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Comment by bentt | Hacker News Reader

Hacker News should be all over this device. They won't lock it down like the Meta stuff. Go ahead and install BeOS on it.

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I think a hackable Linux PC in a VR headset is very exciting. But the major problem is the screen resolution is not good enough to make it a viable desktop replacement. It'll work great for gaming or media consumption, but reading smallish text will be difficult at best.

If they made a more expensive version with a better display it would potentially be interesting as a portable workstation/laptop alternative. But I don't think the SoC they're using supports displays much larger than this, so they'd have to upgrade that too. When you have such a wide FoV the number of pixels you need to cover it all at high resolution becomes very large.

> a viable desktop replacement.

xerox intentionally replicated what the typical office desk 'experience' looked like to create the 'the desktop'; this approach either isn't possible or just hasn't been explored by someone with a headset on

maybe we just need to think of work differently to be productive in an enviornment where we sacrificed horizontal and vertical fidelity for a third dimension?

3d desktops? workframes?

Given the current direction of technology it seems more likely that the need for highly precise and information dense UIs will be reduced, and we will do most of our work by directing agents through language. Where language is not enough we will use custom visualizations and purpose-built UI controls that contain and directly manipulate only the relevant information for the task at hand, constructed on-the-fly. We may not need highly general UIs based on abstractions and metaphors to the physical world anymore.

it's already taking me a lot of time to 'translate' the architecture diagram in my head to something that i can type for an ai, likely losing fidelity on the way

just let me TRON into the machine and show them all how it's done :D

Why would you want to replace your desktop with this? I keep hearing things like that, but anyone who has tried VR knows that it's just never going to happen. VR's killer app is gaming, and that's it.

Never is a long time.

In the xreal form factor it is pretty viable. It just needs a bit more resolution, and for more immersive gaming a bit more FOV, what it has FOV wise is fine for screen replacement.

Once the resolution is there (which is taking an awful long time), you could have whatever 'monitor' setup you want in a small space.

Personally I wouldn't want to replace my desktop, but replacing my monitor? I'd do it if I could.

You want to stick your monitor in front of your eyes?

It's not in front of your eyes, optically speaking.

Out of curiosity do say this after trying with a recent e.g. Vision Pro or Quest 3 and finding that resolution itself (not inputs, UX, ergonomics, etc) is the limiting factor for work and if so what use case?

I have used most of the major headsets. Vision Pro is close to monitor resolution but not quite there. Quest 3 and Steam Frame are nowhere near that. Vision Pro's ergonomics are bad, as are Quest 3's, but Bigscreen Beyond 2 is much, much better and could be acceptable for laptop replacement I think, especially with the flip-up halo band they are working on. For inputs, passthrough with keyboard and mouse/trackpad would be fine for desktop work, and eye tracking could be used in combination I think, along with tracked controllers for 3D tasks.

Something with the ergonomics of Bigscreen Beyond 2, passthrough and resolution improved beyond Vision Pro, and the hackability of Steam Frame, I think could be pretty attractive as a laptop replacement for some people. Of course we're nowhere near that product yet. But a Steam Frame with a higher resolution screen and a better head mount (and the Arcturus Vision passthrough camera add-on) would be pretty close.

I'm not sure what you mean by monitor resolution but if you mean comparing the screen real estate you have in e.g. 32" flat area in an HMD versus a modern monitor it's both correct and irrelevant. Yes a relatively affordable modern monitor will have way better resolution compared to even the most expensive HMD but ... that's not correct since you can have whatever surface, even multiple layers, you can use as screen real estate. You can also adjust readibility, e.g changing font size, based on distance, have foveated rendering from eye tracking, and lots of other techniques that are impossible with just a normal monitor.

IMHO usable real estate relative to the task (because coding doesn't have the same need as video editing, 3D modeling, etc) is a proper way to compare, not pixel density or anything or the sort that doesn't take what VR can actually offer.

