Accuforce v2 vs. OSW vs. Fanatec Podium DD1? Which one is the best?

[NoOne3000]

I'm in the U.S. and am trying to decide which wheel to buy. I have demoed an Accuforce v2 and it felt great, but i'm wondering if i'm missing anything with the OSW and the soon-to-be-released Podium. "RON reviewt" on YouTube apparently was able to spend some decent time with the Podium at the Fanatec community event on Aug. 25 (in Germany?) and I asked him directly in the comments what his thoughts were on the Accuforce to the OSW to the Podium since Fanatec had all wheel types setup at this event. He seemed genuinely unbiased, and in his comments he said he felt the Podium was smoother than the Accuforce and that the OSW was just slightly smoother than the Accuforce and suggested I wait until more reviews and comparisons are released. Now, this could be due to the fact that Fanatec did not spend too much time tuning up the Accuforce or OSW thus inducing a feeling that the Podium was "smoother". I'm looking for some community feedback to help me with my purchase as I'm wondering if I can just go ahead now and buy the Accuforce with no regrets. And I don't really want to wait until December to buy a first gen product either. Do we think the Podium is going to be that much better than the Accuforce or OSW?

Thoughts?

Here's how the prices break down. The Accuforce is easily the most economical option. And it get's even cheaper on Black Friday when they offer it for $1050 shipped! (i'm not sure if I can wait another 7 weeks)

Accuforce v2 Complete System with Accuforce wheel and button box paddle shifters- $1200 shipped.

Simucube OSW small Mige wheel base - $1300 shipped, + Fanatec wheel/button box $400 = ~ $1700 shipped to the U.S.

Fanatec Podium DD1 = $1040 + Fanatec wheel with paddle shifters and button box $400 = ~ $1440

 

[Deleted member 197115]

From the impressions everything on that event was better than Accuforce, so you can scratch that one off the list.
DD1/DD2 and OSW were on par, with OSW perhaps having slightly more details, could be just settings like filtering and dampening.
So seems like Podium can perform at least as good as OSW, the real question is reliability of the new player (it's Fanatec after all). With OSW we have proven track record, Fanatec on the other hand provides our of the box ready to use solution.

 

[Goes To 11]

He seemed genuinely unbiased, and in his comments he said he felt the Podium was smoother than the Accuforce and that the OSW was just slightly smoother than the Accuforce and suggested I wait until more reviews and comparisons are released. Now, this could be due to the fact that Fanatec did not spend too much time tuning up the Accuforce or OSW thus inducing a feeling that the Podium was "smoother".
Thoughts?

I bought an Accuforce wheel recently and tested in pretty thoroughly after reading a bunch of the feedback from the Fanatec event. The Accuforce at the event was not set up correctly. First, there was a mix of foundation and game feedback which in my testing makes the ffb a little vague in iRacing. Not night and day different but I can't quite feel when on the limit properly. Second, smoothing was either turned off or set at default levels. The default smoothing levels for the Accuforce are pretty unfiltered which makes the ffb quite sharp and even more so when smoothing is turned off. The difference between higher levels of smoothing, default smoothing and smoothing off is very distinct and you can even hear the difference in the motor. I think this is why some people were calling the feedback very coggy. It actually reminds me of the difference between my old G25 and CSR wheels. I bet some of the coggy feeling in the G25 isn't because of the gears but because it is faithfully representing game ffb while the CSR belt was filtering some of that out making it smoother. There appears to be a lot of different opinions on what the proper settings are for the AF with some people liking more smoothing than others. But, to get it more similar to the other wheels, it would have benefitted from more smoothing.

The two main complaints about the Accuforce were the cogging and the graininess of the ffb. I think that the cogginess was likely mostly the smoothing as discussed about. The Accuforce does have a slight "graininess" to it. Grainy isn't quite the correct word. It is more like a very faint bump every couple of degrees of wheel rotation. It is obvious if you move the shaft of the motor, less obvious of you move the steering wheel slowly and almost disappears when there is ffb like when adjusting your steering mid corner but it is still there and still colours the ffb a little.

I recommend that you watch the sim racing garage review of the Accuforce V2. He felt that he could get the ffb the way that he wanted it and it was much improved over the last time that he tested the V1.

The accuforce excels with games that do not have good forcefeedback such as Dirt Rally. When set to foundation feedback the AF will ignore the games ffb and will calculate it's own based on the physics. Dirt Rally ffb is completely transformed by this.

I think that the take away is that if the AF was set up better, it would be closer to the OSW and Fanatec but not quite there. I think Gamermuscles said the AF was 5-10% off of the others as tested at the event which isn't bad. The AF cost me about $400 less than what the DD1 was going to cost me which is about 2/3 of the price of a set of PT2 pedals. That trade off was worth it for me especially considering the unknown reliability of the Fanatec wheels. Just based on the price of the base, the AF v2 is about halfway between a CSW V2 and DD1 which sounds about right.

