Apple Vision Pro review The experience is hard to describe, a bit like stinky tofu?

Can you imagine how to cook, how to work, how to live 24 hours while wearing ski goggles?

In fact, with the Vision Pro you can still prepare dishes (including the simpler chopping of vegetables). At the same time, you don't need a smartphone or tablet to see the screen in real space with information such as recipes, and you can even place different timers on different pots.

Figure wsj

Is this the future?

That's probably the future that Apple envisions.

Last June, Apple unveiled its first spatial computing device, the Vision Pro, for the first time at WWDC. In the past six months, there are those who are optimistic and those who are down. Regardless, according to the latest reports, the Vision Pro has sold more than 200,000 units in the pre-sale phase, earning nearly $700 million. And as the official sale of Vision Pro is approaching, we have finally waited for the lifting of the ban on ** reviews. Different from the previous rounds of "cloud hands-on" experience under Apple's strict supervision, this time the reviewer can finally break away from Apple's limited scenarios and explore more experiences, surprises and flaws of Vision Pro in real scenarios.

Figure wsj

WSJ reporter Joanna Stern tried to live in a Vision Pro for 24 hours, and even managed to get herself a dinner in between; Nilay Patel, editor-in-chief of The Verge, praised the Vision Pro as the best headset ever, but also questioned its product logic from the actual experience; We also got to know what CNET and other first-class critics** and bloggers like Daring Fireball think and feel. In particular, it is worth mentioning that this batch of Apple does not seem to invite China to participate in the review - including some of the exaggerated (self)** that boasted about the Vision Pro at the time, which may have something to do with the fact that it was not sold to the Chinese market in the early days.

But what problems does Vision Pro solve, and what problems does it fail to solve? Xiao Lei's feeling after reading many reviews is: it is exciting and frustrating, which is a bit like stinky tofu ......

After Apple released Vision Pro last year, Leitech (ID: Leitech) pointed out the four major problems faced by Vision Pro: wearing comfort, external power supply design, VST (** see-through) effect and mixed reality application ecology. At that time, we could only judge by combining the information displayed by Apple and the first batch of hands-on experiences of foreign media, but now with the lifting of the ban on evaluations, more actual product information and experience about Vision Pro have flowed out in large quantities, and it is time to take a fresh look at these four aspects.

1. Wearing comfort: too heavy!

Figure The Verge

The Vision Pro weighs more than 600g alone, which is close to an iPad Pro, although Apple has made a lot of wearing designs, and the headband also uses elastic woven material, all of which are making the wearing experience a little better. But there is no way for Apple to change the principles of physics and biology, the pressure is still the pressure, most of the ** and bloggers are also commenting on it:

Vision Pro is really heavy.

Heavy, it is impossible to be comfortable, this is common sense.

In addition to the headband shown in the promotion, Apple has also added a more modest double-ring headband this time, which can be removed and replaced magnetically, although it will destroy the hairstyle, but it can also bring stronger comfort than the single-ring headband, you can also understand it as a compromise from Apple, for the sake of comfort compromise.

2. The battery life is not generally poor, and it needs to be charged frequently?

Vision Pro external power supply, picture youtube@marques BrownleeAccording to top YouTube blogger Marques Brownlee, the battery capacity of the Vision Pro external power supply is only 3316mAh, isn't it incredibly low? Especially when you see the size of the external power supply, I'm afraid it's even more emotional about what Apple uses Goblin Technology (inferior).

However, some netizens mentioned that the voltage of Vision Pro is different, and the power supply energy should be measured in Wh instead of Mah, which still needs to be verified.

But in any case, the Vision Pro's poor battery life is an indisputable fact. In the course of a full day's experience, WSJ reporters basically have to charge it once in 2-3 hours, which is barely the length of a movie. Apple's official website does write: support up to 2 hours of daily use, up to 25 hours***

However, considering the bulkiness and uncomfortable wearing of the Vision Pro, it seems reasonable to charge it once in 2 hours: who can wear it for two hours without taking it off? The battery tube is enough for the head to rest.

3. vst **Perspective: There are still many bugs.

Figure wsj

As early as last year, the Vision Pro demonstrated the effect of VST ** perspective when people don't move their heads, but its performance in moving, low-light, and other scenarios has not been understood. The essence of VST is to simulate the augmented reality (AR) experience by taking pictures of the real space outside through the camera, which is computationally processed to allow the user to see the real space directly on the internal display.

As it turns out, the Vision Pro's camera is still inferior to the human eye, even though you can already see the phone screen roughly while wearing the Vision ProHowever, reviews such as WSJ and Verge have all mentioned issues such as motion blur in low light and difficulty in reading small print. Of course, the current OST optical perspective solution will also have problems such as light occlusion, and the perspective effect of Vision Pro has been completely comparable to some OST glasses.

Here are two concepts to explain: OST (Optical See-through), Microsoft HoloLens, Magic Leap, and Rokid take this technical route; VST (Video See-Through **Perspective), Vision Pro adopts.

4. There is a little bit of ecology, but YouTube, Netflix, etc. do not support it.

Zoom's version of VisionOS, Figure Zoom

The good news is that Apple still has a group of developers to support it, including Zoom, Disney+, etc., have announced that they will be the first to launch the App Store for VisionOS, and many developers are also developing, testing, and refining the VisionOS version. The bad news is that industry giants, including YouTube and Netflix, not only don't have any plans to develop a VisionOS version, but they don't even plan to simply migrate based on the iPadOS version.

However, it is still difficult to judge the ecological direction of Vision Pro, after all, more developers are still in the wait-and-see stage, and when the WWDC is held in June this year, Apple will definitely make more and bigger moves. Until then, let's let the bullets fly for a while.