PS: I do spend times in HMDs to work, including Vision Pro, Varjo, Frame, other HMD I can't mention, and in my experience it did already reach point where it is actually "good enough" for most tasks even one where a lot of text (which is typically quite demanding for readibility) is needed, but we don't have the same eyes, workflow, etc. It is though not good enough if you try to reproduce what you already have and compare exactly, but it's also not the point.

Angular resolution, not "screen real estate". It limits information density. Yes, the VR headsets have much higher FoV than a monitor, but it hardly matters for desktop work. Angular resolution is much higher on a monitor. Swiveling your head constantly to look at low-res windows floating all around absolutely sucks compared to having one monitor in front of you with higher information density. Varjo is the exception, and yes I'd say Varjo's resolution is good enough, but Vision Pro is borderline and Quest/Frame are much worse.

No I don't think angular resolution does justice to the comparison either because you are in 6DoF, not in 3DoF. It is a used measure and sure it's better than just resolution but it does not capture the actual situation of the user. Screen real estate means how much screen you can actual use and is resolution independent, meaning if you have a tiny screen but use a huge resolution, you can manipulate a lot of content, vice versa, big screen but low resolution, not a lot of content. Unfortunately I don't know of any metric right now that properly does the comparison which is why I initially asked if you actually tried. Anyway you did and it's just not good enough for you now it seems. I still don't know for which use case but that's fine, hopefully it will reach a sufficient point for you if that's something you find useful.

It's still VR. It's still niche.

There are still many issues that VR hasn't solved (and may never solve).

- You still have to wear a device on your head

- You still (can) get motion sickness and/or headaches

- There is still not a lot of great content around VR

- Many people still prefer the flat screen medium and content

The openness/closeness is only one of the many issues this solves, and it doesn't matter when all of the other above issues exist.

The motion sickness in particular is something that's been mostly solved by using non-stick locomotion, like Gorilla Tag (https://store.steampowered.com/app/1533390/Gorilla_Tag/). Both the 'big name' developers and the various flat-to-VR mod makers still insist on stick locomotion, though, even though that actively makes the experience worse.

That's not a solution, that's a workaroud. Gorilla Tag is still a niche game where you're simulating gorillas.

Most games are human-centric, so until we're able to move around using our legs & feet, stick locomotion is still the preferred way to get around in a human-centric simulated environment.

Funnily, I always found all the anti motion sickness "hacks" (especially teleporting for movement) to be the only things that actually caused motion sickness for me when I started out using VR. "Normal" controller movement was never a problem for me, so it was kind of unexpected that the safe mode was actually harder for me.

I often wonder how common this is. As in, how many people consider motion sickness in VR a problem specifically because they only ever experienced it with these workarounds applied, and then never even found out that actual normal movement (which their brains might be completely used to from years of video games) would have been completely problem free for them.

Same here. It was so weird to see all these VR developers claiming you can't have smooth locomotion when that works so much better for me than disorienting teleports where my brain has to rebuilt my frame of reference from scratch every time.

> - There is still not a lot of great content around VR

I'm sorry but, will there ever be? I've always been on the fence about VR, it looks great for flying/racing/space games, but there has been a lot of time since it seems to have peaked and the only killer app it has is Alyx which came out 6 years ago

VR might be worth it if there's a modern Descent VR and a modern X-wing vs TIE Fighter VR. Hawken was a fun game and I was looking forward to trying it in VR, but the servers are offline. There's a VR mod for Mechwarrior 5, and mech games do seem to be ripe for the VR picking.

What I would really like to see next, though, isn't so much on the content side. Instead of putting everything in the headset and seeing how light it can get, I really want to see a system on a belt, vest, or backpack involved. The HMD can just have hardware for the display, audio, and head & eye tracking. Put a coiled connector down to my shoulders. Put the compute, storage, and batteries on my torso somehow. That's where most of the weight is, and your core will notice it a lot less than your neck.

