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Microsoft Announces HoloLens 2 Mixed Reality Headset For $3,500 (theverge.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the new-and-improved dept.

Artem S. Tashkinov writes: Hailed as a third wave of computing, Microsoft has made the HoloLens 2 mixed-reality headset available for preorder for a staggering $3,500 and it's expected to be shipped later this year. It will be sold only to enterprise customers. Compared to the first generation HoloLens, the second version is better in almost every important way: it's more comfortable to wear, it offers a much wider field of view, it contains powerful recognition software that can detect real world physical objects and allow you to seamlessly interact with them using hand and finger gestures. It features new components like the Azure Kinect sensor, SnapDragon 850 SoC, eye-tracking sensors, an entirely different display system with 2K resolution for each eye, a couple of speakers, and an 8-megapixel front-facing camera for video conferencing. It's also capable of full 6 degrees of tracking, and it also uses USB-C to charge.

19 of 60 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Just saying by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    "Just saying," allows you to blurt out any idiotic comment without relevancy to get a cheap laugh.

  2. V1 by itamblyn · · Score: 2

    I was also very much impressed with V1. I had the same feeling I had when I tried out the capacitive touch screen on the original iPhone for the first time "...WOW". Hololense V1 really is incredible. The only problems with it (field of view and poor hand recognition) are the type of thing that sound like they can be improved upon in new iterations. Hololense is one of the big advancements in tech in the past few years IMO.

  3. Re:Just saying by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    you could build out an enclosure with 7,1 sound and about 5 to 7 50+ inch 4k UHD televisions for this price... Maybe even a seat with a built in subwoofer.

    AR... not VR. So you're close if you can fit all that into a motorcycle helmet, good luck.

  4. Free gift by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

    I heard the first 100k come with a free AR-15.

  5. VR and AR are still in infancy by SmaryJerry · · Score: 1

    They are so poor compared to what they could be with better screens and more powerful computers. They would still be good enough to take off if they also weren't insanely expensive. Main stream VR and AR is still 10 years away due to cost/quality combination.

    1. Re:VR and AR are still in infancy by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      They would still be good enough to take off if they also weren't insanely expensive

      Haha, for those of us old enough to remember the first laptops costing $8k 25 years ago $3.5K in 2019 doesn't seem that insane.
      Jesus, give it another year or two and with Apple's new innovations in pricing technology a top of the line iPhone will probably cost $3.5k.

    2. Re:VR and AR are still in infancy by godrik · · Score: 1

      Main stream VR and AR is still 10 years away due to cost/quality combination.

      VR is already a (small) market in video games.

      AR is still not quite there. But that's why they target at particular industries at this point.

    3. Re:VR and AR are still in infancy by crgrace · · Score: 2

      You must be young. Computing technology hasn't always been cheap and ubiquitous.

      My Dad was an immigrant and a hardworking construction supervisor in California. My mom stayed home (this was the 80s remember) and we had a modest but happy life. Dad could see the writing on the wall and bought me and my brother a Mac SE so we could learn computers back in middle school. It was about $4000 in 1988 or $8500 today. Crazy money, especially for a construction worker. But I learned how to code in Turbo Pascal, spent high school writing games as much as playing them, then breezed through undergrad, got through graduate school (with a lot of pain and suffering) and now I have an amazing job and am solidly in the upper-middle class. My brother didn't go into technology but he's a lawyer also doing quite well.

      Thanks Dad. I owe you everything. That Mac was our ticket to the American Dream.

  6. Getting closer by SuperKendall · · Score: 3, Informative

    They said double the field of view for the new model - I also tried the original and it was a bit too limited. I think 2x might be enough improvement to be decent, really hoping I can try one of these out at some point.

    At the price they are charging they definitely will be more for enterprise or other serious applications, and that's probably a good thing in terms of taking over a niche they can build on. Maybe someday a consumer model...

    --
    "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
    1. Re:Getting closer by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      I'm waiting for the YouTube videos of people trying to lean on furniture that isn't really their and putting their heads through the TV. Like with VR but even more dangerous because the whole point is for it to interact with the real world.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    2. Re:Getting closer by SuperKendall · · Score: 1

      putting their heads through the TV.

      The fake furniture thing would be funny but I don't think a Hololens could really do a very realistic job of erasing something that was actually there... at the very least it would be a pretty bad design to try.

      The thing I liked about the Hololens (and pretty much any AR system) is that you could see so well was was really around you so you could use it in a real living room or other space with mixed objects. It made me realize an important aspect of any AR system really is that it knows what is around so it doesn't obscure anything too badly, or at most skins it to look like something else.

      --
      "There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
    3. Re:Getting closer by dpidcoe · · Score: 1

      The fake furniture thing would be funny but I don't think a Hololens could really do a very realistic job of erasing something that was actually there... at the very least it would be a pretty bad design to try.

      Ever seen a little kid try to interact with a non-touchscreen laptop and conclude that it's broken because the screen isn't responding as they smear their fingers all over it?

      Hololens wouldn't have to erase the TV, just get the user used to interacting with screens that aren't physically present. Then one day a real screen gets mistaken for a fake one and bam!

  7. Re:1 toy or food for 8 months by gravewax · · Score: 1

    So which enterprises do you think make a decision on food for 8 months or a toy? I suspect what you think of an enterprise is something the rest of the world doesn't

  8. Re:Yes, but by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    >Does it run Linux?
    Yes, but Linux doesn't run AR.

  9. strange claims by Cederic · · Score: 2

    can detect real world physical objects and allow you to seamlessly interact with them using hand and finger gestures

    Well, yes. The Mk1 Eyeball supports that too. It's called "picking things up".

  10. Re:Excited to try one out! by smallfries · · Score: 2

    No wireless. Less space than a Nomad. Lame

    --
    Slashdot: where don knuth is an idiot because he cant grasp the awesome power of php
  11. Re:Microsoft demos by pjt33 · · Score: 2

    Ssssh! We won't be able to persuade our boss to buy any if he thinks that...

  12. VR vs AR by sjbe · · Score: 3, Insightful

    VR is already a (small) market in video games.

    Yes it is. Also a small market for various simulators. Unfortunately VR is likely to remain a comparatively small market. It's very useful for a few niche applications but broader use cases for the technology are generally lacking and likely to remain so. That's not to bash the technology (I used to work in the industry so I'm a fan) but just to temper expectations. Some people have been expecting VR to be the Next Big Thing for the last 30+ years and the reality of it seldom is quite what people expect and the practical use cases have remained few.

    AR is still not quite there. But that's why they target at particular industries at this point.

    AR has FAR broader potential applications and you are right that it still has a ways to go. That said, AR is already in your hands via your smartphone. I use astronomy apps that help identify stars by putting labeled information on the screen about whatever I'm pointing the phone at. I've used measurement overlay and heads up display apps and there are games that interact with the real world. Google translate has AR features that replace text in one language with text in another in real time. It's a lot easier to envision AR applications as enhancements to existing technology than VR applications which will necessarily be new.

  13. made for Robert Kraft by Locutus · · Score: 1

    He can afford it, claim the business expense and well, use it for porn after hours. That is, when not in a room full of executives wearing them while jumping up/down and waving their arms around as everyone tries flipping the pages on the virtual MS PowerPoint presentation demo. During intermission, when they stop for a bit, then Microsoft can get some footage and use it for marketing to sucker^H^H^H^H^H^Hexcutives at other corporations.

    LoB

    --
    "Anyone who stands out in the middle of a road looks like roadkill to me." --Linus