Xreal, formerly Nreal, hosted one of the busiest booths at CES in recent years, so it's no surprise that the company is returning with new AR glasses for this year's show, especially considering the long-awaited launch of Vision Pro from Apple. Following the Nreal Light of 2019, the new Xreal Air 2 Ultra finally brings back 6DoF (six degrees of freedom) spatial and hand tracking, along with a wider 52-degree FOV (field of view) and 42 pixels per degree sharpness inside an 80-gram titanium package. The firm even goes so far as to claim that these specs make the $699 Air 2 Ultra a compelling alternative to the $3,499 Vision Pro.
Unlike standalone mixed reality headsets, the Air 2 series of glasses needs to be powered by an external computing unit, such as a smartphone, computer or Xreal Beam module, via USB-C. While the previous Air 2 Pro and Air 2 were positioned more as wearable personal display devices, the Air 2 Ultra emphasizes its 6DoF spatial computing capabilities, meaning virtual objects can be mapped to the real world as you walk.
This is made possible by dual front-facing 3D environmental sensors as well as Qualcomm Snapdragon processors in the Samsung Galaxy S23 or S22, iPhone 15, or any Mac or Windows machine that can run Xreal. Nebula rocket launcher. If you already own an Xreal Beam, you can also connect the Air 2 Ultra for a 3DoF (read: just head tracking) experience with video playback or console gaming. Oddly enough, the company does not plan to support more smartphones for the time being, but is preparing a new custom computing unit to accompany the Air 2 Ultra at some point.
Like the Pro, the Air 2 Ultra's front layer supports three levels of electrochromic dimming for greater immersion (no need for a physical shield), as well as directional audio technology for greater privacy and dual microphones for voice interaction. You'll find the same Sony micro OLED panels with a resolution of 1080p per eye, a refresh rate of up to 120Hz (90Hz in 3D mode), and brightness of up to 500 nits (250 nits in 3D mode). Xreal added that these glasses can project a virtual 2D screen "to an equivalent of 154 inches from a distance of 13 feet," and what are they "TÜV Rheinland certified for color accuracy, visual comfort, low blue light and flicker-free use."
The $699 Xreal Air 2 Ultra is available for shop.xreal.com/products/xreal-air-2-ultra/”>make an order now, and if you purchased an Nreal Light a while ago, chances are you'll be eligible for a $100 discount. That's still not as aggressive as the Meta Quest 3's $500 base price, but then again, the Air 2 Ultra is primarily aimed at developers for the time being. For one, Xreal's upcoming Unity-based NRSDK 2.2 won't be available until these glasses start shipping in March. Only then will developers be able to take advantage of improved hand tracking, hand gesture recognition, spatial anchors, depth mesh, and more. That is to say, Xreal will need to win over as many developers as possible to build its mixed reality ecosystem, before gaining the attention of consumers, if not businesses; The latter has been the case of HTC, which announced that it was sending virtual reality headsets to the International Space Station in November.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/xreal-air-2-ultra-is-an-affordable-alternative-to-the-apple-vision-pro-apparently-220944571.html?src =rss
