Apple Vision Pro

Apple Vision Pro First Test

After a nearly 30-minute demo through the main features that are still ready to be tested, I believe that Apple has delivered nothing less than a real thrill in the capability and execution of its new, XR – or mixed reality.

To be very clear, I'm not saying it delivers on all the promises it makes, it's a truly new paradigm in computing, or any other high-powered claim Apple hopes to deliver once it ships. I need a lot more time with the device than a guided demo.

But, I've used every major VR headset and AR device from 2013's OCKULUS DK1 through the latest generations of quest and vive headsets. I have tried all the experiences and stabs I can get when it comes to XR. As hardware and software developers of those devices and their marquee apps, I'm amazed that they continue to be stuck in the “killer app conundrum” — trying to find one that gets real buy-in with the wider ones.

There are few real social, narrative or gaming successes like VRCHAT or Cosmonius. I was also moved by the first-person experiences Sundance filmmakers made highlighting the human (or animal) condition.

But none of them have that, with over 5000 patents filed in the last few years and enormous talent and capital to work with. Every bit of this thing shows an APPLE level of ambition. I don't know if this is going to be the 'next mode of computing' but you can see the conviction behind every choice made here. No corners were cut. Full-tilt engineering on display.

The hardware is good - very good - with 24 million pixels on both panels, orders of magnitude higher than most consumer-facing headsets. The optics are better, the headband is comfortable and quick to adjust, and there's a top strap to keep the weight down.

Apple says it's still working on which light seal (cloth shroud) options to ship with when it's officially released, but I'm comfortable with the default. They aim to ship them in different sizes and shapes to suit different faces. The power connector has a great compact design and interconnects using internal pin-type power linkages with an external twist lock.

There is also a magnetic solution for some (but not all) optical adjustments needed by people with vision differences. The onboarding experience includes automatic eye-relief calibration that matches the lenses to the center of your eyes. No manual wheel adjustment here. , the main frame and glass piece look good, although it's worth saying that they're size-wise. Not huge, but definitely there.

If you've had experience with VR, you know that the two biggest hurdles many people face are latency-driven nausea or the isolation that wearing your eyes can provide for long sessions.

Apple has cut both of those. The R1 chip that accompanies the M2 chip has a polling rate of 12 ms systemwide, and I didn't notice any judder or framedrops. A slight motion blur effect was used in the passthrough mode but it was not distracting. Windows looked crisp and moved fast.

Actually, APPLE was able to reduce those problems due to completely new and original hardware. Everywhere you look here is a new idea, a new technology or a new implementation. All that newness comes at a price: $35000 hits expectations and places the device firmly in the power user category for early adopters.,There were some truly surprising moments from my short time with the headset. Aside from the display's sharpness and the interface's snappy responsiveness, the entire suite of models boasts attention to detail.

The Personas Play. I highly doubt Apple can pull off a workable digital avatar by scanning your face using a Vision Pro headset. Suspicion was crushed. If you measure the digital version of yourself that you create as your avatar in FACE TIME calls and elsewhere, it has toes on the other side of the uncanny valley. It's not entirely perfect, but they have skin tension and muscles working perfectly, the expressions you make are used to interpolate a full range of facial contortions using machine learning models, and brief interactions I had with a live person on a call. (And it was live, I checked by asking off-script stuff) didn't feel creepy or odd. It worked.

Actually 3D movies are good in this. Jim Cameron probably had a moment when he saw “Avatar: Way of Water” on the Apple Vision Pro. This thing was definitely born to make the 3D format sing - and it can display them very quickly, so there's a nice library of shot-on-3D movies that will give them all new life. The 3D photos and videos you can take directly with the APPLE VISION PRO also look great, but I haven't been able to test the capture myself so I don't know what it's like. Embarrassing? Hard to say.

The setup is smooth and simple. A few minutes and you're good to go. A lot of apples.

Yes, it's great. The output of the interface and the various apps are so good that Apple used them directly from the device in its keynote. The interface is bright and bold and responsive to the way it interacts with other windows, shadows on the floor, and lighting conditions.

Overall, I'm hesitant to make sweeping claims about whether Apple's Vision Pro is going to live up to Apple's claims of pioneering spatial computing. I've had very little time with it and it's not finished either - APPLE is working on things like Light Shroud and certainly many other software aspects.