MyOpinion

"Do you think VR and AR have a lasting future, or is it a fleeting phenomenon?"

"Hello Marc

Virtual reality existed long before the current wave that started in 2012, and was used for simulation, visualization, design, research, and training. With the advent of low-cost, consumer-oriented VR headsets since 2016, these areas have grown, and I expect virtual reality to remain a fixture in these areas regardless of market developments in the coming years and decades.

The more interesting question you probably were aiming at is whether virtual reality will be able to establish itself in the consumer market in the long term, with so many media, gadgets and digital forms of entertainment vying for our attention.

As I wrote last week, the VR market is currently dominated by Meta. Meta Quest is the leading VR platform where most developers make their money. I believe that as long as these developers remain profitable and Meta stays in virtual reality, virtual reality will continue to exist and grow as a consumer-oriented entertainment and computing platform. But these are ifs.

Meta has made virtual reality relatively successful with aggressive investments and subsidies, distorting expectations and prices at the same time. If Meta took into account the cost of R&D and added a healthy margin, VR headsets like the Meta Quest 3S would easily cost twice as much or more. We don't know how much money Meta spends on the VR division alone, but it's safe to assume it's still a money-losing business. Until that changes and other manufacturers can turn consumer virtual reality into a profitable business, I remain cautious about making long-term predictions.

For now, those who benefit are the developers who make a good profit from VR games (and there are many, rest assured), and of course, we consumers who can get hardware and software at an incredible value ratio. However, we should be aware that Meta is essentially still investing in virtual reality and can also stop that investment with likely devastating consequences for the fledgling computing platform. What is true for virtual reality is even more true for augmented reality, which is much further away from true mass adoption and profitability.

Do I think VR and AR can become mainstream in the long term? Absolutely. But I can't say when that will be. As someone who has been a journalist in the industry for almost ten years and has followed the technological developments, I no longer think in terms of years, but decades. From that perspective, we may still be at the very beginning.

Kind regards,

Tomislav

If you’re one of the few remaining PSVR owners looking to use the original 2016 headset on PlayStation 5, you only have a few more days to request your free PS Camera adapter, as Sony is discontinuing the device later this month.

Sony released its PlayStation Camera Adapter for free in 2020 to help bridge the gap for PSVR users looking for a console upgrade to PS5, which notably didn’t offer full PSVR support out of the box.

The PlayStation 5 HD Camera that launched alongside PS5 can’t track the original PSVR headset or PS Move controllers spatially, requiring the additional adapter.

The number of EVs on the road is growing. Recent figures show the EV market share closing in on ten percent nationally. EV infrastructure — with the help of substantial government investment — is improving to meet the demand. The number of EV charging points in America increased by 29 percent nationwide in 2023. But is that increase happening quickly enough?

The picture becomes a bit murkier, looking at individual states. Different states have different needs for EV charging. An interesting metric for how successful states have been at providing EV infrastructure is to look at their EVs per charging point ratio. The more registered EVs a state has, the more public charging points it needs. And many states — even avowedly EV-friendly ones — may be far from where they need to be with EV charging infrastructure.

The HERE-SBD EV Index for 2024 scores states out of 25 for their EVs per charging point ratio. And it tells a slightly different story than the raw numbers. California, for instance, has by far the most EV charging points of any state. However, California also has the second-worst EVs to charging point score of any state, suggesting far more needs to be done.

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.

The update optimizes the tracking algorithms and improves system stability and performance with new and optimized features. Users can also look forward to a host of new features such as smartphone mirroring, Bluetooth keyboard and mouse support, as well as improved hand and motion tracking.

Let's get this straight up front: The Vive Focus Vision isn't a competitor to the Meta Quest 3, or the recently released Quest 3S. At $999, how could it be? Instead, it's another stab at the high-end VR market for HTC Vive, an audience it's cultivated since the launch of the first Vive headset in 2016. While Meta has leaned more towards cheaper and more mainstream VR headsets over the last decade, HTC Vive has done practically the opposite, aiming for VR gearheads and enterprise customers with PC headsets like the Vive Pro 2 and feature-rich standalone models like the Focus 3.

You can think of the Vive Focus Vision as a cross between the Focus 3 and last year's goggle-like XR Elite. It's a standalone headset with two 16MP color cameras for mixed reality, built-in eye tracking and automatic interpupillary distance (IPD) adjustment. It could also be appealing to PC gamers with its $149 DisplayPort wired streaming kit, which gives you an uncompressed view of high-end VR experiences like Half-Life: Alyx.

As intriguing as its new features are, though, the more I tested the Focus Vision, the more it felt like a missed opportunity for HTC’s Vive VR platform. For one, it's running the same Snapdragon XR2 chip as the Focus 3 and Quest 2. That chip originally debuted in 2020, and it simply seems inexcusable in a high-end headset today. Both the $300 Quest 3S and $500 Quest 3 sport the XR2 Gen 2 processor, which is 2.5 times faster than the original chip and also has up to eight times faster AI processing. For a high-end headset at the tail-end of 2024, I would have expected HTC to at least match the power of far cheaper competitors, or – even better – to include Qualcomm's newer XR2+ Gen 2 chip.

The Focus Vision is also still using older Fresnel lens optics, which are prone to artifacts and light bleeding, instead of the sharper pancake lenses in the Quest 3. At least HTC shoved in 12GB of RAM this time around, compared to the 8GB found on the Focus 3 and Quest 3. And the company still has a resolution advantage over the Quest 3: The Focus Vision delivers 2,448 by 2,448 pixels per eye, compared to Meta's 2,064 by 2,208 pixels per eye. HTC Vive's 120-degree field of view also delivers a greater sense of immersion than the 110-degree FOV in the Quest 3.

