Adventures with HTC Vive Pro

I hear great things about the $800 HTC Vive Pro virtual reality headset -- except when I ordered it, I couldn't install the software.

I've been experimenting with an HTC Vive virtual reality headset for some time—I think VR is going to be huge, though it's still early days yet. I recall that the system was a pain to install back in 2016, but I finally got it to work.

A couple of days ago, I saw a great review of the new version, the HTC Vive Pro, which is basically $800 (not include the controllers and base stations, which I have from the old system). So I bought it—and now I can't install it. I go into the live chat, and they tell me that I need to install the new version of the software, after uninstalling the old, something the installation instructions were unclear on. I faithfully uninstall the old version, but when I go to the URL I was given for the download, I can't find anything to download there.

I ask the tech support person what to do, and I'm told,

Could you try at a later time? I think we have some technical issues regarding the software and we forwarded the issue to our headquarters.

Really? They're selling the new hardware, but the software for it—which apparently must have worked at some point—is just unavailable, until some unspecified "later time"? Yow.