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Vision Pro Ultrawide Display Turns a Little MacBook into a Productivity Powerhouse

November 8, 2024 From roadtovr

Apple has finally dropped the ultrawide virtual display for Vision Pro in beta, giving the existing virtual display feature the ability to stretch to wide and ultrawide widths for extra screen real-estate. Out of the box it’s impressive, but default MacOS window management makes it kind of a pain to use. But with the right third-party window manager, it’s even better than I hoped for.

I’ll be honest, I didn’t know just how useful the new ultrawide feature would be. I’ve used Vision Pro’s virtual desktop feature many times before. It’s a great way to get some extra screen real-estate out of my MacBook Air (M2). But it was limited in that it could only really act like a single, large 16:9 monitor.

My productivity workhorse is my desktop PC on which I’ve used two side-by-side monitors for years. For a power-user like me, having the extra width to have multiple things on screen at once is great; constantly minimizing and maximizing apps is a pain. I also combine my dual monitors with additional virtual workspaces, meaning I can group applications together on a specific workspace for a specific task.

I’ve yet to make the leap to a single ultrawide monitor over dual monitors. They’re pretty damn expensive and physically take up a lot of space.

But with a little software update, Apple just gave me an ultrawide monitor that I can take with me wherever I take my Vision Pro. The ultrawide setting essentially gives you two 16:9 monitors side-by-side, but without the seam in the middle if you were using dual monitors.

So not only is my little MacBook Air now able to replicate all the screen real estate that I have with the big setup that takes up my whole office desk, it also has the benefit of no seam in the middle of the monitors. I didn’t fully appreciate how much this would increase the flexibility I have with setting up my workspaces. Now it’s easy to span an app seamlessly in the ‘middle’ of the workspace, while less important apps can be on the flanks. It’s great! But…

MacOS window management is simply not ready to handle ultrawide monitors. Even though Apple just added improved window tiling in the latest version of MacOS, it really isn’t very helpful on an ultrawide monitor.

At best you can ask the system to put an app into any quarter of the monitor, but this results in super-wide apps that aren’t useful in that particular shape. You can make a window go to just one half of the screen, but that gives you a maximum of only two apps on the screen at once.

Without window management that’s actually made for ultrawide monitors, you’re stuck doing a lot of resizing of windows to get them into useful arrangements to really take advantage of all the space you have. Or you do the seemingly insane thing Apple always shows in their marketing: just use randomly sized windows that overlap with other windows while also wasting a bunch of screen space. I mean look, this is literally what they showed when promoting this feature:

Being able to quickly get apps into useful size and position is essential to really benefiting from an ultrawide monitor. The more time it takes to size and position apps, the less often you’re going to actually use the extra space to your benefit.

Luckily there’s many third-party window managers out there for MacOS. And I would argue that having one is essential if you’re using the Vision Pro ultrawide virtual display.

Here is a look at MacOS’s built in quadrant window tiling which is not remotely useful for an ultrawide monitor. Then you see a third-party tool that makes things much better.

For now I’ve landed on a window manager called Rectangle. With it I can easily set up a ‘main’ app in the center 2/4 of the monitor, then stick apps in the remaining 1/4 on the left or 1/4 on the right. Or I can even stack two apps on the sides, taking up 1/8 of the monitor each.

This works great and makes me feel like I have even more room than I did when using two physical 16:9 monitors (again, the lack of gap in the middle is a surprising benefit because you can put your most important app directly in front of you).

Although Rectangle has the features that make this work well, the app itself is overcomplicated; like using a sledgehammer when all you really need is a regular hammer. There still might be a more streamlined solution out there.

There’s really no reason why MacOS itself shouldn’t have similar window-arranging capabilities that actually make sense for ultrawide monitors, especially now that Vision Pro doubles as one.

Anyway… with the window management issue taken care of, I’m finding the ultrawide virtual display feature even more useful than I expected. When combined with MacOS’s built-in Spaces feature—which allows me to slide easily between multiple ultrawide workspaces—my little MacBook Air feels like an absolute productivity powerhouse. It’s wild to me that it can run five ultrawide workspaces worth of apps and still feel nice and smooth.

