I'm glad someone like you is covering this device. Thank you for all the helpful information. Xreal made a good choice in paying you to explain this device.
Thank you for watching it, and for the kind words 🙂 I'm very happy to have provided some technical insight into a niche that's usually all about marketing!
Man the price point just isnt there yet for me, at that point id put that money towards an actual tv, definitely cool tech but it needs to be like $200 to really get me invested
That's definitely fair, and it's clearly poised for the luxury market rather than the "every man". Regardless, I use mine enough that I could easily justify the cost! Thanks for watching as always, man.
@daddykarlmarx6183 can't display your steamdeck on a tablet, and a TV is not portable. If you price it to a portable monitor, it's fairly reasonable. At least in the USA.
@@X862go not really you can get 1080p monitors for really cheap. If you want a portable one at the same resolution it's still half the price of the glasses.
Did you find that using the beam drained the battery more slowly than without? My experience shows that I *might* get more battery life with it, but I primary use the beam and glasses with streaming games where sending a higher resolution to the glasses doesn’t demand more from the deck so it’s not a perfect anecdote.
Love the channel brother, been here since day one and really diggin watching you progress. Keep it up! For the glasses, I think I'll wait till I can get em second hand for $150, maybe inna few gens they will have power pass built in.
I cannot imagine a better person to ask regarding this, with regards to Steam Deck✅, XREAL Air Glasses✅, and Linux software ✅ There is a plugin available on Decky Loader, that works with XREAL Air glasses, that seems to allow for you to move your head and it will send input to the game, and allow it to help with POV Let me restate: there is a Decky Loader Plugin that lets the XREAL Air glasses control the camera stick, in game. I’d love to see you cover it, and I’d be thrilled if you could include what setting to change to let the SIAPI and input from the XREAL glasses work; I cannot figure out if “mouse” input would map to Right thumb stick or what…
Around 12:30, you talked about plugging in the beam to the dock with the HDMI-USBc cable and you can charge BOTH the deck and the beam at the same time. Are you sure that's the case? I've spent a couple sessions watching videos with the beam connected to my steam deck dock via the HDMI-USBc cable and the beam eventually drains to 0. Needless to say, it's one of the most disappointing things. I've got my steam deck tethered to a dock, but now I have another device that I have to keep charged (the beam), since there doesn't seem to be a way to keep the beam charged when plugging it in with the HDMI cable.
Aliexpress is your source for the Redmagic dock mentioned. A point that concerns me is the need for the glasses to pull constant power for their block/black out feature. Obviously the glasses are working constantly to black the glass, I think I’ll stick my 1st gen with the cap for the front. Lastly, that sunglass idea they have was absolutely stolen from a successful Etsy supplier who happened to build me a 100% side and nose block setup. Thanks for the video.
I believe electrochromic glass doesn't take up too much power, particularly for such a small area. As he showed in the video it was in the realm of around 2 minutes which isn't far off margin for error
Nice review. Should have mentioned about compatibility with various devices and operating system. Not quite understanding on why the Beam is necessary when a simple software/firmware update to the Xreal glasses can allow us to keep the virtual screen stationary when we move our head around? For the use case starting at 16:58, could have mentioned about portability making it easy for travel. Is it possible to have multiple virtual (stationary) monitors using the Xreal glasses using a laptop (Linux, Windows, Mac), Steam Deck, and maybe iPhone/Android?
Thank you for making this detailed review. The info at 12:30 was exactly what I was looking for---a potential solution to have the glasses on while charging everything. Do you have any data regarding how much battery drain the glasses do on the Steam Deck when undocked?
Hi! I have SteamDEck and buying Xreal Air 2 Pro for it. Its main problem cannpt power/charge while using the glasses as only one usbc port for charge or connect stuff... There are various expensive muds like RedMagic dock etc to solve it but with a cable mess. I am building lithium packs for drones and electric motorcycles so have some soldering skills. I have a plan to solder to the 2 main +- cables of the Sd battery and make a small DC 2pin pug to one side. That way I could give power to the battery leads directly which is as a 2S battery around 8.4V (it is written as higher voltage cells so 8.8V is the max, but I can measure vilt voltmeter at 90% charge level if it is 8.8V I can set a stepdown to 8.8V for example.) And I could power it from 12V battery/adapter using stepdown dc-dc module setup for the battery voltage to keep (8-8V for example).... What do you think?
