Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Lenovo launches HoloLens competitor

engadget.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–67 of 67 posts

Re: Lenovo launches HoloLens competitor

#61

Post by rchaud »

eugeniub wrote: post #13
keyle wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Still miles away from mass adoption. VR/AR is at the stage of the Apple Newton and I don't think we're at the iPhone stage yet (in relative terms).

I think Oculus Quest could be the iPhone of VR. Keep in mind that the iPhone gen 1 didn’t sell well at all compared to just about any other iPhone generation.

The iPhone brought mobile internet browsing into mainstream consciousness; we were already addicted to the Internet before it arrived, so it's no wonder that iPhones and smartphones took off.

The Oculus on the other hand has to provide not just good ergonomics, but also content that showcases the hardware well.

I had a Galaxy S7 and GearVR headset in 2016. Some of the games were cool like a TRON-style Pong game, but most of the content was awful, stuff like "explore a famous museum", which was all badly optimized, pixelated 3D video.

Even if Oculus launched with a VR version of a product that's known to be highly sticky engagement wise (e.g Fortnite), I don't know if people would go for it. Fortnite is already on every device anyway, are people really so into it that they want to be fully immersed visually when playing?

Re: Lenovo launches HoloLens competitor

#62

Post by WorldMaker »

zyx321 wrote: post #55
taneq wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What makes you think Microsoft intended to keep hololens-class devices manufacturing to themselves? Nothing, but they'll be wanting HoloLens-class devices to be running Windows. This thing runs Android. > We've seen hardware plays like this in the past with the Surface design which seems to have too odd of a cadence and release cycle to be purely motivated as a product offering. As you say, the Surface was aimed sq…

The platform that Microsoft wants to push is not just Windows. It's Azure. The HoloLens 2 keynote made a big deal out of opening the ecosystem to Apple and Android clients.

Yeah, Microsoft thinks that Azure can be the backplane/glue binding all the AR ecosystems and the various overlays you may want shared between experiences.

(Which is often an interesting Big Deal in cyberpunk novels; it's not the hardware or the operating system, it is who controls the database connecting the real and virtual worlds.)

Re: Lenovo launches HoloLens competitor

#63

Post by WorldMaker »

taneq wrote: post #51
strmpnk wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes you think Microsoft intended to keep hololens-class devices manufacturing to themselves? This could be a relationship just like PC OEMs like Lenovo already have, licensing things with a royalty. The prominence of the AR apps in windows (preinstalled in many cases) well before the hardware that Microsoft made themselves was ready for mass adoption makes it clear that they want Windows and that ecosystem to…

> What makes you think Microsoft intended to keep hololens-class devices manufacturing to themselves? Nothing, but they'll be wanting HoloLens-class devices to be running Windows. This thing runs Android. > We've seen hardware plays like this in the past with the Surface design which seems to have too odd of a cadence and release cycle to be purely motivated as a product offering. As you say, the Surface was aimed sq…

> Nothing, but they'll be wanting HoloLens-class devices to be running Windows. This thing runs Android.

The article states that Lenovo doesn't have strong opinions about which OS the hardware runs, so it sounds like Lenovo has hedged to also support Windows on the hardware when the time comes that Windows on ARM is out of Beta (around the time that the HoloLens 2 releases?). Microsoft will still have a play to convince people to buy the Lenovo hardware and run Windows on it, the hardware sounds classed to be capable of it, and that's probably a good competition for all involved.

Re: Lenovo launches HoloLens competitor

#64

Post by WorldMaker »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #49
yumraj wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is how it will play out: 1) MS will sue Lenovo. 2) China will threaten MS with consequences including no access to China market. 3) MS will withdraw the lawsuit and lick its wounds.

From my 9 years working in Microsoft China, I think Lenovo, Microsoft, and China all have a very good relationship. I’d be very surprised if Microsoft took action against Lenovo, I would be astounded if they went anywhere near where the Chinese government would admonish them.

I wouldn't be surprised here if Microsoft was even intentionally lending the IP. Microsoft doesn't want to be the sole hardware vendor in a category, so encouraging HoloLens clones is probably somewhere on their explicit agenda.

Re: Lenovo launches HoloLens competitor

#65

Post by WorldMaker »

in3d wrote: post #46
writimov wrote: post #2

I've used a Google Glass, Oculus Rift, Cardboard VR systems and seen a demo of Oculus Rift. Is the Lenovo ThinkReality a real competitor? The market hasn't picked up VR for gaming and AR has flopped so far. How about high end systems for engineering and design. There could be a case where engineering speed and collaboration could increase from using a few of these systems at any company doing hardware design.

AR is essentially in beta. There are no consumer-oriented products and the improvements between generations are huge. Much, much too early to say it has failed.

There are plenty of consumer-oriented products if you count the average phone. iOS and Android have both made big plays around AR. While it's not "goggles AR", it's also seeing a slow but steady adoption by consumers in the boring, but still important to AR handheld way.

You'll see people randomly using the measurement tools and other "boring" AR utilities all the time now, and then there are games like Ingress, Pokémon Go, and the soon to be released Harry Potter AR game, which all have rather large consumer adoption.

AR is getting so prevalent it's already "boring" or just a part of the user experience for consumers. What that means for eventual adoption of "goggles AR" for consumers is an interesting question. It's probably going to come down to form factor preferences and how many people want their main computing device to be in their pocket versus worn on their head, or how easy it is for the device to "flex" between roles as interest/necessary.

Re: Lenovo launches HoloLens competitor

#66

Post by k__ »

rchaud wrote: post #61
eugeniub wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think Oculus Quest could be the iPhone of VR. Keep in mind that the iPhone gen 1 didn’t sell well at all compared to just about any other iPhone generation.

The iPhone brought mobile internet browsing into mainstream consciousness; we were already addicted to the Internet before it arrived, so it's no wonder that iPhones and smartphones took off. The Oculus on the other hand has to provide not just good ergonomics, but also content that showcases the hardware well. I had a Galaxy S7 and GearVR headset in 2016. Some of the games were cool like a TRON-style Pong game, but…

I had the impression that the iPhone brought the Internet in general to the masses.

The mobile market is orders of magnitude bigger than the desktop market ever was.

Re: Lenovo launches HoloLens competitor

#67

Post by jackbrookes »

netcan wrote: post #59
jackbrookes wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I run psychology experiments (motor control/spatial decision making) in VR and and its been a gamechanger in the last few years. Create your experiments completely in software to allow them to copied, modified, and distributed much more easily.

Interesting. Anywhere I can see more on this?

Here's my work so far.

https://github.com/immersivecognition/unity-experiment-frame...

https://link.springer.com/article/10.3758%2Fs13428-019-01242...

There are also some older papers by Loomis et al. https://link.springer.com/article/10.3758/BF03200735

Post reply on HN