For me, the ultrawide option (with some third-party help) has changed Vision Pro’s virtual display feature from something that’s nice to have here and there, into an essential capability of the headset.

Now listen, some of you who have made it this far might be thinking to yourself: “to some extent you’re just praising ultrawide monitors in general.”

You’re not wrong. But the thing is, this one fits in my headset, which means I can bring a highly productive workspace with me anywhere that I would take my laptop.

Vision Pro is still too heavy to want to use this setup all day (and it’s still more expensive than an ultrawide monitor itself!). But mark my words: once Apple has an equivalent headset that’s half the size and half the price, people are going to see huge value from this kind of work setup.

Meta Opens First Ray-Ban Pop-up Store in Hopes of Making Smartglasses Fashionable

November 8, 2024 From roadtovr

Ray-Ban Meta smartglasses are already pretty fashionable, as they look nearly identical to a few of EssilorLuxottica’s best-selling sunglasses, albeit with the inclusion of neatly integrated cameras, speakers, battery and onboard AI driven by a positively tiny Qualcomm Snapdragon AR1 Gen1 processor. With the launch of a new pop-up store in Los Angeles today, Meta is hoping to test out whether it can move the needle with broader adoption.

Meta calls the LA pop-up store “experiential retail,” having modeled it after the Meta Lab pop-up at Connect 2024 in October, which allowed event-goers to try on a pair of Ray-Ban Meta smartglasses to capture photos and videos and keep the resultant files, or even buy a customized pair of the $300 glasses right then and there.

Ultimately, the idea with its first publicly available pop-up in LA is to increase word-of-mouth marketing, which Creative Director Matt Jacobson hopes will make its users into the “best salesperson ever.”

Ray-Ban Meta Glasses, Image courtesy Meta, EssilorLuxottica

Adorned with a giant pair of Ray-Ban Meta glasses on the outside (with the glasses’ LED privacy light), the flagship pop-up in LA is only going to be around until December 31st, although it won’t be the last.

The company’s next pop-up is planned to hit Phoenix, Arizona in January, which the company calls a “real shop-in-shop,” the exact location of which is still a mystery.

“Can we build a store inside somebody else’s business? Can we drive traffic to it, and can we leverage their marketing as well as ours? By the end of January, we will have tested all three expressions of our experiential first-party retail.”

To boot, the Meta Lab location is doing more than just letting people try on and buy Ray-Ban smartglasses. The company says it will have “regular programming,” which includes stand-up comedy with Desi Banks, a live podcast with Madeline Argy, a ‘paint and sip’ night with Tinashe, a Ray-Ban Meta-focused workshop with Director Drex Lee, and a cooking class with Cassie Yeung.

From there, Meta hopes to share its findings with EssilorLuxottica, which operates over 17,000 stores worldwide, as well among third-party partners. Meta announced in September it was expanding its smartglasses partnership with the eyewear conglomerate into 2030.

As pop-ups go, the LA and Phoenix locations may be a limited engagement, but it may also spark more to come.

“We can’t scale a hundred of these, but we can build a few of them at locations around the country, and then fill in if we decide we want to do more first-party retail. This is aspirational, inspirational. They’re not easily scalable in terms of what they look like, but in terms of experience, they are,” Jacobson says.

If you’re in the LA area, you can find the Meta Lab pop-up over at 8600 Melrose Avenue, open from 10:00 am – 7:00 pm PT seven days a week beginning November 8th through December 31st.

Posted holiday hours are 10:00 am – 3:00 pm on Black Friday and Christmas Eve, with the location closed on Thanksgiving, December 3rd, and Christmas Day.

Apple Releases Long-awaited Panoramic Display Feature on Vision Pro in 2.2 Beta

November 5, 2024 From roadtovr

Apple has released initial access to the long-promised panoramic display feature for Vision Pro’s Mac Virtual Display, which now brings three virtual screen sizes via its visionOS 2.2 beta release.

Having initially launched with Vision Pro back in February, Mac Virtual Display only included a single virtual screen size, albeit allowing Vision Pro users to have multiple app windows open at the same time.