In the end, all the different wheels have their advantages and disadvantages and you need to figure out what is most important to you.

From the impressions everything on that event was better than Accuforce, so you can scratch that one off the list.

Just based on a poorly designed community event test????

 

[sjb266]

Confirmation bias....

 

[Jeremy Ford]

I'm kind of liking the look of those Podium bases for the easier out of the box consumer grade setup and game compatibility for both PC and consoles. That gives it some pretty useful advantages.

As for reliability, logically it shouldn't be a concern. Like an OSW it's a big ass motor connected directly to the wheel. Mechanically it's simple in this respect which ought to make it largely bullet proof like other direct wheels. But sure they have some history on using their customers as the testers and and release the .5 edition fixing the weaknesses.

 

[NoOne3000]

If the Accuforce was 5-10% less nicer than the OSW, then I imagine it being tuned would close that gap even more. It will be nice to see the manufacturers setup their wheels to the best they can and then have folks go in and test. I assume this is going to happen at the SimRacing Expo in Germany on 9/14-9/16. Accuforce has the cord which I don't like at all. I don't know how much of a pain it is with the button box and paddles, care to comment? So that gives the Podium an advantage right there, but no one knows the long term reliability of whatever technology the Podium is using to negate the cord and of course we all know its going to be a bumpy ride with this first version. And we know how long it took Fanatec to release a production ready wheel, so you can take that as "they took their time to perfect" or "it's not ready but we need to get it to market". There are going to be issues. Cost-wise, the Accuforce is much cheaper than an OSW (especially at $1050 if I can hold out until November) and for a $400-$700 savings over OSW and Podium, at least for me, I could tolerate the 5% inferiority to the other Direct Drive units. I may not even notice that. I'm really looking forward to seeing unbiased comparisons between the big 3 DD providers which hopefully come out of the upcoming SimRacing Expo event in Germany.

Great discussion thus far.

 

[Deleted member 197115]

OSW has already killed AF, who buys it nowadays. Podium could be just the last nail in the coffin as addreses concerns of tecnically inclined users.

 

[Deleted member 197115]

Just based on a poorly designed community event test????

Not only. I don't think it was really a shocking surprise to anyone.

 

[Goes To 11]

Not only. I don't think it was really a shocking surprise to anyone.

Your a little out of date.

 

[Deleted member 197115]

Isn't is essentially the same as V1, same motor, redesigned housing and cheaper components to lower the price.

 

[Goes To 11]

Isn't is essentially the same as V1, same motor, redesigned housing and cheaper components to lower the price.

Watch the new review. I got the impression that Barry believes that the improvements are in the Sim Commander software.

 

[RaceNut]

Watch the new review. I got the impression that Barry believes that the improvements are in the Sim Commander software.

SimCommander is evolving all the time but, the fundamental working hardware in v1 vs v2 is the same as I understand it. The software is the AF-systems greatest feature imo; it lends more versatility with tuning options for various titles. I wish we had such options with the OSW's.

 

[Furnace Inferno]

It is indeed the software that makes the AF so great, any game which has terrible in-game FFB or a wall of indecipherable settings you just switch the foundation FFB in Sim Commander and fix. I know people say it’s complicated but it’s really not that bad compared to say PCars FFB options. You can pretty much have baseline settings that work across all your games with only tinkering to smoothing to get it feeling like you’re driving on rubber.

Now as to the comparisons honestly we are talking about diminishing returns here, don’t fall into the trap of getting swept up in the hype. People love to proclaim how much better X is over Y but the differences are really not that big. If you were happy with what you tried on the AF then go for it, what the other wheels will give you over it in feel you wouldn’t even be able to notice without having tried them both back to back on a solid rig.

The real reasons to go for an OSW or Fanatec aren’t just because of slightly better performance.

Accuforce:
+ Sim Commander
+ Price
+ Proven Reliabilty
+ Plug & Play Complete Package
+ Small power/controller box
+ dev support because it’s a single package
+ can use higher quality custom rims
- Controller Box fan noisy
- only one official button box option
- a lot more expensive outside U.S
- no real documentation on proper setup
- not quite as strong or smooth as OSW

OSW:
+ higher strength capability and smoothness
+ fan noise very quiet
+ custom rims
+ simucube software as simple as Logitech profiler
+ proven reliability
- need to buy a rim
- controller/power box is very large
- no real game support with poor or no FFB in some heavily reliant on community
+/- doesn’t have industry standard mounting solution
+/- bare motor aesthetics

Fanatec:
+ higher strength capability and smoothness
+ all in one unit (though the powerbrick looked nearly as large as the AF box)
+ quiet operation
+ no wheel cable
+ multiple good quality rim options
+ on wheel quick adjustments
+ dev support
+ only DD wheel that works on consoles
- unknown reliability/build quality
- can’t use any custom rims
+/- complete Fanatec ecosystem
+/- unknown software said to be equal/better than Sim Commander
+/- quick release system doesn’t look as robust

Now I’ve not really commented on price other than to say the AF price ratio is very different outside the States because those are for the individual to decide.

