No they're just overspec'd and overpriced. If their goal was to ultimately release a consumer level device, they shouldn't have gone overboard with tech that has limited room for cost cutting.
It's typical of Apple's hubris, to throw in all these features they think people will want, meanwhile if the headset had no cameras and was just a display strapped to your head for $1000, it likely would have sold a lot better. But they didn't want a VR device for whatever reason.
At the same time you could blame discretionary spending being at some of the lowest levels in a decade.
I remember when apple got universally panned for putting cameras in laptops. Most people surely wanted the cost savings, while the small number of power users who needed video chat should have no trouble picking up a USB camera for $100 (more like $200 in present-day USD). Of course, what actually happened was that people (and apps!) in the mac world could suddenly assume that everyone else already had a camera set up, even if they weren't technical, and that was the real killer feature. The rest of the industry quietly memory-holed the snide commentary and followed suit.
Volume will drive price down once VR gets Good Enough. Right now it isn't, so I'm glad that Apple is playing to their strengths by taking swings at substantive challenges -- like the fact that VR makes the wearer look like a complete dope -- rather than becoming discount VR vendor #312.
Or when they release a phone with no keyboard, no apps, that couldn't even do 3G speeds. Followed by the iPhone funeral parade held by microsoft. Or when they release a tablet. Everyone was talking about how that was merely a content consumption device and no one would want it at that price point. Later everyone was concerned that Apple would cannibalize its laptop market.
Apple has a history of doing products that seem expensive and weirdly overspecced at the beginning, and then stick with it if they truly believe in it. OTOH, there are also clearly products that Apple killed because they didn't work out. But I believe it's still to early to tell where the Vision line is going.
They got lucky, many of us remeber a Apple that was about to send everyone home for the last time, and that only did not happen due to a set of lucky accidents that turned out great.
Disagree, it needs to be better and different, not worse. Every other Apple product is sleek and fashionable, this is a big goofy VR headset. A VR “screen for your face” device would probably be a little better but only in the sense that it is better to not waste a bunch of money on R&D for a device that is not going to be bought.
For a real attempt, the UI needs to be augmented reality you can wear walking around, and the form factor needs to be a pair of normal glasses. It is certainly possible the tech doesn’t exist yet. But that won’t convince people to buy a silly version.
They need cameras for tracking your position and orientation. Also, tracking your eyes can be beneficial in many ways, i.e. enabling foveated rendering, not just for showing a blurred face on the external screen.
I do not think the price is only issue. Problem with VR headsets is that you need to commit your self to use it.
Personal computing did not reach mainstream until smartphones. Even notebooks were too much of commitment for most people. Maybe AR [0] glasses could go in path of smartphones but VR headsets are polar opposites to smartphones.
[0]: Actual augmented reality that is projected on top of real vision - not recorder reality with camera like in case of this product.
They're smoking something if they think anyone is buying this for 3.5k when it has exactly zero game & app support - discretionary income is going to be spent on things that are fun for deep immersion in a hobby, or else something that can be shared and enjoyed with others.
I'd wager they overstuffed this thing with sensors and high quality tracking to gather good training data, and the next model will be as effective with fewer cheaper sensors.
Isn't it part of the Apple way to release expensive and weird products at times to keep Apple in the minds of people as a luxury brand. Things like $400 wheels for Mac Pro or the $1000 stand for the external display.
I can see AVP as being half luxury and half tech-demo/devkit for a more budget friendly device.
> to keep Apple in the minds of people as a luxury brand. Things like $400 wheels for Mac Pro or the $1000 stand for the external display.
I have never seen anyone look at those two examples and think “luxury”. Even the most ardent proponents of Apple products laugh at those prices and think they are absurd. With good reason. Who ever is going to look at computer wheels and think they’re a sign of luxury¹?
¹ Yes yes, someone surely will, just like there’s someone for everything. I’m making a general point.
Rich tech fetishists. I worked for one for several years and he had every fancy Apple gadget they ever made. On a positive note, I frequently got his castoffs when he got bored with them.
Yeah it really feels like a devkit they sold in hopes someone would come up with the killer app because they hadn't figured it out themselves yet.
It's a shame as it seems like they maxed out the tech specs, but given the state of the art it still ends up being too low resolution for true MacOS productivity replacement, while also being too heavy & tethered to a short lived battery pack.
Maybe a worse-is-better version that is cheaper/lighter will sell more for entertainment uses.
I guess if they just called it a devkit, nobody would have bought it. But, with the specs, price, and the ridiculous form factor, it was a devkit in all but name.