Many were hoping Apple would release the new ‘Wide’ and ‘Ultrawide’ display formats for Mac Virtual Display last month during the company’s online Mac product reveal event. Now, as reported by MacRumors, visionOS 2.2 is here in beta, allowing Vision Pro users who opt in to finally take advantage of long-awaited wider screen real estate.

Apple said during the feature’s unveiling in June the update would bring an “ultra-wide display that wraps around you,” allowing for resolutions “equivalent to two 4K monitors, side by side.” Mac-side dynamic foveated rendering also keeps content “sharp wherever you look,” Apple said.

While it’s unclear exactly when Apple plan to push out visionOS 2.2 to the stable branch, it’s likely to come alongside the next ‘X.2’ updates for iOS, iPadOS, macOS Sequoia, watchOS, and tvOS, MacRumors suggests.

In the meantime, to enroll in the visionOS 2.2 beta, simply follow these few steps:

Updating Vision Pro via OTA updates

Sign in to the Apple Developer Center with with your Apple ID and accept the ToS.
Put on Vision Pro, and go to Settings General > Software Update > Beta Updates and choose the developer beta.
When a new developer beta is available, you can install it from Software Update.
From there, you should see the new ‘Wide’ and ‘Ultrawide’ options when tethered to your Mac.

Apple Reportedly Delays Cheaper Vision Pro Beyond 2027, M5 Chip Refresh May Arrive Instead

November 4, 2024 From roadtovr

Apple may be taking a beat before it releases a cheaper follow-up to Vision Pro, which would more broadly appeal to consumers, instead releasing a hardware refresh next year that includes the new M5 chipset.

According to independent tech analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, Apple has delayed the cheaper version of Vision Pro “beyond 2027”. Kuo, who is a respected figure in Apple supply chain leaks, claims in an X post that “Apple’s only new head-mounted display device in 2025 will be the Vision Pro with an upgraded M5 processor.”

“I think what really drove Apple to delay the cheaper Vision Pro is that simply reducing the price wouldn’t help create successful use cases,” Kuo maintains. “It’s similar to the HomePod situation—even after launching the cheaper HomePod mini, Apple’s smart speakers failed to become mainstream products.”

This comes in sharp contrast to a previous report from The Information in June that alleged Apple was charging ahead with a single, more affordable headset for release in 2025—let’s call it ‘Vision SE’, and leaving a more powerful ‘Vision Pro 2’ for later release.

Granted, there’s no way of knowing exactly what Apple is planning to do, as the Cupertino tech giant is famous for seeding would-be leakers with misleading bits of information in effort to catch them, so reports of the ilk should be taken with a heaping handful of salt.

Still, Kuo’s claim that Apple is pushing forward with what will surely be an equally expensive hardware refresh to the $3,500 Vision Pro may not be so farfetched.

In the midst of recent supply chain rumors claiming Apple has sharply slowed Vision Pro production, Apple CEO Tim Cook was keen to remind doubters in a concurrent Wall Street Journal interview that Vision Pro isn’t “a mass-market product.”

“Right now, it’s an early-adopter product,” Cook told the WSJ. “People who want to have tomorrow’s technology today—that’s who it’s for. Fortunately, there’s enough people who are in that camp that it’s exciting.”

Provided Kuo’s claim is true, it would signal a decisive shift in the company’s release strategy, leaving the next Vision Pro to carry on its legacy, again putting the headset in the odd position of being both too expensive for general consumers, and too niche for a large swath of third-party developers to consider it a viable money-making platform, like Meta’s Quest platform is today.

– – — – –

Meanwhile, the XR competitive landscape is changing at a pretty fast clip. After the release of Meta’s $300 mixed reality Quest 3S, we’re still waiting to hear more about the company’s next big move to release a fleet of third-party OEMs running Horizon OS, which is ostensibly in service of Meta’s bid to become the “open” XR platform to Apple’s closed garden XR ecosystem.

Meanwhile, Google has signaled its preparing support for XR headsets on Google Play, which could portend the long-awaited Samsung/Google/Qualcomm headset that rumors suggest may try to compete with Vision Pro.