If all wheels were available right now and everything was known and the Podium rims were as good as the high end custom ones because I’m in the UK I’d probably go for a Podium base and pay a few hundred more.

Since I already got an AFV2 last Black Friday, I really considered switching but actually I don’t think there is a big enough difference between the two to justify it with how many unknowns there are right now and Sim Commander is too good to give up without an alternative and it’s also the reason I didn’t get an OSW for only a few hundred more.

 

[MJH78]

The problem I have with all of these side by side reviews is that OSW just isn't a product with a strict parts list. For example the above post mentions that OSW has a large controller box. Look inside that box and you see there is only a power supply and a circuit board in there with some wiring between them. The box is anything you want it to be and different pre-builders also use different cases for them which will obviously affect the size but also potentially the noise levels which was marked as a positive. If your case has a couple of extra fans on it, all of a sudden it might be the noisy option in a small case!

I bought my OSW 'Large Mige' year and a half ago from Sim-plicity. It had 10k ppr encoder and was running on MMOS software. Now I have upgraded the encoder to SinCos and am running on SimuCube. The wheel already feels completely different. Never mind that SimuCube is constantly being developed so the experience keeps changing. So what are we comparing to? There seems to be a split people perceive between the 'large mige' and the 'small mige' but in my opinion the encoder and software will make a much bigger difference to your experience than the peak force the wheel is able to do.

There are just too many variables to be able to get anything more than an idea of roughly where things stand unless there is a completely independent test such as the SimRacing Garage one which of course is now quite out of date. For example for the Fanatec demonstration, we have very little idea of how any of the DD wheels were set up (software and hardware) and as far as I know most of the people there had very little experience of either the Accuforce or OSWs to be able to tell whether they performed as well as they should have. For example it is completely conceivable that the miges there had old encoders which are still for sale today on new OSW kits or that the Sim Commander software wasn't properly set up.

Unfortunately until the wheels become a lot more commonplace we will all just have to live in blissful ignorance over whether your personal choice was the right one or the wrong one. Moreover, I wager that once you have made your decision,whatever your choice, you will be too busy enjoying your driving to even bother trying to figure out whether some other wheel is marginally better than yours..

 

[RaceNut]

The problem I have with all of these side by side reviews is that OSW just isn't a product with a strict parts list. For example the above post mentions that OSW has a large controller box. Look inside that box and you see there is only a power supply and a circuit board in there with some wiring between them. The box is anything you want it to be and different pre-builders also use different cases for them which will obviously affect the size but also potentially the noise levels which was marked as a positive. If your case has a couple of extra fans on it, all of a sudden it might be the noisy option in a small case!

I bought my OSW 'Large Mige' year and a half ago from Sim-plicity. It had 10k ppr encoder and was running on MMOS software. Now I have upgraded the encoder to SinCos and am running on SimuCube. The wheel already feels completely different. Never mind that SimuCube is constantly being developed so the experience keeps changing. So what are we comparing to? There seems to be a split people perceive between the 'large mige' and the 'small mige' but in my opinion the encoder and software will make a much bigger difference to your experience than the peak force the wheel is able to do.

There are just too many variables to be able to get anything more than an idea of roughly where things stand unless there is a completely independent test such as the SimRacing Garage one which of course is now quite out of date. For example for the Fanatec demonstration, we have very little idea of how any of the DD wheels were set up (software and hardware) and as far as I know most of the people there had very little experience of either the Accuforce or OSWs to be able to tell whether they performed as well as they should have. For example it is completely conceivable that the miges there had old encoders which are still for sale today on new OSW kits or that the Sim Commander software wasn't properly set up.

Unfortunately until the wheels become a lot more commonplace we will all just have to live in blissful ignorance over whether your personal choice was the right one or the wrong one. Moreover, I wager that once you have made your decision,whatever your choice, you will be too busy enjoying your driving to even bother trying to figure out whether some other wheel is marginally better than yours..

Really, I think any of these options are very good ones, all far exceed the mainstream offerings by a large margin. I don't think there is any wrong choice here, it's just a couple of pro's / con's one way or the other that may influence the choice, depending on ones preferences or location.

 

[ricerracer]

OSW, its a beast that never has reliability issues and if you get it from simracingbay then you will also get amazing customer service.

