I had an original Rift (with Touch and three webcams) and a Vive. I ended up giving up on both of them for two primary reasons:
(1) Lack of inside-out tracking. The basestation solution for the Vive was at least slick and clever and not terribly inconvenient, but needing 2-3 webcams connected to your PC for the Rift was crazy.
(2) The cord to the HMD was just too much of a nuisance.
I told myself I wouldn't get into VR again until it was untethered and didn't require external sensors or cameras. Lo and behold, here we are with the Quest only a few years later. I haven't had a chance to try it yet, but to me other VR HMDs feel somewhat irrelevant in comparison.
I also had a Vive and a Rift and also sold both after a few months.
I just picked up a Rift S yesterday and started playing with it.
When I had the Vive I was pretty disappointed in the Rift (no touch controllers at the time, leaked light through the nose, just generally worse).
The Rift S is a lot better. The tracking without base stations, the touch controls work well, and they've really nailed the little things with the experience (easier setup, better menus, better hardware, fewer cords etc.). The price is also pretty good at $399.
The much more expensive unreleased Vive with the new strapped on controllers looks interesting, but it's really nice not having to deal with putting up the room sensors. Also since the new Vive will be more than double the price it's not really a fair comparison anyway.
By "new Vive", you're referring to the Valve Index, correct? The Valve Index is designed and produced by Valve (creators of the Lighthouse tracking system used by the HTC Vive and the Valve Index), not HTC (which produced the Vive and Vive Pro).
(1) Lack of inside-out tracking. The basestation solution for the Vive was at least slick and clever and not terribly inconvenient, but needing 2-3 webcams connected to your PC for the Rift was crazy.
(2) The cord to the HMD was just too much of a nuisance.
I told myself I wouldn't get into VR again until it was untethered and didn't require external sensors or cameras. Lo and behold, here we are with the Quest only a few years later. I haven't had a chance to try it yet, but to me other VR HMDs feel somewhat irrelevant in comparison.