Microsoft HoloLens

[Ilya]

Microsoft HoloLens devices will begin shipping in the first quarter of 2016 to developers in the United States and Canada.

$3,000

 

[Mary Lou Maloney]

Neat idea but most likely will not survive. The big reason very few peeps would afford this. 3000.00 in Canada.

 

[meStevo]

That's not an end-user price. It's akin to buying into v1 of Google Glass. A consumer version is probably years away.

 

[Mary Lou Maloney]

I purchased a device called Exelvan for looking at 3D videos and 360 degree images. The thing that is wrong with this debice is that is designed to be used with different sized iphones. Royal pain to put a 4s Iphone and allign just right to not see a double image. Should make the device to fit only one sized phone.

 

[Ilya]

Microsoft HoloLens Development Edition starts shipping March 30.

https://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-hololens/en-us/development-edition

The $3000 price is rather high, but it is not intended for home users. It's for developers. Software companies can certainly afford this if they want to develop and test their apps for the HoloLens.

 

[Mary Lou Maloney]

Developers must sure get paid well to be able to afford these.

 

[Ilya]

That would be mostly companies, not individuals paying for it.
Also, keep in mind, that unlike other VR devices, this one is self-contained: it has a computer inside.

 

[Foxbat]

I think Augmented Reality is a more realistic product that has a wider range of applications than Virtual Reality. But they both have their places in the future of user interaction.

I work at a steel mill that has some of the most advanced technologies in use. One thing we do that is different from other mills is we have automated storage/retrieval of the 20+ ton coils. Each storage warehouse are can hold almost 1,000 coils. Every year we need to conduct an audit of the coil warehouse and show to the Auditors that bins we show are empty have no coils and the ones the system show have product have the actual coil as stored. I thought how neat it would be to walk into the storage warehouse and be able to look up at the storage racks with the coils and have a computer overlay with Coil # and customer ID. You would still need the spot check to satisfy the Auditors, but this was just one application for the HoloLens I thought I could sell to my Management.

They just need to come up with a version that allows us to wear full PPE (i.e., a hard hat)

 

[Ilya]

Augmented reality is truly a break-through technology. Applications are limitless!

By the way, I will be at Microsoft Build 2016 in two weeks. Hopefully will get to play with the HoloLens again!

 

[Ilya]

Well, the HoloLens has been officially launched today and supposedly is shipping to developers and "enterprise partners"

I have just visited the Destination Mars HoloLens demonstration an hour ago. It was pretty cool! Though unlike last year's demonstration, this one was more like a virtual reality demo, rather than augmented reality demo. I could hardly see any people around me: they were mostly blocked out from my view.

I did get to walk on the surface of Mars guided by Buzz Aldrin himself! I could walk and look in any direction, I could see the surface under my feet, or stars above my head. The field of view is still limited, just like last year, but surprisingly it didn't bother me as much as last year, perhaps because there wasn't much to look at with my peripheral vision: all action was within the virtual frame.

The precision of imaging was truly amazing! No matter how quickly I moved my head, the image was solidly bound to the surroundings. No lag at all! The sound coming from the headset was also surround. I did a 360 turn and sound image stayed with my virtual guide.

The HoloLens headset itself looked slightly different from the last year's model. Felt lighter and seemed easier to setup.

This was a group demonstration: a group of 8 people. There is also another one-on-one HoloLens demonstration. If I have time, I will try attending that one too.