Hands-on: Shiftall MeganeX Superlight Packs a Wishlist of Ergonomics Into a Tiny Package

November 1, 2024 From roadtovr

Japan-based Shiftall is the latest company making an effort to deliver an ultra-compact VR headset for enthusiasts who are willing to spend big on maximizing their PC VR experience. Despite the tiny package, the MeganeX Superlight headset still manages to deliver the optical adjustments that should be standard for every headset. Though undoubtedly expensive, the headset overall is promising, provided the company can finalize a few tweaks before crossing the finish line.

Available for pre-order in Japan, United States, EU & UK, the $1,900 MeganeX Superlight from Shiftall is purportedly set to start shipping between February and March of next year. You can check out the full breakdown of specs here.

This is a tethered headset designed for the SteamVR ecosystem. Shiftall is selling the headset by itself, which means you’ll need to bring your own SteamVR Tracking beacons and controllers—or drop another $580 to buy them new.

This week I got to check out a prototype version of the MeganeX Superlight headset and found it to be a promising piece of hardware that’s certain to be held back by its steep price.

Shiftall CEO Takuma Iwasa told me the headset is primarily targeted toward hardcore VR users, especially those spending long stretches in VRChat. Considering his own claim of more than 3,000 hours in VRChat, it’s clear he has a real understanding of the needs of this kind of customer.

That’s what led the company to try building a compact PC VR headset: Iwasa wants to deliver something that’s lightweight and comfortable for long sessions.

A big part of a VR headset being comfortable is about being able to adjust it to fit each individual. Getting the headset’s lenses into the ideal position for your eyes is crucial to maximizing visual quality and comfort.

To that end, I was happy to see the MeganeX Superlight includes a list of optical adjustments that I’ve long wished was standard on every headset: IPD, eye-relief, diopter, a flip-up visor, and even a lens angle adjustment.

IPD (or interpupillary distance) is standard on most headsets, it’s the distance between the lenses. Matching the distance between the lenses to the distance between your eyes is important to making it easy for your eyes to fuse the stereoscopic image, and for getting your eyes into the ‘sweet spot’ of the lens (the optical center, where the lens has the greatest).

On the MeganeX Superlight, IPD is set by entering your IPD measurement into the software on your computer, causing the headset’s motorized lenses to move into the desired position.

Eye-relief is less common to find on VR headsets. This is the distance from the lens to your eye. Not only is this important for maximizing field-of-view, it’s also important for dialing in the ‘sweet spot’ of the lens. That’s because the sweet spot isn’t just a plane, it’s a volume (technically speaking, this is often called the ‘eye-box’).

On the MeganeX Superlight, the mount which connects the headset itself to the headstrap makes it easy to adjust eye-relief by pinching a pair of pads which allows you to freely slide the headset closer or farther away from your eyes.

Diopter is even rarer than eye-relief. This setting changes the focus of the lens to account for a person’s vision correction needs. Rather than wearing glasses, users can dial in their diopter to enjoy a sharp view.

On Shiftall’s headset, there’s a small dial near the side of each lens which is used to adjust the diopter for each eye. Although this is a manual process (ie: you can’t just enter a value and have the headset set it automatically), Shiftall tells me that part of the headset’s setup process will include a calibration screen to make this process easier.

While a growing number of headsets include decent passthrough views via external cameras, if the goal is to simply look outside of your headset, it’s hard to beat your very own eyes. To that end the MeganeX Superlight has a little plunger on the headstrap mount that makes it quick and easy to flip up the visor for a glimpse of the outside world, and to flip it back down when you’re done.

And last but not least—something I’ve seen on only one other company’s headsets—is an independent lens angle adjustment.

Many VR headsets have a pivot at the point where their headstrap connects to the headset, but the angle is entirely at the mercy of how the facepad rests on the user’s face.

On the other hand, because the MeganeX Superlight headset essentially hangs down from your forehead, a small dial on the side of the mount allows you to independently adjust the angle of the headset (and thus the lenses) regardless of how the headstrap is resting on your head.

Taken all together, these adjustments make it easier for a wider range of people to get the best and most comfortable visual experience from the headset.

And if you’re planning to pay nearly $2,000 for a headset that’s not only compact, but also includes a whopping 13.6MP (3,552 × 3,840) micro-OLED display per-eye, you’re definitely going to want it to have the adjustments necessary to give you the best visuals it can.

