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morenullstuff t1_j5yunbf wrote

Reply to comment by KittenKoder in HoloLens AR actually makes soldiers less lethal, soldiers hate it | Report comes after Microsoft lays off various VR/AR employees by BlueLightStruct

I actually work on these headsets and theyre pretty fucking epic actually. I'm surprised this was the outcome

I'm guessing 99% of people commenting in here have not tried the hololens 2 or the magic leap 2. The magic leap is the exact opposite of their first trash headset.

Just too late I guess

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-OQO- t1_j5yxf2d wrote

While I’m sure they’re amazing, they’re just too frick’n expensive. How are people supposed to appreciate something like that?

And what are they supposed to do; play Beat Saber?

They’re amazing for the devs and the clients like aerospace and medical because they’re using bespoke software.

Until there’s a killer app, doesn’t matter how good the hardware is.

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kingand4 t1_j604h2d wrote

This is spot on. The trouble is the killer app turns out to be many industrial tasks (warehouse inventory, assembly and disassembly procedures, procedures in general, etc. -- take a look at the recent Vuforia products for more examples), but the form factor, durability, and field of view just aren't good enough for those applications yet.

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KittenKoder t1_j5zgq7r wrote

I'm talking about the military. Using one in other fields is probably a great idea, but before investing in military tech they need to first ensure they are useful in a wartime situation and not just a neat tool with far better applications. The problem in a live fire battle is high tech that's used in the field cannot require charging and must be extremely lightweight, soldiers already have to carry very heave weapons and supplies, even a tiny bit of weight can make the difference between life and death.

So given the extra weight and the inaccessibility of a charging method without also increasing weight, they will not find much use of worn tech like this in situations that they would be used. A better investment would be more remote drones and smart weapons that can be used from the safety of a bunker.

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kingand4 t1_j603swd wrote

I've tried them and I disagree with you.

They're fine if you're just playing around, but they're not good for any sort of labor. Just about the only real use I found for them was making a ridiculously large virtual monitor for watching YouTube.

The FOV for the HoloLens 2 was a huge let down -- maybe on paper it looks better than the HoloLens 1, but it's still far too narrow.

The weight is very well balanced, but it's still just a lot of additional weight that gives people headaches.

They're also too bulky to wear in any industrial setting where you have to be careful about head clearance.

Sure, the HoloLens is still an impressive feat of engineering, but it still has a long way to go before it can be used in the industrial applications Microsoft has been marketing it towards.

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