[paulcole]

If there's not a sub-$2,000 version of this thing in 18 months, it's going to get put in Apple's attic alongside the Newton and G4 cube.

Essentially no consumer is spending $3,500 on a single tech purchase anymore. That price point is just way too high for anything but niche business use and I just don't see Apple being willing to settle for that niche.

[ado__dev]

Unless they can deliver a totally game-changing experience imo. And so far it looks like they have the best VR/AR headset on the market, but will that be enough, remains to be seen.

Like if Apple is able to provide such a good experience, that I don't need multiple monitors for work, I could easily justify that purchase. But it would have to have great battery life, support virtual screens, provide a fast and smooth experience, be super comfortable even after 6-7 hours, etc. I don't think Gen 1 will check all those boxes off, but gen 2-3-4, maybe.

[pitherpather]

> unless .. game-changing

I have been silently dismissive until seeing a c.a. 5 minute ad on YouTube last night. Now I would be interested in at least trying the experience. However, I am wondering if the sales video might be better rendered (or somehow more impressive?) than the VR/AR itself.

[yunwal]

If there’s any company capable of raising the overton window of tech pricing it’s apple. The price of AirPods Max seemed like a joke when it came out, but I see them everywhere.

[paulcole]

Yeah they did do a great job of taking headphones/earbuds from throwaway freebies to $100-$200 must-haves and then pushing that to $500 with the Max. Although the Max certainly isn't a must have for most people.

I just a hard time believing that $3,500 is the price point they have in mind for VR stuff. In my own head, I had decided to insta-buy if it was $2,000 at launch and I wasn't even close.

[steveBK123]

Right, unless it replaces another $2000+ device, it's pretty hard to get mass market adoption at a $2000 price point, let alone 2x above that all-in.

The market for $2000 laptops is decent for example, but this thing for productivity use cases still needs you to own the $2000 laptop to connect to!

Cameras have moved higher end as the market has shrunk, but there still aren't that many of us buying $4000 cameras.

Even inflation adjusted, this is about 3x the intro iPhone price. Mass adoption followed when the price got cut 40% and they worked out subsidy & financing with the carriers so optically the price became 80% lower.

[flappyeagle]

There’s at least 180,000

[paulcole]

Apple sold 200 million iPhones last year.