The MeganeX Superlight’s displays are incredibly crisp, to the point that there’s simply no visible pixels, sub-pixels, or even a hint of screen-door effect that I could see in my time with the headset. The virtual world not only looks completely sharp and solid thanks to all of those pixels, it also looks very vivid thanks to the rich colors and deep blacks shown by the 10-bit display.

While I need more time with the headset to be sure, my initial impression from memory was that the MeganeX Superlight felt like it had a slightly larger field-of-view, slightly larger sweet spot, and less glare compared to Bigscreen Beyond (its nearest competitor).

From a resolution standpoint, there’s so few examples of VR content that actually have the underlying graphical fidelity to show a meaningful difference—between Bigscreen Beyond’s impressive 6.5MP (2,560 × 2,560) per-eye resolution and the MeganeX Superlight’s even more impressive 13.6MP (3,552 × 3,840) per-eye resolution—that the improvement wasn’t obviously noticeable.

But it stands to reason that the MeganeX Superlight should be the superior headset in cases where high resolving power is most important, like in flight simulators where long sightlines to distant objects are common, and for virtual desktops where resolving fine text is crucial. I’m especially interested to try the MeganeX Superlight for the latter.

While greater resolving power is always a plus, there’s no question that if you want to run VR content anywhere near the headset’s native resolution, you’re going to need to pair it with top-tier PC.

At the headset’s native 13.6MP per-eye resolution and 90Hz refresh rate, your computer will need to pump out an absurd 2.5 gigapixels per second (assuming naive stereoscopic rendering). [Note: Shiftall says the MeganeX Superlight only works with modern NVIDIA GPUs. AMD is not supported at present.]

If you don’t already have (or aren’t planning to buy) an NVIDIA 3080, 4080, or better, it’s hard to make a case for paying $1,900 for the extra pixels on MeganeX Superlight over the $1,000 Bigscreen Beyond (assuming both headsets were otherwise equal).

While I was impressed with the array of optical adjustments, stunning resolution, and vibrant colors of the MeganeX Superlight, I have the same reservation about the headset that I did with Bigscreen Beyond: the lack of built-in audio is a big oversight. I understand that there’s some people out there who are happy to deal with putting on their own headphones or earbuds over top of their headset, but my gut is that most people prefer the convenience of not having to deal with yet another thing to put on.

Bigscreen Beyond has since rectified this issue with an optional headstrap with on-board audio. And making it optional is fine; the people who want it can get it, and those that want to use their own aren’t stuck with it.

Shiftall tells me it’s also planning to build an optional headstrap with on-board audio, but it won’t be available (or probably even announced) before the headset starts shipping early next year. I understand that making and launching hardware is extremely difficult, but it’s a real shame to not have an audio headstrap available at launch.

Another issue I saw during my time with the headset is some pupil-swim in the lenses. That means when your eyes move in smooth pursuit (as opposed to saccading) across the lens, the scene seems to warp in an uncomfortable way.

This is typically an issue with poor lens calibration, and it isn’t uncommon with prototype headsets which aren’t being made with final tooling or calibration processes.

While there’s no reason to think the company can’t dial in its lens calibration before launch, getting it right is very important. So it’s something I’ll definitely want to get another look at closer to the headset’s release.

Assuming Shiftall manages to improve the pupil-swim—as it says it expects to—the company is on track to deliver a pretty impressive headset. The only major issues are that of cost and the lack of on-board audio. Those two factors ensure that the MeganeX Superlight will remain a niche headset. But if the company can find a clutch of users that want what it’s offering, it will have further proven out the existence of a hardcore PC VR crowd that’s willing to spend big to maximize their VR experience.

Canon Announces Pricing & November Release for New Spatial Video Lens

October 30, 2024 From roadtovr

Canon today announced a more affordable lens option designed for social media creators and videographers interested in VR and 3D content creation.

Back in June, Canon announced its RF-S3.9mm F3.5 STM Dual Fisheye lens, which was designed to allow its line of cameras to take spatial video and photos—priced at $1,099.00.

