I'm pretty sure that in 10-15 years these things will be really lightweight and small. Vision Pro won't fail, it'll just take a while to get there.
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Vision Pro is the definition of function over form
- Thread starter CrysisDeu
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It’s really hard for a company to maintain a new product line unprofitable for 5 years
I agree that the form factor is not a great experience. In fact, I am dreading putting any of those VR devices on, once I do, it is okay for about an hour but it is such a relief to take them off again and that should not be the case! There is simply something in the way so to say. Laying down does not help much either because then gravity puts even more weight on my face. I find myself constantly adjusting the fit, in hope it gets better but nope its simply how goggles work haha if I loosen the strap, then it puts more weight on my nose area and if I make it tighter to stay in place, it puts too much pressure on my forehead and cheeks. The fact that I have to do all this is already too much work to be convenient
Do we need to have VR headsets that people wear 8 hours a day! I think most are already not that keen on how much phone usage we have every day, I think targeting a world where we use VR headsets that long is definitely not ideal.
I don't think it's any different from people staring at their laptop screens or external monitors all day in the office.
I remember when AirPods first debuted and people were unsure of whether to interrupt other people who had AirPods in their ears (the implication was that they were busy listening to audio), but over time, we kinda learnt to just go "to heck with it" and proceed to get their attention anyways.
I believe it will be the same with the vision pro (and passthrough). Whether they are working on a giant spreadsheet at their desk or via a VR headset, if we need their attention, we are going to just need to either wave our hand in front of them or tap them on their shoulder and say and what we need to say.
We will adapt.
if you follow the apple patents and manufacturing tech news, you'll see that smart glasses will arrive within 3 years from now, if not sooner. It will be tethered to an iPhone, as the battery life in such a device cannot support 'thinking', only displaying. There's no tech bottleneck for this device (wireless latency is solved), it's just a question of what tech compromises are acceptable (i.e, how thick/heavy it will be).
I think AVP 2 will still have Eye Sight, Apple really wants the outside of the device to look cool. Some weight will be shaved off by switching to that new motherboard material that is significantly lighter, and maybe with the power efficiency of M4/2nm, they won't need fans anymore (or just passive cooling) reducing the weight and size. I could see them rejigging the external cameras, possibly reducing the number. Also, Apple's in-house battery tech will probably appear with AVP 2 (it's rumored that's why the battery life is so bad, it wasn't ready so they went with existing tech that was not optimized for it). The biggest problem is the lens, afaik more than half the light sent into the lens does not make it into your eyes, wasting a lot of energy. Those lens are cutting edge, so unless there's a breakthrough (more efficient, greater FOV), we're stuck with them.
I think AVP 2 will still have Eye Sight, Apple really wants the outside of the device to look cool. Some weight will be shaved off by switching to that new motherboard material that is significantly lighter, and maybe with the power efficiency of M4/2nm, they won't need fans anymore (or just passive cooling) reducing the weight and size. I could see them rejigging the external cameras, possibly reducing the number. Also, Apple's in-house battery tech will probably appear with AVP 2 (it's rumored that's why the battery life is so bad, it wasn't ready so they went with existing tech that was not optimized for it). The biggest problem is the lens, afaik more than half the light sent into the lens does not make it into your eyes, wasting a lot of energy. Those lens are cutting edge, so unless there's a breakthrough (more efficient, greater FOV), we're stuck with them.
Why not take the processor out of the headset and put it in the battery pack? The headset could be much smaller/lighter and battery pack likely wouldn’t gain much weight. Better yet, have the battery portion of the pack be able to unclip for hot swapping.
The prospect of wearing an avp for 8 hours a day. Ouch. I was good using quest a couple hours a week.
Best analysis of VP form and function I've seen so far. Thanks.
For me, the thing that I think I could do with VP that I can do with no other device is read PDF files. I know this is an edge case, and most people have no problem reading PDF files on their computers, iPads, or even iPhones. But I've never been able to get the fonts on PDF files big enough to read comfortably on iPads. If I zoom in to a PDF file so the font is big enough, the line doesn't fit the screen, forcing me to scroll horizontally to read each line. On my desktop monitor, this isn't a problem, but I can't sit comfortably at a desk for the time it takes to read long PDFs. With a VP, I could enlarge the PDF to the size I need, position it where it's comfortable to read, and still have the entire page in view, or perhaps even use the 2-page view.
You see, I'd be using the VP to read a 2D PDF, but it's VP's 3D capability that will allow me to size and position the PDF in the way I want.
So yes, VP is mostly just a fancy display, but it's a display that will allow me to do some tasks better. It's not currently worth spending $3500 on, but if the price comes down a bit, and its capabilities and apps available for it improves a bit, the way they did for iPhones and Apple watches in the first few generations, I think more and more people will find that VP fits into their device lineup in ways that improve their workflow.
