arrive and was complete, even though the web site said it was out of stock of Track Clip Pro and there would be a two to three week delay. The first thing that surprised me was the size… Is that it?

After reading a few reviews I went straight to the manufacturer’s website and downloaded the driver software, as some reviewers had issues with older software being supplied on the CD. This was not the case in my delivery, the drivers where current on the CD, but a good practice to get into anyway. The driver download was only 4MB so only a few seconds to download on DSL. Installation of the software was painless and quick. And a printed Quick Start Guide is provided that has 6 steps and you are loaded. The next step was loading up FSX for a test flight. I just used the default flight and found the view was crazy: I was “looking” all over the place. So refer back to the Manual which is installed as part of the software.

First Flight

I found the Quick Start Guide only applied to the track clip and not the track clip pro.  Another visit to the manufactures site again to down load of the Track Clip Pros manual as there was no documentation for the Clip Pro supplied with the equipment. After further configuration of the drivers and a second test flight was attempted. This was a lot better, with small movements being converted into big changes in your point of view.

Setting up the Track Clip Pro

Back to the configuration of the drivers for further tweaking and testing and a third test flight which went well being able to pan around and zoom in and out with small movements. This took some getting used to though.

Tracking Software in FSX

All was going well so time to make the set up a bit more user friendly, instead of having cables wrapped around my head and sitting on my lap. I use a Logitech USB head set with the cable that feeds it is on the right hand side, but the track clip sits on left side, so cable ties where called for to tidy things up and keep the two cables together.

The next test was to practice an aerobatic routine for Ohakea 08 using Rudolf Klimke’s model of the Fokker DR I. The first run was a bit shaky to say the least, and I still found my thumb extending for POV hat switch out of habit. After one or two more flights I am a convert to the system. This system has made so much difference to the way I fly it was immediately noticeable: the routine I was practicing took up to eight minutes to fly from take off to touch down using a hat switch POV and was very stiff. In the routine there was so much happening and the orientation of the aircraft was changing rapidly I found using hat switches I didn’t have time to pan to the view of the horizon and had to guess when to level out or turn.

The second flight although a bit more loose was completed within six minutes 15 seconds to fly the exact same routine, at a much lower altitude and felt much more natural. When in a descending 80 degree bank approaching the runway at right angles I can pan to where the runway is, to time the turn to line up in a matter of a second be back looking at the horizon. The scrolling of the movement is very smooth too with no effect on frame rates. Pre flight checks where easy: Small movements of the head and the elevators and rudder have been checked. For taxing, being able to look under the centre wing of the tri plane to see the centre line of the taxiway and glance away to look for traffic then back and stretch up to look over the engine cowel. Or effectively lean out cockpit on the left and right sides to looking over the top wing on a loop to see the horizon coming up and cutting the throttle. I’ve found instruments that I hadn’t noted before because the view was obscured in the default view!

This isn’t the cheapest bit of kit I’ve added to FSX, but for pure enjoyment it’s well worth it. It gives you a feeling of being in the pilot’s seat, being able to just move your head to change your view makes virtual flying so much easier and realistic. Even in bad IRF conditions it has it’s value when you break out of the clouds and search for the runway before hitting the minima and having to go around. Once you are wearing the Track Clip Pro there is no noticeable increased weight on the headset, and it doesn’t interfere with the boom microphone. The software is also designed to work with Car Sims and FPS as well, so if you’re into that sort thing I would imagine it would add extra dimensions to those sort of sims also.

A few negative things that I have observed with this hardware though:  

1. It is very expensive for what you get; the rear of the unit is clear plastic and I can see a good four to five dollars worth of components in there! Additionally the technology is about four years old now to the market.
2. A quick reference guide for the Track Clip Pro installation would have been helpful.
3. The cable arrangement is a bit untidy, when you clip the Pro onto your headset; it is left to the user to sort it out cable management. Which I did with zip ties which looks a bit messy

But overall I rate this very highly: I wouldn’t award it a Golden X because of the reasons above, but in my opinion it is worth 5 Stars.