Now the company is widening its line of dual lens optics with an even more affordable VR lens system with the introduction of RF-S7.8mm F4 STM DUAL lens, which is going on sale this November for $449.99.

As the name suggests, the lens offers a 7.8mm focal length, as well as a 60-degree angle of view. Like the previously released Dual Fisheye lens, the new lens is also compatible with Canon’s latest cameras that support RF mounts, which includes EOS R, R5, R6, RP, and the R7.

While admittedly offering a lower field-of-view (FOV) than the 144-degree FOV of its bigger brother, it’s also less than half the price.

Previewed at Apple’s 2024 WWDC, Canon intends to use the new lens to meet the growing demand for accessible spatial video creation.

Notably, the new RF-S7.8mm F4 STM DUAL lens is said to operate like a traditional 2D RF lens, enabling easy setup for newcomers, and allowing anyone with its latest RF mount cameras to create immersive content for headsets like Apple Vision Pro and Meta Quest 3.

According to Hiroto Kato, Canon’s vice president of Imaging Products & Solutions, the RF-S7.8mm F4 STM DUAL lens is “an exciting step” in making 3D content creation accessible.

“With the RF-S7.8mm F4 STM DUAL lens, Canon is not only providing a new visual tool but also enhancing the way creators communicate using emerging VR, spatial and 3D technologies,” said Kato says. “This lens allows users to capture immersive content, bridging the gap between traditional content creation and the latest in VR and Spatial imagery. It’s an exciting step forward in making high-quality 3D content more approachable for everyone.”

The new dual lens is scheduled for release in November 2024, priced at $449.99. Check out the specs below:

Specification	Detail
Focal Length	7.8mm
Maximum and Minimum Aperture	f/4.0 – f/16 (1/3 stops, 1/2 stops)
Lens Mount Type	Canon RF Mount; Plastic Mount
Interpupillary Distance / Baseline Length	11.8mm
Minimum Focusing Distance	0.49 ft. (5.9 in.) / 0.15 m
Maximum Magnification	0.07x
Angle of View (Diagonal)	63° 00′
Lens Construction (each lens)	9 elements in 7 groups
Special Elements (each lens)	Two UD lens elements
Lens Coating	Super Spectra Coating
Filter Size Diameter	58mm screw-type filter
Rear Mounted Gelatin Filter Holder	Not Supported
Aperture Blades (each lens)	7
Lens Switches	Left-right focus difference adjustment mode switch
Dust/Water Resistance	Not Provided
Focusing System	Gear type STM focusing
Left/right focus difference adjustment	Provided, user-adjustable using the Control Ring
Dual Pixel CMOS AF	Provided; Horizontal: approx. 30%, Vertical: approx. 46%
Focus Guide – Shooting Mode
Photo Mode	Left lens only supports focus guide
Photo Mode with L/R adjustment switch enabled	Both Left and Right lenses support focus guide
Video Mode	Left lens only supports focus guide
Video Mode with L/R adjustment switch enabled	Both Left and Right lenses support focus guide
Full-time Manual Focusing	Both Left and Right lenses support focus guide
Control Ring	Provided
Optical Image Stabilization	Not Provided
Stabilization with in-body IS (EOS R7)	Not Supported
Dimensions	ø2.7″ x 1.6″ L (ø69.2mm x 41.5mm)
Weight	Approx. 4.6 oz. (131g)
Accessories
Lens Hood	Not Supported
Lens Cap	E-58II (bundled)
Dust Cap	Canon Lens Dust Cap RF (Bundled)
Lens Case	Canon Lens Case LP1014 (sold separately)
Extension Tubes	Not compatible
Close-up Lenses 250D / 500D	Not compatible
Canon RF Extender 1.4x/2x	Not compatible
Canon Gelatin Filter Holder III/IV	Not compatible
Rear Gelatin Filter Holder	Not compatible

Vision Pro Owners Hopeful Apple Event Will Bring News of Unreleased Panoramic Display Feature

October 25, 2024 From roadtovr

Apple announced in June it was planning to release a wider, higher-resolution version of Mac Virtual Display for Vision Pro. Now, the company says its holding a bevy of Mac announcements starting Monday, October 28th, which many are hoping includes the still unreleased mode.