Except there is so little investment in devs and the ecosystem that even as a devkit it falls flat. VR/AR is a teensy niche of simulation enthusiasts and a large group of people who essentially play 30 minutes of beat saber occasionally. That's not exactly a thriving market, and Apple explicitly eschewed that market entirely, because nobody sims on a mac anything, and there are no controllers to play beat saber with.
Where are the grants to devs to buy and develop something good for it? Apple just kind of expected everyone to do that work for free for them. Watching movies on an airplane is not a $3500 use case. Mirroring your desktop to a head mounted display that is too heavy and cumbersome to be a $3500 use case. Putting iPad apps into the air is not a $3500 use case.
Where's the killer app? What even IS a killer app for head mounted displays? They've been around for 30 years now. It has never been an insufficient hardware problem. The original oculus devkits were genuinely terrible, but VR IS a killer app for sim enthusiasts, so they rushed to implement it into everything they could straight away. Euro Truck Simulator was one of the earliest integrations. But that's not an Apple market and never will be.
If someone wants VR/AR to be some stupid ShadowRun heads up display for managing all the info you encounter in the world, that app should be built and iterated on first. How many average people even run an "organize and remember everything" app? What percentage of iPhone users even use the damn calendar?
I’d like Apple Maps to show up in my field of view. In that case I could even not have a phone at all. (But not like $3500 want). I agree that nobody has found a really good use case. I do wonder to what extent that is just because nobody has released an AR headset that you’d wear outside.
But they still look kind of off when wearing them in public (slightly bigger than normal sunglasses, cable from one ear and other people can see the light from the screens from the side or back).
And the lack of integration is a pain - the phone has to be unlocked so is subject to random taps and swipes in my pocket.
However, an Apple-built Carplay-style projection into XReal type glasses could work very well - the question being how would you control it?
Exactly. They need to cut the price in half and focus on entertainment. Thats the only thing I hear friends talk about who still use theirs AVP. Wearing it longer than a movie becomes too strenuous.
My guess, Apple knows this won't become mainstream/usage for 5+ years.
And as such, they need to bring technology from the future 5-years from now, to today ... and as such, that's why it's so expensive.
They aren't expecting people to pay $3,500 for this device when the killer app exists. But it needs to cost that in order for developers to "develop to where the puck is going" in 5-years time.
> People love their electric scooters nowadays, and they’re just worse Segways.
Not sure about that. The scooter is a >200year old design and there is a reason it subsist to this day. Segways are huge and not as easy to store/fold. Onewheeler are more elegant design and much more compact but awkward to operate when powered off in places you aren't allowed to use it and you cannot carry loads as easily. In that sense a scooter offer the speed of the segways/onewheelers, with the convenience of being able to push them easily anywhere with minimum effort while staying foldable, easy to hide away once reaching destination yet they can carry stuff.
I see noone mention the Segway flaw in real world use - if either wheel loses traction for a moment, the device will spin and dump the rider on the ground. They're laughably bad and uncomfortable to ride compared to a regular pushbike, let alone eBikes.
Scooters are a smaller form factor, but bikes should be the real personal transport winner.
"high profile injuries" is a wonderful understatement. The most notable "injury" being the death of the president of the company while riding his Segway [1]
Maybe ... he bought it out in 2009, which was also when Paul Blart: Mall Cop came out, which served as a eulogy for any chances of dignity for the Segway
Segway was in a sense ahead of its time and trying to create a new market segment.
The early problems were it was illegal to use them on sidewalks but also there weren't bike lanes like there are in big cities now.
It was also pretty big & heavy it didn't work for multi-modal like using it for the last mile to/from a train or bus.
So the e-mobility space got won decades later by worse, cheaper products that were smaller & lighter .. being used heavily for food delivery app drivers using them semi-legally in bike lanes. A use case that wasn't imagined in the Segway unveiling.
Not when your VR headset costs as much as a Gucci handbag.
The middle class won't want to join a new untested alternate reality if it's full of working class people, and the working class will always want to go where the middle class is at. The only thing to stop them is the price. That's why it costs the same as a piece of designer clothing. Apple has to lock in a critical mass of affluent adopters first, before they can mass monetize the prestige.
It's typical of Apple's hubris, to throw in all these features they think people will want, meanwhile if the headset had no cameras and was just a display strapped to your head for $1000, it likely would have sold a lot better. But they didn't want a VR device for whatever reason.
At the same time you could blame discretionary spending being at some of the lowest levels in a decade.