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Later on years of seeing promising augmented reality (AR) demos, I experience a bit like the boy who cried wolf each time I come back impressed and convinced the engineering science is near to go mainstream. The skillful news is that it's getting closer. In detail, I saw impressive, consumer-focused demos from two companies with radically dissimilar histories and strategies at this year'southward Augmented World Expo. I got all-encompassing hands-on time with Meta'due south new Virtual Workspace surround, as well as ODG's R8 and R9 untethered, movie theater-course AR wearables. Here'south what I plant.

Two contrasting approaches to vesture AR

Telephone-based AR is getting a lot of attention recently, based on the publicity around Google Tango, Apple's ARKit, and the success of Pokémon Go. Truly immersive AR demands a wearable solution. ODG has been selling untethered glasses that provide augmented experiences for several years now. They're in wide employ across many industries, but have been a little besides impuissant and expensive to attract a broader audience. Now, with its new R8 and R9, ODG is hoping to deliver on its vision of a freeform mobile augmented world.

Meta is taking a nearly opposite grade. Its headset is tethered, and designed to replace your computer monitor with a science-fiction-like virtual workspace for use at your desk. With a beefy enough laptop, it could also piece of work in a hotel room or airdrome. But it certainly isn't trying to be any type of mobile device.

ODG: Personal movie theater, VR, and a sprinkle of AR

ODG is going for both portability and style with its new R8 and R9 wearablesDespite beingness labeled as an AR device, the leadoff demos for the consumer-targeted ODG R8 mimicked those typical of VR devices — immersive experiences and cinematic quality 2D and 3D videos. ODG brings a lot to the party though. First, the R8 is incredibly light at under v ounces, and more comfortable than any VR headset on the market. 2nd, you aren't isolated from the world effectually you. You tin can still run across effectually the video, or even through it depending on how you lot have prepare its effulgence, and your ears aren't covered by its speakers.

Finally, the R8 is completely united nations-tethered, so you lot can use it for a few hours betwixt charges wherever you are. Because it's not isolating or tethered, I could hands run across using it to watch movies on an plane or a train. The 40-caste field of view of its 720p display isn't nearly as wide as a VR headset, only it'due south a lot ameliorate than HoloLens, and it is enough to mimic a big screen Telly a few feet away. Aye, the R8 runs Netflix, and other video services that ODG can get to work with its open-source version of Android.

The R8 has a fish-eye camera that, coupled with its Snapdragon 835 processor, does a reasonably skilful job of tracking your position. Applications can create objects that are stable in your field of view, but this is one area where the R8 is behind the much beefier and more expensive HoloLens. The R8 besides features a pair of 1080p cameras so the user can record 3D video. That sounds pretty cool, but I wonder whether the increased cost of calculation them is worth it for nearly users.

The R9 loses the stereo cameras. Just that model has a fifty-degree field of view, 1080p displays, and a special I/O port for additional sensors or other accessories.

You tin command the R8 and R9 on the headset itself — having used the controls on Google Glass and Gear VR, I suspect it volition piece of work, but feel pretty bad-mannered — or from a smartphone or Bluetooth-continued controller. ODG is planning to ship both models this year, with the R8 expected to cost almost $one,000 and the R9 about $1,800.

Meta finally begins to deliver on its vision

Meta's wearable is much less isolating than a full VR headset but still fairly heftyWhen I finally got to demo a Meta 2 final calendar month I was really disappointed. What I experienced was nothing like the gee-whiz version that CEO Meron Gribetz showed on phase. The company promised to fix that at AWE, though, and they did. Here, I was transported into a futuristic globe where I could create virtual monitors at volition, pull videos off my phone and stick them to my virtual walls, and grab 3D models from a shelf to manipulate them using simple gestures. All of this was happening on the xc-degree-field-of-view, 2560 x 1440 resolution Meta two AR headset.

One overnice touch is that Meta has integrated the use of a physical mouse with the virtual environment, so you don't have to mimic an orchestra usher to get work done. The stop result is that, for 15 minutes at least, I could imagine myself working in that surroundings instead of at my traditional multi-monitor desktop setup. More importantly, I can envision setting up an external GPU on my laptop on the road and having my unabridged office appear in front end of me at volition.

The promise of the Meta Workspace is clear. Whether the $949 Meta 2 volition deliver on it when it ships subsequently this year remains to be seen. A fifteen-minute demo is i thing; a device you lot non only can alive with, but choose to employ day-in and day-out, is another.

Comparing ODG'southward R8, R9, and Meta two with Microsoft's HoloLens

Microsoft's HoloLensFor me, both ODG'due south and Meta's newest offerings place them far alee of Microsoft's HoloLens as products. The tragically small field of view of the HoloLens, coupled with its savage $3K price point, make it a non-starter — except for deep-pocketed developers betting on Microsoft's even deeper pockets to spur innovation and deliver a side by side-generation version that addresses both of those issues.

Picking between ODG's R8 and the similarly priced Meta is an apples-to-oranges comparing. I could hands meet using an R8 to scout movies on airplanes, and run some express (for now at least) AR applications. Potentially, the R8 would as well be a good solution for flying my drones, but that would depend on how the command integration works. The R8 is super-absurd, but you demand to accept an actress $1K to spend for something that certainly isn't essential.

Likewise, I am tempted to believe that Meta's Workspace actually is (or at least is condign) an alternate work surround to my monitors. Because it's tethered, and doesn't have the aforementioned third-party back up as many of its competitors, its success will almost entirely depend on whether it can deliver that vision all the fourth dimension, and not simply for 15-minute demos.

I look forrard to doing some extended field tests of both devices when they ship later this year, and reporting back on how they evangelize on their potential.

Now read: The best VR headsets and accessories