“We have an exciting week of announcements ahead, starting on Monday morning. Stay tuned,” Apple marketing executive Greg Joswiak recently revealed on X.

The coming week of announcements seems to be a replacement for its annual Mac event, traditionally held in October, which in the past has seen the release of new iPads and Macs. The event is very likely centered around the reveal of the company’s new slate of Macs featuring various flavors of its M4 chipsets.

The Mac event however may present the ideal opportunity to highlight the promised panoramic Mac Virtual Display feature for Vision Pro, which was planned to release sometime after the debut of visionOS 2.0 in June.

Mac Virtual Display | Image courtesy Apple

At the time, Apple said its new Mac-tethered virtual screens would include an “ultra-wide display that wraps around you,” allowing for resolutions “equivalent to two 4K monitors, side by side.” Thanks to Mac-side dynamic foveated rendering, Apple maintains content will “stay sharp wherever you look.”

Like everyone outside of Apple sphere of influence, we haven’t seen it in action yet beyond the initial WWDC keynote, although on-stage teaser showed a simple UI toggle, letting Mac Virtual Display users choose ‘Normal’, ‘Wide’ and ‘Ultrawide’ modes.

If you’re looking to follow along, you can bet Apple will be livestreaming announcements on its website, and also very likely on its YouTube channel too. There’s no word yet on when to tune in, so check back soon.

Typically, Apple events start at 10 AM PT. You can click here to find your local time, although we’ll be updating this article once we know more.

Cisco Boosts Vision Pro Meetings with New ‘Webex’ Spatial Video Streaming Update

October 24, 2024 From roadtovr

Cisco updated its Webex networking app to include even more immersive support for meetings on Vision Pro, which now marries the app with its spatial video streaming hardware.

Cisco released Webex on Vision Pro back in February, allowing for mostly everything you’d expect from a Vision Pro version of the cross-platform video chatting app, letting users meet via Webex using their Persona avatars, and do things like place 2D chat windows around their mixed reality environment.

Now the company has gone one step further with the release of Cisco Spatial Meetings for Vision Pro, which now lets users stream stereoscopic video with the help of Cisco’s Room Bar Pro. Essentially, it spatializes non-flatscreen participants for the benefit of Vision Pro users.

Cisco’s new Webex spatial meeting update holds implications beyond the comparatively more simplistic face-to-face chats, including things like product demos, remote training, education—essentially anything enhanced by the added depth perception of viewing objects and environments in three dimensions.

“Think of all the use cases for companies in industries like manufacturing, retail, and healthcare. I believe that this combination of Cisco Spatial Meetings and Apple Vision Pro will drive unprecedented levels of creativity, productivity, and innovation,” says Jeetu Patel, Cisco’s Executive Vice President and Chief Product Officer.

Additionally, Cisco updated Webex for Vision Pro to include its AI Assistant, letting users improve productivity with AI-enhanced capabilities to catch up on meetings, get summaries, writing assistance, and more.

Bringing more immersive support for Vision Pro users is another step in the company’s ‘Distance Zero’ initiative, which the Cisco launched last year in effort to shorten the distance between users by using video and AI to make meetings more immersive.

Apple May Halt Vision Pro Production by Year-End Amid Report of Sharply Reduced Output

October 23, 2024 From roadtovr

Apple appears to be scaling back production of Vision Pro, and may even halt manufacturing entirely by the end of the year, The Information reports.

According to the report, Apple started reducing production this summer, with supply chain sources maintaining that the company has built up enough inventory to meet projected demand for the foreseeable future.

Apple hasn’t released overall sales figures for Vision Pro, which launched first in the US in February 2024 before coming to a select number of countries. Independent research firm Counterpoint Research however maintains the company has sold 370,000 units to date and is projected to sell 420,000 by the year’s end, as per The Information report.

Conversely, part suppliers are said to have produced enough components for around 600,000 headsets, with Vision Pro assembler Luxshare halving daily production to 1,000 units.

Hideo Kojima wearing Apple Vision Pro | generative extend based on an image courtesy Hideo Kojima

Owing to its eye-watering $3,500 price tag, the move to tune down production comes amid comparatively tepid Vision Pro adoption. In contrast, competitor-apparent Meta has handily shipped millions of Quest headsets over the years, and is currently pinning its hopes this Holiday season on its latest Quest 3S mixed reality headset, which starts at $300.