Accuforce 2nd

Fanatec last purely because its unproven, their previous products have had reliability issues and their customer service stinks

 

[LoeVG]

@racingenthusiast ,

Now you're fooking going to calm ya tits, mate.. I'm sick of you constantly bashing Fanatec just because YOU didn't get what you wanted.. Every post you make is infused with a massive amount of Fanatec bash seasoning, and tbh, I am not fond of such a person being in this forum making other simracing enthusiasts look bad. This has to stop asap!

We get you've had a bad experience with Fanatec! You've done your part and so has Fanatec.. Case closed!

Your behaviour is disgusting.

 

[Turk]

I was considering getting a DD wheel for a while, the reported graininess turned me off the accuforce, I felt like if I was spending that much money I didn't want any compromises no matter how slight they may be.

Both the accuforce and the OSW had limited wheel options, or required some bodging to get wheels to work. Neither seemed all that plug and play. That's probably improved.

If I was in the market I'd feel much more comfortable buying Fanatec, because it does seem to be more of a consumer product that is plug and play, plus it fit's into Fanatecs current ecosystem.

Not saying it's the best, just probably is less hassle.

 

[Mr Latte]

I was considering getting a DD wheel for a while, the reported graininess turned me off the accuforce, I felt like if I was spending that much money I didn't want any compromises no matter how slight they may be.

Both the accuforce and the OSW had limited wheel options, or required some bodging to get wheels to work. Neither seemed all that plug and play. That's probably improved.

If I was in the market I'd feel much more comfortable buying Fanatec, because it does seem to be more of a consumer product that is plug and play, plus it fit's into Fanatecs current ecosystem.

Not saying it's the best, just probably is less hassle.

It seems the Fanatec DD indeed can live up to being high-performance units. Something they should be at this price level. We had several people on the forums (looking at other threads), who doubted or presumed it was not a good idea for Fanatec in them deciding to go with their own motor based design.

I don't think, I buy into the "other wheels" were poorly configured at the recent Fanatec community event. To make their own have an advantage. It was DD unit owners that were invited, several of these would of been Simx V2 wheel owners and they could of set the software to what they know worked well.

Fanatec have several advantages, although the concern for me personally which some may share is. They have held off on DD wheel till these were shown but they may feel based on several of Fanatecs past releases, I think its fair to say with some criticism, often products newly released need revised or have issues.

I really do not want to spend £1000 or more on a product that has issues, be it reliability or component flaws. Therefore I find it exciting to want to own the product but concerned in that maybe. It may be better to get one a tad later, once we discover how the first or early adopters report on their purchases.

For me personally, I need more assurance to buy with confidence rather than buy from the excitement of ownership from the early or first pre-order batches. I look forward to more user reports from the Sim Expo.

 

[Furnace Inferno]

It seems the Fanatec DD indeed can live up to being high-performance units. Something they should be at this price level. We had several people on the forums (looking at other threads), who doubted or presumed it was not a good idea for Fanatec in them deciding to go with their own motor based design.

I don't think, I buy into the "other wheels" were poorly configured at the recent Fanatec community event. To make their own have an advantage. It was DD unit owners that were invited, several of these would of been Simx V2 wheel owners and they could of set the software to what they know worked well.

Fanatec have several advantages, although the concern for me personally which some may share is. They have held off on DD wheel till these were shown but they may feel based on several of Fanatecs past releases, I think its fair to say with some criticism, often products newly released need revised or have issues.

I really do not want to spend £1000 or more on a product that has issues, be it reliability or component flaws. Therefore I find it exciting to want to own the product but concerned in that maybe. It may be better to get one a tad later, once we discover how the first or early adopters report on their purchases.

For me personally, I need more assurance to buy with confidence rather than buy from the excitement of ownership from the early or first pre-order batches. I look forward to more user reports from the Sim Expo.

Actually the guys have said none of them had any real experience or knowledge of the Accuforce and how to set it up with Sim Commander so they just used stock settings which I can tell you in some games feel really rough and I’m not sure what they did with the damping and other settings.

Take Assetto Corsa Competizione that just released, using the AC profile to get it working on the AF was extremely harsh and artificial and a long way from feeling smooth until I tinkered a little bit if someone went into it like that they would have just assumed the AF was notchy and mechanical.

Now the argument is they should setup the software better out of the box and have more specific in-game profiles setup just for those but then you also have the issue of people liking a certain feel or effects whether they are realistic or not. I only like realistic FFB effects but from reading it seems most people like all the added fake ones to get more feel for the car so my settings might seem dead and lacking in detail to some.

Anyway ignoring those differences if you check out the comments on GamerMuscles videos you will see even he admitted the differences between the DD wheels were only in the 5-10%. You also have to consider just because those guys have bought and used DD wheels doesn’t make them experts, no offence meant to them as they’re channels are still enjoyable but I’m far more interested in what Barry of SRG has to say.