I disagree intensely. A true AR product with a viewfinder that people can wear all day every day like a normal sized pair of glasses is a total game changer. It doesn't have to operate like vision pro at all, which is simply another iPad, that really adds nothing to anyone's life. But an AR accented world, with REAL passthrough (not this camera-created virtual passthrough crap) has unlimited potential with life changing applications.
Such a device doesn't need to be an independent computer or run visionOS. As an iPhone accessory, it could be 10x as useful as Apple Watch.
A glasses-form device that is just AR only, totally controlled from the iPhone? Ok, I can see possibilities in that.
I also agree that as it currently is, VP is like another iPad, but as I said in my last post, one that has the potential to improve on the iPad in some crucial ways for me.
interesting you say that re the iPad, see below link to Gurman's newsletter from last Sunday that was nowhere mentioned by MR, as he thinks VPro could replace iPad.
I've been thinking more after my demo and I really can see more use cases for myself, besides the occasional movie/immersion using it as a large monitor for the computing that I do.
The current form factor is what it is, for now, you're not going to get immersion with glasses but there are other use cases where glasses will be just fine.
Vision Pro Debut Brings a New Shopping Experience to Apple
The Vision Pro finally went on sale this weekend, bringing with it a whole new shopping experience for Apple customers. Also: The company returned to growth last quarter despite a slump in China, but warns that revenue may decline again in the current period.
www.bloomberg.com
Pretty much this. Its the convenience factor that sets the other Apple devices apart from this. Once the goggles are like a 1/3rd of their current weight, it becomes less of a hassle putting them on, they become more seamless into everyday life. Right now there is a distinction that exists that prevents that. It shouldn't feel like a burden to put on the AVP, but it does versus me pulling out an OLED ipad next month.
They have not gotten 1/5 of the thickness or weight because the form factor is decided for the device. They can even get thicker in some generations
To be honest I’m not so sure. Look at the iPhone, it hasn’t become a thin rectangle of glass in 15 years, instead it has become bigger and chunkier, larger displays asking for a larger battery and the physics of photography driving a bigger lens complex.
I think there’s a good chance that the Vision Pro in 15 years will still look much the same, just be faster and with slightly larger displays and more storage and ram. It seems to me that compact devices ask for a radically different trade-off in compute power, screen and battery.
Look at the Humane AI Pin, that isn’t really a pin but a small box which is about as small as a tiny old flip-phone, which is as small as a powerful smartphone compute package, some microphones, a phone modem and antenna, and a battery will get for a good while. And that’s still quite heavy too. More like a pocketable device than something you casually wear on a jacket lapel.
100% exactly my concern
The top charts for VR games are filled with games that don't need a controller. VRChat (they already have and are actively refining purely hand-based controls), Gorilla Tag, Walkabout Mini Golf, Tabletop Simulator, Beatsaber, etc would all work fine with the AVP paradigm. And even past that, most shooty-action or slashy-action VR games would work fine with a basic HUD or skeuomorph "virtual objects on belt" controls. There's a ton of games with button controls that amount to low-key laziness in not wanting to truly adapt to the medium.
The caveat there is that losing controllers also means losing haptic feedback. I think it's possible but unlikely that Apple will try to come up with something there (for example, some kind of Apple Watch integration and a much cheaper wristband for the other hand), but if they do it'll be in the form of something that can be worn and otherwise ignored when not in use, not something that has to be held.
Apple has more cash on hand than the country of Luxembourg's entire GDP. They could run a decade-long project of having interns literally set money on fire every morning so the bosses can meditate on the ashes and it wouldn't make a significant dent in their reserves.
Imagine that there are people who don’t even want to use these things. They don’t care about form nor function. They read these conversations and think “where is this world going”. They hope tech would peak so hard that people start take interest in real world again. They dream of people throwing their watches and headsets to trash and enjoying just reality. Looking at a butterfly and feeling the summer wind on their skin - without taking a photo - just looking and feeling. Or walking around the forest and enjoying the smell of fresh morning - without fiddling with watch - just enjoying the moment. But then they realize that while people are spending time in their smartphones, watches and headsets the real world will be slowly destroyed by pointless lifestyle of a modern society.
How dystopian, a family of four sitting in the living room, everybody with huge goggles, lost to their own lonely digital world. It's just so anti-social, literally. How much fun is a Youtube party if you can't look and point at the screen together? Of course if children start at an early age to grow up with a weight strapped to their head they might get used to it all day. I'll keep my iPad for gaming with the kids, thank you very much.