Despite Apple stocking its Vision Pro App Store with millions of iOS apps and some very flashy first-party content, like the recently released short VR film Submerged, such an expensive headset has predictably curtailed third-party developer interest.

Apple CEO Tim Cook however tempered expectations in a recent The Wall Street Journal interview, noting that “[a]t $3,500, it’s not a mass-market product. Right now, it’s an early-adopter product. People who want to have tomorrow’s technology today—that’s who it’s for. Fortunately, there’s enough people who are in that camp that it’s exciting.”

This follows a previous report from The Information maintaining that Apple is planning a cheaper follow-up to Vision Pro, reportedly coming sometime in late 2025 instead of Vision Pro 2, which has been postponed for a later release.

Meta Explains Why It Sees Wide Field-of-View Headsets as a ‘bad tradeoff’

October 22, 2024 From roadtovr

Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth revealed last week a mysterious wide field-of-view (FOV) headset prototyped in the Redmond, Washington-based Reality Labs offices. Bosworth now reveals the research prototype had something close to a 210-degree FOV, however wide FOV displays are a critical tradeoff the company isn’t ready to make.

And if you were hoping this was the wide FOV Quest yet to come, you’ll probably be disappointed. Bosworth revealed in a recent Instagram Q&A the device is actually a mixed reality headset, however he tempered expectations by calling the prototype “very, very, very low resolution,” which notably featured “giant gaps in the display where there was no image at all.”

Bosworth intimated Meta won’t be chasing after such a wide FOV because there are simply too many conflicting tradeoffs.

“I know how much ya’ll love field-of-view and want more. I’m with you. I like it. I get it, I do. The tradeoffs are so bad. The tradeoffs on weight, form factor, compute, thermals… it’s all bad,” Bosworth said in the Q&A.

Enthusiast-grade, wide FOV PC VR headsets like Pimax Crystal Light ($699), Pimax Crystal Super QLED ($1,799), and Somnium VR1 (€1,900/$2,050) don’t need to worry about those things as much, as they rely on dedicated GPUs and typically don’t need to fit into the sort of tight compute and power envelopes as Quest. And as we know, Meta doesn’t produce PC VR-only headsets anymore either.

Bosworth boils it down to price, since producing a significantly larger FOV in a standalone beyond the typical 110-degree horizontal increases the costs of all associated components.

“Field-of-view is one of the most expensive things you can add to a headset. And by definition, and all that cost—that quadratic cost—is going to the least important pixels,” Bosworth said, referring the display’s periphery.

Even so, Meta doesn’t seem ready to revisit higher price points just yet—at least not after retiring Quest Pro, which released only two years ago for an eye-watering $1,500 before being reduced to $1,000 less than a year after launch. In the near-term, the company is pinning its hopes on the most affordable mixed reality standalone yet, Quest 3S.

“It’s a really tough trade to embrace. We care about field-of-view, and that’s why we do this research. We look at different ways to approach it, and attack it, and make it cheaper […] and more affordable, and not make it so expensive,” Bosworth said.

Summing up the subject on wide FOV headsets, Bosworth maintains “there is a practical reason that we end up in the space that we do.”

The prototype was developed by the company’s Display Systems Research (DSR) team led by Doug Lanman, who is also known for his work on varifocal prototypes. In 2020, DSR said its then-latest varifocal prototype, which featured static varifocal displays and folded optics, was “almost ready for primetime.” The team also showed off display prototypes capable of higher display ranges, providing better contrast for more immersive visuals. None of those technologies have made it out of the lab yet.

Instead, Meta appears to be continuing its march to reach the masses with mixed reality, acting as the lower-cost foil to Apple’s $3,500 Vision Pro—an emerging XR competition with battle lines that are still unclear.

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A recent report from The Information maintains Meta may launch a Quest 4 sometime in 2026, which will give us a better idea of how Apple hopes to respond to similar reports of a cheaper follow-up to Vision Pro, reportedly coming sometime in late 2025.

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