With the slick Kia EV6 and the family-loving EV9, one can be forgiven for forgetting that the Kia Niro EV is still around. While the Niro EV is from a different era, it’s still going strong, and a new 2025 version now has some details announced — most importantly, pricing.

The Niro EV had 2,349 sales in the US last quarter, a bit less than half of the EV6’s 5,044 sales, but perhaps it will get a boost from the 2025 model options. Pricing for the Kia Niro EV Wind starts at $39,600, while pricing for the Kia Niro EV Wave starts at $44,600 (MSRP).

The 2025 Kia Niro EV has a 64.8 kWh battery that provides 253 miles of range on a full charge (EPA estimate). “The 2025 Niro EV retains its extensive list of features while adding even more technology. Rear seatbelt pre-tensioners are now standard on both trims, with the Wave trim receiving Blind-Spot Collision Avoidance Assist – Rear with Parallel Exit as an additional Advanced Driver Assistance Systems (ADAS),” Kia writes. Rear seatbelt pre-tensioners? Well, it’s something…. That’s the baseline upgrade for the 2025 model.

The battery blitz in America continues and the newest beneficiary of that is the upcoming Rivian R2.

Rivian just inked a battery supply deal with Korean battery giant LG Energy Solution (LGES) for its next-generation R2 model that's set to launch in the second half of this decade. The Irvine, California-headquartered automaker showcased the R2 electric SUV—which looks like a baby R1S—in March and is now inching closer to bring that model to market.

LGES said on Thursday that it will provide Rivian with its advanced 4695 cylindrical cells for over five years, with a capacity totaling 67 gigawatt-hours. The new cell type has a diameter of 46 millimeters and is 95 mm tall, the battery maker said in a press release. It will feature six times the capacity of the existing 2170 cylindrical cells.

If you've been wanting an electric car but everything seems too expensive, there's some good news on the horizon. A whole lot of EV leases are due to expire in 2026, which should lead to something of a glut, according to data analyzed by JD Power.

We have the revised IRS clean vehicle tax credit to thank. This was revamped under the Inflation Reduction Act, and while tough new battery sourcing rules and a requirement for final assembly in North America have meant many fewer EVs are eligible for the tax credit when bought new, a loophole that considers a leased vehicle to be a commercial sale means any leased EV is eligible for the $7,500 incentive, which can now be subtracted from the price of the EV at the time of sale or leasing.

In 2023, 46 percent of all franchise (i.e. not Tesla, Rivian, Vinfast, or Lucid) EV sales were leases, a trend that JD Power says it has seen through the first three quarters of 2024 as well. Once Tesla is included, about 30 percent of new EV sales this year have been leases. By contrast, fewer gasoline-powered cars are being leased each year since the start of the pandemic.

That means there will probably be a shortage of used ICE vehicles in 2025 and 2026. Used EVs might also be a little scarcer next year, JD Power says. It expects a 2 percent drop in the number of used EVs next year, but a 230 percent increase in 2026 as 215,000 cars end their leases.

JD Power also has some good news about new EV prices—they're getting cheaper. The average price for a new electric compact SUV, once tax credits and manufacturer incentives are included, is $35,900, $12,700 less than the price in 2022 for the same class of vehicle.

"At Survios, we pride ourselves on delivering a world-class gaming experience to our players. To ensure that Alien: Rogue Incursion meets these high standards and delivers the Alien VR experience that fans and players expect, we have made the difficult decision to delay the game's release on meta platforms until early next year. The Playstation VR2 and Steam versions of the game will still be released on December 19, 2024."

Gargoyle Doyle is the latest creation from director Ethan Shaftel (Ajax All Powerful) and won the prize for best VR film at this year's Annecy Animation Festival.

Here's how his L.A.-based studio easyAction describes the story of Gargoyle Doyle.

"Doyle is a grouchy, self-important gargoyle with a chip on his shoulder – quite literally, as he was damaged in a fall during installation above the cathedral’s main entrance. Relegated to a back alcove with other irregular gargoyles, Doyle resents the hand life dealt him, especially the fact that he is stuck two feet from Chet, a decorative metal rain gutter. Chet is the yin to Doyle’s yang, a chatterbox optimist who never shuts up. Ever.

Doyle and Chet watch the world change around them as their alcove falls into disrepair. Hundreds of years later, as bulldozers surround the cathedral for demolition, both must confront who they really are and what their lives add up to."

As Reuters reports, CEO Elon Musk was asked during an earnings call Q&A about when to expect a $25,000 "non-robotaxi regular car model." Musk responded that "the future is autonomous," pointing to the Cybercab that Tesla unveiled last month.

"It should be blindingly obvious" that that's the direction Tesla is taking, Musk added, arguing that "having a regular $25K model is pointless."

In December 2023, however, Musk said Tesla was "obviously...working on a low-cost electric vehicle that’ll be made at very high volume." And when Reuters reported in April that Tesla had canceled plans for a $25,000 EV to focus on its robotaxi, Musk said the article was incorrect.

According to Tesla, "what matters [now] is lowest cost per mile of efficiency." Musk said the Cybercab will be around $25,000 to produce and available to purchase in some capacity, but it won't have a steering wheel, so it wouldn't be like purchasing a Model 3 or Cybertruck today.

However, Tesla plans to start fully autonomous, unsupervised Full Self-Driving in Texas and California next year for its Model 3 and Model Y EVs.