Hi, alexcompton. It is important to consider your personal requirements before deciding whether to upgrade to the latest new series of the 1st Air. If you are satisfied with the current level of wear comfort and display, there may not be a need for an upgrade.
Nice video, especially the battery time compared to the screen is important. In the EU store it's 459€ for the base version which is about 487$, even 399$ is a lot but that's way to much for me sadly. My limit would be 350€ but even the Air 1 costs 389€. If it would be 1440p I would use it as my main monitor for everything even for the current price, guess I'll have to wait a little longer.
Man i wish you actually covered where the speakers sit compared to your ears. Especially for smaller faces. I know you mentioned it for bigger faces. I have a weird nose bridge to ear distance, which means any regular pair of glasses are usually too long and sticks out past my ears at the back. I tend to have to wear kids size glasses when it comes to the length of the arms. I have tried those bose glasses with the speakers in and i can’t wear them at all as my ear need to sit where the speaker is and if i put the ear hook at the correct place then the glasses fall off of my nose. I feel like this product would have a similar problem as there’s no adjustment mentioned for that. Am i correct?
thank you for the detailed review. One question: If I am short-sighted do I need additional lenses? If I hold my smartphone in front of my face, I can read everything without any problems. The projected screens aren't technically any further away, right?
I don’t know if you’ve found your answer elsewhere, but I am also nearsighted in my “good eye” (don’t ask about my bad eye) and will say that trying these out without prescription lenses is like looking at a TV across the room without my glasses. It’s counterintuitive, I know, but it’s definitely scaled to be further away than where you or I would hold our phone screen without glasses. Hope this helps! I will do more testing until I decide to return them or my prescription lenses come in, but bottom line is that prescriptions are going to help.
As for charging the steam deck and using the glasses, I reccomend you get the Rokid Hub and a jsaux usb c to usb c 180 degrees adapter. I would try and purchase a Rokid Hub that came out after July 2023 as the older ones aren't steam deck compatible. Also hopeful for you to make a steam deck OLED video soon
As en VR user, I get motion sick when the display always is in front of my eyes. It's only 3Dof, not 6 Dof. There is even more Motion Sickens potential inside of 3dof devices than in 6 Dof. So no way I use this Device xD But thanks for the very good review :D FYI I use my Quest 3 with Sunshine and Moonlight to play on the Steam deck and it's also very good byside the need to be in the Dekstop mode xD
Hi, e.v.k! The Air 2 series glasses come with an upgraded optic engine. The display performance is better than the previous version. And the corner display is better now.
5: you want to bring your computer when you travel but a laptop is big, clunky and have poor input. They used to be required because the screen, but now you can grab your deck, your preferred keyboard and mouse, the dock of your choice and the glasses. Sounds horrible, right? So many more component than JUST a laptop, but seriously - being able to use whatever keyboard and mouse you want, have a decent screen and having all of it be portable is kinda awesome.
Great video, just waiting for the tech to mature a bit more. Have you tried using a VR headset with the steam deck (not for VR gaming but the same use case as the XREAL air)?
Steam deck isn't powerful enough to drive a full VR headset properly. This is technically a 1080p (full HD display) monitor that uses a USB C instead of HDMI. That why these work flawless with most devices without additional software. It's just like plugging a external monitor. You would need lots of software tinkering to get the VR headset to run on the deck.
I actually like the Xreal Air 1 case a whole lot better because you can put a carabiner on it. With this new case, I'm forced to put it in a bag so I won't have quick access to them.
I'm surprised you didn't do a latency test with the Beam in the mix. From my limited use, I found the Beam introduced about 100 ms of added latency to every device I used, including the Deck. For some games that might be okay, but definitely not with rhythm games. Personally, I'm sensitive to added latency so I quickly noticed it when using the Beam. I contacted XReal support but they dismissed my case basically saying, "that's just how it works so there's gonna be latency" which I did not appreciate. It has sat in its box ever since.
