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Can anyone recommend what the best VR headset is if all I want is the appearance of some giant monitor floating in front of me? I don't think I need any kind of specialized controllers or head tracking or anything like that.

I'd just like to be able to pretend I have my monitor with me when I'm on a plane or space constrained in some way, and I'm happy enough to use keyboard and mouse without seeing them as my input options.

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To be honest I don't think the best option for this is a VR headset, it's a pair of VR glasses. I use the Viture One glasses on airplanes, and the best part is they mostly just look normal on the face compared to something like a AVP or Quest. I think the new xReal One Pro glasses have a better FoV, but probably not enough for me to upgrade at this point. They can do "spatial tracking" where the display stays oriented in the same spot as a floating monitor if you move your head, or "static tracking" where the display is always fully in your FoV regardless of where you move your head. Both options plug in via usb C, and you can use them with anything that can do displayport over usb c (Steam Deck, Macbook, Android Phones, iPhones with an adapter, etc).

Viture: https://www.cnet.com/tech/gaming/viture-pro-xr-review-great-...

xreal: https://us.shop.xreal.com/products/xreal-one-pro

All modern VR headsets are going to have head tracking - even for something as simple as outputting a monitor signal, you need to have it occupy a point in 3D space to avoid motion sickness and to let the user naturally look at it up close, etc.

If you're going for no expense spared, the Apple Vision Pro is probably the best device that does exactly this. The Beyond 2 from this video is also good, but it only works in conjunction with a PC, it's not a computing device. Otherwise, there's the Quest 3.

Let's imagine you aspire to 1080p. AR glasses can more or less provide that as a 4 m screen at 2 m distance, with pov angles similar to a laptop screen. With head tracking, that can be a 1080p portal into a larger workspace. For 1:1 realistic motion, notice how far you have to move your head to point your nose at imaginary laptop screens above or to the side of your real one. Unrealistic motion[1] can reduce that, but I don't know if it's available off-the-shelf.

VR headsets trade pixel density for FOV. An Apple Vision Pro has a PPD similar to AR glasses in the center, but that's ~halved by the time you reach the edge of a 4 m 1080p screen at ~30 deg from center[2]. That blur makes eye motion across the screen less available. Try using a laptop screen while keeping your nose pointed at your focus. Head motion gives you greater apparent resolution by temporal supersampling - someone else will have to weigh in with Vision Pro experience.

Giant floating monitors may have been technically possible in non-glasses non-VR HMDs for a few years now. We're mostly limited by pixels-per-degree, and that by panel resolution, rather than optics. There have repeatedly been 2x or more higher res panels available in the sizes used in HMDs. But the HMD market is VR games, which wants large FOV for immersion, is cost sensitive, has optics limitations, and needs higher frame rates, which with GPU and bandwidth limitations (and eye tracking unavailable), makes resolution a "you couldn't use it anyway". One might put 4k panels in a DIY-ish non-VR box-like HMD... anyone know of existing work? A kickstarter? Not enough programmers on transit willing to wear big crude boxes perhaps.

[1] https://x.com/mncharity/status/1225091755667853318#m [2] https://kguttag.com/2023/08/09/apple-vision-pro-part-5b-more... (but... caveat)

Apple Vision Pro if you use macOS. Wait for Valve's upcoming annoucement otherwise, then compare options from Valve, Pimax, and Bigscreen.

Your options there are basically the Apple Vision Pro (UX designed specifically for that use case but it's awkwardly heavy and unbalanced), or the Quest 3 or Pico 4 (more comfortable and much cheaper, both will be much worse at it from a software perspective since their design effort is mostly as standalone video game consoles).

There's also the Xreal glasses, but those are much less 'virtual monitor fixed in space' and much more just having a screen strapped to your face that's tuned to an acceptable focal depth.

Steam is rumored to be releasing a standlone headset soon as effectively a Quest 3 competitor that can also play non-VR Steam games and presumably works with PC/laptop streaming, but there's no real info available yet.

I use a Quest 3 + Immersed software and code 6+ hours a day like this. One giant 50" monitor + 3 support ones on the sides. Best "monitors" ever. I love that I have no eye strain at the end of the day. It must be a Quest 3, not the 3S - it must have the pancake lenses, the old ones only focus well in the centre.

Do you have an opinion on how close the Quest 3 + Immersed can get to replicating an 8k 54" tv at 36" away? I know the VR panels are ~30 PPD (and there's other issues) and I'm asking for something that's ~60 PPD. But does blowing up the screen 50% work? (Or changing the aspect ratio, keeping the same pixel count and still scaling.)

MacOS just doesn't really play well with non-retina text anymore. I think windows/linux probably has clearer text at lower PPDs.

I can only describe my setup, have never tried an 8k monitor.

I am guessing I have about 40 PPD. I still have a sliver of space on each side where I see part of my support screens (vertical 1080P on each side). It has a 110 degree horizontal FOV.

My main screen is driven by the MacBook Pro's native resolution (3456x2160). Immersed can create 4k virtual screens, but I don't really see an improvement, the Quest's panels are the limiting factor.

Not crisp like retina, but the size makes up for it. In very rare cases I just lean right up to the screens (they are 3 feet from me). As the focal point is somewhere 4-5 feet away, you can have your face right against the screen to see tiny detail.

Also the fast refresh (I have mine set to 120Hz) matters. I tried my work's Vision Pro. Yes, more crisp graphics. But it gave me motion sickness, there is a slight motion blur, the pixels don't seem to refresh fast enough. The Quest is rock solid, never felt unwell using it.

I really don't even notice it is not retina.

I see. So it sounds like you have the MBP set to the non-retina setting then passed to quest via immersed? (ie if you look at the laptop screen IRL everything is very small) But in the headset it functions almost as though it was nearly a 50" 4k TV. So presumably has the macOS text issues but worth it otherwise.

And the mouse latency is fine wirelessly?

(Sorry, I don't love the retina word but I haven't found a substitute since high DPI resolves to so many other things.)

Exactly, tiny text on the main screen (if I un-dim it, Immersed dims it automatically). I am not aware of text issues, I guess I never noticed any. There is a mouse emulation mode that is supposed to be more responsive, and native mouse - I use the native setup and don't notice any lag. Just have a good router and be close to it. Retina is the only word I know :) because it started way back on iOS/iPhone before it was that common. And probably because I use a Mac.

One other thing that is an unexpected bonus. It rains where I live. A lot. And when it is grey and dim, I can sit in a "sunny office". In fact, I even tweak my day to the virtual environments. Sunrise in a mountain lodge in the mornings, sunny office or ski chalet in the afternoons. Very positively mood altering.

What I don’t understand is why don’t all VR devices just add a non-tracking mode for low latency desktop monitor replacement.

They have better optics than xreal and emulating a 1080p on a higher res display will allow less edge blurring allow for a larger virtual monitor

The simple answer is that they don't want to bother supporting that because people don't actually want it. Xreal is king of that product category and designed heavily around 'not looking weird', and still has only a fraction of the lifetime sales of VR headsets.

Removing the tracking doesn't reduce the latency. It does feel extremely uncomfortable and makes people sick, though.

Technically AR not VR, but I recently got a pair of XREAL One AR Glasses, and they work well for your use case.

I tried this with rokid max: it was not usable for me, as it was too blurry. likely reason was my IPD (I think 71). You may read that this device can adjust IPD, but it's a software solution, not hardware. since I had no compatible mobile device (no current enough android version), I could not even test this.

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