In addition to the above four aspects, the interaction of Vision Pro is also worth mentioning.

5. Interaction is difficult: "Void Point Poke" reminds me of Luo Yonghao's TNT.

In terms of interaction, Apple has adopted an interactive design based on eye tracking + gesture recognition on the Vision Pro, which has been evaluated by the editor-in-chief of Verge as surpassing any kind of mass market. However, most reviewers ran into a problem, as a computing device focused on office scenarios, the Vision Pro needs to rely on finger pokes and voice input text.

Figure wsj

The experience of void dot poking is very poor, which I know deeply with my existing AR glasses, and the voice input scene is more restrictive. Back then, everyone was very interested in Quiet! Don't be so noisy that you use TNT to ridicule, to a certain extent, because in many scenarios such as office, there are fundamental problems with this way of voice.

On another note, Vision Pro's current Personas (Personal 3D Avatar) are so bad that the WSJ reporter even had a displacement of her Persona around her neck after a series of facial scans. Fortunately, these issues can be improved through subsequent system updates.

Joanna Stern Personas' neck, Fig. WSJ

What is Vision Pro?

The product idea of Vision Pro is not new, it is nothing more than the premise that the technology cannot achieve real glasses-like AR, choosing the hardware form of head-mounted VR, and then realizing the AR experience through VST ** perspective.

The rare thing about Vision Pro is that in such a product form, it can really make users mistakenly think that it is the real space that can display the recipes, timers, applications and other screens out of thin air, instead of these pictures displayed on two screens close to the eyes.

As the editor-in-chief of Verge said, the Vision Pro is the best headset ever . However, many reviewers dismiss such fallacies.

But what is the value of Vision Pro to users?

When Steve Jobs released the first-generation iPhone in 2007, he likened the iPhone to an iPod, mobile phone, and Internet three-in-one device to give consumers a clearer idea of the value of the iPhone.

What is the iPhone, Figure Apple.

From the perspective of the average consumer, the starting price of the original iPhone was $499, the iPod Video (2005) alone was priced at more than $300, the Nokia N95 released in the same year as the iPhone was 550 euros (about $730), and the Palm's price-performance PDA (personal digital assistant) was also $99.

What would Vision Pro be if Jobs were to follow Jobs' lead in 17 years?

A personal theater? Compared to a regular home theater, the Vision Pro 2The price of $50,000 is not high, but the audio-visual experience of Vision Pro is far from that of high-definition surround screen large screen + Dolby surround sound and other theater configurations, and it is not even as good as an 85-inch + large TV, at most it can only be regarded as a "private small theater".

The bigger problem is that the Vision Pro is always just a personal device, and it's hard to even share what we've seen and heard with the people around us, which is completely different from showing the screen of your phone.

Figure Apple. The biggest compromise is that using the Vision Pro is an extremely lonely experience, even with the eerie ghost eyes on the front of it. You're alone in it, experiencing a world that no one else can share. Verge's editor-in-chief also touches on the fundamental issue of being acceptable for traditional VR headsets, which have largely transformed into dedicated consoles over the past decade, but as a major computing tool, this isolation is particularly abrupt. 」

Just like Cook's criticism of virtual reality (VR): virtual reality separates us from each other. Isn't Vision Pro?

Vision Pro or a Face computer?

Indeed, in terms of computing performance, the Vision Pro is equipped with two desktop-level computing chips, which can handle almost all of our tasks on PCs and smartphones, replacing the work of laptops to a certain extent (some people). However, the problem is also the interaction, the optimization of the process, and the expansion of the ecosystem. Theoretically, the development and maturity of AI large models can help Vision Pro overcome problems such as interaction, but there is still a long way to go.

In addition to the above, what else could a Vision Pro be? This is a vital part for both Apple and consumers. At the moment, I'm afraid Apple itself is not clear, as Chen Yibin, the former deputy editor-in-chief of Aifaner and a senior science and technology person, said: Vision Pro will take a while to find its own positioning like Apple Watch, "It may be more difficult than Apple Watch".

Will Vision Pro replace iPhones? No. As long as it is with a fully immersive experience it will not replace the mobile phone. I contribute a logic, that is, from the perspective of the amount of information, the form of mobile phones is rich and portable enough, and it is difficult for other devices to achieve such a high amount of information and so portable; My friend contributed another logic, from human evolution to making tools, we have always used our hands, which is an instinctive impulse that exists at the genetic level of human beings.

Will Vision Pro replicate the pomp and circumstance of the original iPhone? No. The Vision Pro will be a bit like the Apple Watch, both of which were released without a complete definition of their positioning. The Apple Watch has gone through a luxury positioning, and finally settled on health + sports.

The Vision Pro may be a little more difficult to find a position than the Apple Watch, because the Apple Watch can at least benchmark against past luxury watches and sports watches. However, Vision Pro currently has no benchmark, at least in the past civilian consumer electronics market has not yet formed a category.

The current Vision Pro is more like replacing the monitor from the demo, and in terms of interaction logic, despite the help of gestures, in the serious office scene, it is inevitable that a mouse and keyboard will appear in the demo**.

I believe that Apple is also working hard to create a scene for Vision Pro, and has recently shown unprecedented seriousness in the field of gaming, such as the release of the Gaming Porting Toolkit and so on - you know how many years OpenGL has been rotten - this series of actions is likely to serve the future of Vision Pro.

Logically, it is also smooth, with the device that enters the virtual world, open the virtual world.

I think that compared to whether the **Vision Pro can be implemented, it is better to see what basic innovations and attempts Apple has made in building the Vision Pro ecosystem. As mentioned earlier, there are 12 cameras on the Vision Pro, which is more than on a new energy vehicle, and there are not many companies that have the ability to handle multi-camera information flow technology at the same time.