Oh man, I admit to dropping the ball there, it completely slipped my mind, I'm sorry 😓 I didn't notice delay nearly that bad so maybe a new firmware that mine has doesn't have the issue? I'm usually sensitive to it, but I'll try to run some tests and see if your case still holds true.
Hi, ruegore! We apologize for any inconvenience caused by the Beam. We are continuously working to enhance its performance and minimize latency. For high refresh rate games, we recommend directly connecting the glass and devices for optimal experience.
@@XREAl_Tech_Support Your glasses are ok to use, one of the best in my opinion but I will wait for better beam can be bigger without fan inside and much faster.
@@XREAl_Tech_Support My issue had nothing to do with high refresh rate games. Please don't misconstrue the issue I reported. For basic, bog standard 60 hz refresh rate and 60 fps gaming, I was getting 100 or more ms of delay between performing an action and seeing it play out through the Beam on every device I used. Directly connecting the Air to the device poses no problem, but guess what? Then I'm not using the Beam for any of its other benefits! I (begrudgingly) accept your excuse that the Beam inherently introduces this much delay due to the way you engineered its projection technique, but you made zero mention of any such information during the pre-ordering phase for the device (I was one of those pre-orders!) and we didn't find out about this inherent flaw until AFTER we got our Beam devices and experienced it for ourselves. Just state the actual hard numbers and capabilities of the device -- don't make these lame "we're working to improve it" excuses while also saying the way the projection works introduces a delay. That's like making promises you can't keep and gaslighting us at the same time, just stop it. To top it all off, the delay is present no matter if it's gaming or anything else connected to it. I noticed it when entering keystrokes onto a document, moving a mouse around, basically anything where you expect a fast response. But I get it, it's not such a big deal when you just use it to just watch media. Gaming isn't your focus. If you simply provided actual technical specifications (including lab-measured response times) I would NOT have bought it, and probably a few other people wouldn't have either if gaming with the Beam was their primary use-case. Must be nice to be a person that doesn't care about the 100+ ms lag this device introduces, because there seems to be a lot of 'em.
I personally feel that the upgrade I worth it, but that's heavily case-dependent, so I gave you the information and thought it best to let you decide how much the improvements mean to you. Thanks for watching!
So, I looked into this, the actual glasses + beam + adapter + since I wear glasses - a new pair of lenses costing 100£. So in total it goes to nearly 600-700 , for a peripheral device is not worth it at all. What’s unpleasant is them selling each of the necessary item separately. So no, I love the possibility but the price point is too high at this point in time. Maybe in a few years.
Hi, Amaan! I can tell you that the weight ratio between the front and back of the glass is 1:1 on the new glasses, but the value is about 1.7:1 on the old version. And because of the zero-pressure nosepad, the wear comfort is better on the Air 2 series.
Quest 3 works better for a large display experience. The better field of view helps with giving you a large image at a distance. These feel more like holding a tablet up to your face in terms of eye fatigue.
@@jeffreytong the original Occulus, Index, Quest, and Quest Pro, I have some of the worst motion sickness you've ever seen when in VR, and it gives me a headache to boot. These don't have any of those issues since they're primarily in "real" space. I also have a massive head, and I haven't found a comfortable VE headset yet 😅
Hi, acdnan! The XREAL AR glasses offer a distinct experience compared to the Quest headsets. The choice between the two depends on your specific requirements. If you prioritize portability and exceptional display performance, then the XREAL AR glasses would be more suitable for you.
I have to admit I'm a bit disappointed with your review, not testing everything they sent you is a big nono. I sincerely think the review would have been much better if you tested the shirt and the stickers as well... Jokes aside, great video, thank you for the insights :)
Interesting, I'd actually contact Valve support about that because that's definitely a hardware issue with either the battery or the charge controller. Thank you for watching, I hope you get that fixed!
@cryobyte33 thanks I tried. Reflashed the deck. Didn't work they told me they would escalate months ago and nothing. Opened a ticket again over the weekend. From what I understand it's a linux Power saving feature.
