Meta Increases Quest 2 VR Headset Price by $100, Adds No New Features

[PowerButton]

🧐
Apple will release 2 versions of their headset, an iView and iView Max (naming will change. The lower will be an entry level version and the Max will be their $2,000 flagship version.

Apple’s sell has always been about the ecosystem and they’ve never released a product that’s priced well beyond market without having a second, cheaper unit. Apple’s ecosystem will be a direct competitor to Meta and that’s why Meta/Zuck are so scared.

Meta doesn’t care that much about the hardware, but they do care about their Wonka land. 😏

 

[Unregistered 4U]

🧐
Apple will release 2 versions of their headset, an iView and iView Max (naming will change. The lower will be an entry level version and the Max will be their $2,000 flagship version.

Apple’s sell has always been about the ecosystem and they’ve never released a product that’s priced well beyond market without having a second, cheaper unit. Apple’s ecosystem will be a direct competitor to Meta and that’s why Meta/Zuck are so scared.

Meta doesn’t care that much about the hardware, but they do care about their Wonka land. 😏

Depending on its capabilities, $2,000 WOULD be low for the market. They have the technology to produce a system that rivals systems many times more expensive in a setup that doesn’t require a PC. They’d have that market to themselves.

 

[MadDawg2020]

I know Meta is terrible, but this seems bizarre even for them. A $100 price increase is a 1/3 of the former total price of the product, surely that can't be blamed entirely on inflation and increased manufacturing costs?

Have you seen how much a container on a cargo ship goes for now? $100 barely covers that increase.

 

[diamond.g]

Depending on its capabilities, $2,000 WOULD be low for the market. They have the technology to produce a system that rivals systems many times more expensive in a setup that doesn’t require a PC. They’d have that market to themselves.

HTC has a Quest alternative that they appear to be gearing towards businesses. The "normal" version is $1300, with the business models not having pricing listed. The rest of the Vive lineup appear to require a PC.

 

[iBreatheApple]

I mean I despise Facebook and Meta in general, so I wouldn’t go that far.

I just don’t see enough of a use of VR for me to justify $600+ on a VR headset just to try out a few games on my PC (I have three that support VR, come to find out)

Not trying to sell anyone anything, and I sorely wish Facebook never bought Occulus, but what can you do…

That’s fair. I’m not “very anti” anything but I have come to feel that way about Facebook/Meta.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

HTC has a Quest alternative that they appear to be gearing towards businesses. The "normal" version is $1300, with the business models not having pricing listed. The rest of the Vive lineup appear to require a PC.

Yeah, but if you compare that to the devices being produced by companies that ONLY make business systems, though, the HTC quality isn’t there. It’s the same device with a few “business” frills.

We’ve already seen that, in single threaded performance (VERY important here) Apple Silicon performs up there with the BEST performing PC chips, within 6 or 700 points of the best performing chip. And it does so without getting so warm that you have to offload the compute. There’s no one that has a solution like Apple’s where desktop PC performance can be brought to bear in a headset form factor and they won’t be close for some time. Like back when they introduced the iPad, Apple COULD charge what the market will bear, but they instead plan (if the rumors are correct) to charge well under that current high end hardwired PC market. Similar to the XDR monitor, it will be great for the few million that purchase it, not so great for those that mainly want it because it has an Apple logo on it.

 

[Santiago]

Ah, yes, that's what was holding back adoption of a pointless-outside-of-a-narrow-niche technology geared towards a nonsensical pipe dream no one actually wants—it wasn't expensive enough!

 

[compwiz1202]

Kinda hard to unload to scalpers when the thing is easy to get through regular channels.

Yes as long of stock is good, scalpers won't get much business. Once backorders come, it's all over. Scalpers will be stalking stores and botting sites, so the backorder will get even worse.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

Ah, yes, that's what was holding back adoption of a pointless-outside-of-a-narrow-niche technology geared towards a nonsensical pipe dream no one actually wants—it wasn't expensive enough!

Well, I mean, the Mac is also pointless-outside-a-narrow-niche. And, this has already reached over half the Mac unit sales. Once they get to 20 million a year in sales, they’ll be LESS of a niche than the Mac! And, as Apple has shown, if you play your cards right, you can make a decent profit from 20 to 30 million units a year, at lease enough to make it profitable enough to continue doing.