Overload[0] is the modern version of Descent, made by the creators of Descent. It has standard VR support, but doesn’t work with motion controllers. Flight sticks, keyboard and mouse and other input devices work fine.

[0] https://store.steampowered.com/app/448850/Overload/

Try Underdogs for some fun mech action, “You control giant metal arms using your real-life hand movements to punch, bash, and tear enemies apart. Movement: You move around the arena by grabbing the floor with your hands.”

That’s on Steam and also on the Meta store to run directly on the Quest.

Also, find the Hawken discord where we meet for networked games on a community build of the old Hawken.

Wow. Thanks for the helpful and detailed reply. Once I have my rig set back up I'll look into these.

Every single time I use VR, it is a brilliant experience and then a day later I completely forget about it. The object permanence and product stickiness just isn't there yet. It is like the Apple Vision, I only remember it is a thing when it is brought up by someone else.

The VR world still has not produced a killer app.

I had imagined that remote work would induce a VR desktop work environment (as the killer app), but that hadnt taken off at all (mostly, i think, because it's difficult to type and do keyboard work in VR).

Gaming has not and will not be the killer app for VR imho. It needs to be business/money/work-related for it to actually gain a level of traction like how personal computing gained traction from mainframes.

You forgot to add to the list: If you wear glasses you have to buy special lens inserts.

I did for my Valve Index, which I've used twice and are now sitting in a box. So, if I ever wanted to wear Facebook glasses, I couldn't because they don't sell them in my prescription; not that I ever will.

VR only works when your eyes are not skewed.

Yeah. The primary draw for me is being able to try out VR stuff on Linux (finally).

There are other devices with what seems like unofficial Linux support, but this seems like the only modern VR system with official support for it.

I’m excited. In addition to VR games I’m pretty interested to see how viable it is to do things with the Frame that I’d usually do on a Linux laptop.

I hope the openness of the OS leads to lots of cool 3rd party options. I’d love to see a standalone headset the size of the Bigscreen Beyond 2, and I’d also be much more willing to pay $3000 for a premium VR/AR device that runs Linux than an Apple or Meta device.

If you're good with 1990s era text fidelity, you'll love it. If, on the other hand, you prefer text that's readable enough to not care that it's digital, this will certainly let you down.

Even Apple's Vision Pro is only half-Retina, the same jaggedy text a my 1998 G3 PowerBook. I kid you not, the PPD is identical. And taking off Vision Pro and looking at your iPhone or MBP screen makes you want to smash Vision Pro against the wall. The displays absolutely suck -- and Frame's are even worse.

(If Apple narrowed the FOV down to about 75-80 degrees, they'd get decent text. But 80 degrees isn't deep immersion so we got 100 degrees and terrible text.)

As a hive mind representative, I will be the first to say: I was already waitlisted before I saw it on HN.

It’s the year of the Linux Headset!

> Go ahead and install BeOS on it.

How unexpected! I love this comment.

Now the only problem is I'm not sure if I really have another $1059 worth of playing VR golf and rhythm games in me. Cool hardware though & even cooler software.

Is that confirmed? Arm devices tend to be awkward to install your own OS on in general. E.g. look at Android phones.

I mean Valve definitely are very open-source friendly but I wouldn't just assume.

Steam Machine and Steam Deck are open so I cannot see why this wouldn’t be.

Those are x86. But yeah it does sound like it will be open.

Android phones with unlocked bootloaders are awkward, but doable. It would be somewhat un-Valve-like if they lock the bootloader.

They don't specifically say you can install your own OS but they have similar wording on the Steam Frame page as their other systems:

> Just like any SteamOS device, install your own apps, open a browser, do what you want: It's your PC.

But as gp correctly points out, with ARM there tend to be additional technical challenges for that compared to your normal PC even if Valve does nothing to intentionally lock it down.

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