Day 17238. As I walk through this desolate planet, Viture still makes more advanced glasses and with a far more comprehensive ecosystem. Nreal, Xreal, whatever you call it, they are just copying features from Viture as they go...sad.
bro i have a question which one should i buy knowing the xreal first glasses are 100$ off on amazon 🥹 and which ones would you prefer for my first ar glasses ?😊
Another option for charging the steam deck while using these is the viture charging adapter. It's made by another manufacturer of AR glasses, but I use it with my nreal (I got mine before the name change) airs. It works just as well as red magic adapter, much I much prefer the shorter cable without the weird chin.
I used Rokid's power splitting adapter with a steam deck charger and the original Nreal Air Glasses with no issues, except the adapter gets a little hot. But also Buyer beware, don't buy Viture's adapter for use with the ROG Ally, fried the motherboard and killed my Rokid glasses :( hard to tell what's compatible between different makes and manufacturers.
I love my Xreal 1s, but the problem I have is I bought mine like 3 months ago.... They had a huge marketing push with the Beam. Already, I have an obsolete version. Luckily they don't appear to be a major upgrade, but its kind of lame.
I actually have the same version of the Beam as you, I believe there's new firmware that updates them to the standard I have, at least that's my impression. Thank you for watching!
first video of yours i've watched (i saw that you helped someone else with emulation and they said you were the best steam deck emu channel and with my steam deck coming tomorrow i wanna see some videos). i'm 51 seconds in. the way you informed the viewer about you getting this for free is great. i wish more people were as open about this kind of thing. you got a sub out of me for how you handle sponsorships!
Thank you so much for watching and letting me know that you liked the disclosure! My entire channel is built on transparency so I'm really happy that people have noticed
If I could charge while directly connected, I'd buy now. Even a "mini dock" that just provided 2 USBC, 1 for the glasses, one for power passthrough to my deck. But I can't see trying to run a full dock on a plane, car or bus. And the beam is a neat idea but I'm highly latency and frame rate sensitive when using glasses.
This has been one of the most anxiety driven parts of the steam deck. I love the device, but one of these days my charging port is going to break down. it's inevitable. It will happen. When it does happen, I wish I had a second port that also could charge my deck, so I wouldn't immidiately end up with a bricked device, and could buy a new deck or go through a slow RMA process without needing another device.
Wasn't the previous version super recent ? I was kinda interested but if they release new stuff so often that's a bit worrying regarding updates/long term support.
The previous version released about a year and a half ago, but there WAS a marketing push about 4 months ago when they rebranded. These are definitely a generational leap in projection quality, but I'll be sure to mention if they "churn versions" in a follow-up if I notice it!
I’m curious about how the additional pixels per inch affect overall image sharpness compared to the original xreal air. I know the new micro OLED displays are quite a bit smaller (0.55 versus 0.68) and the PPI is now 4032 Xreal air 2/2 Pro versus 3320 on the original. They are the same resolution as before, but can you offer feedback on if there is a noticeable change because of the shrinkage of the displays and therefore a higher pixel density?
I tried these glasses and I ended up sending them back because there's no pupillary distance settings. My eyes are wider than the center of the lens. I read a lot of comments saying that the edges of the screens are blurry and the reason why is? It's that their pupils are set wider than the center of the OLED panels. Why don't these companies make an adjustment for pupillary distance. My Quest 2 has an adjustment widen the lenses. I also tried the new Rayneo glasses and they are the same.
So how does the HDMI to USB C charge to the Beam? HDMI doesn't send enough power. If I'm not wrong I thought that's literally one of the main points of the beam existing. Is for when connecting to HDMI devices.
Hey could you recommend some settings for ratchet and clank rift apart? I know that the game isnt very popular right now but being steam deck verified i have gotten pretty great quality at 30 fps
Did you find out any Dock station that have 3 USB C to charge and play in the same time? I am thinking to buy an dock station and I have the same problem that you have.
only one i trust and thats this guy , not like eta and other big channels acting like everything is great, buy buy it guys ! thx you! hope you keep your line dude!
Great review! Man, I really want these. Needing the Beam in order to charge the host device while using them is pretty lame though. Hopefully the community finds some other tricks to make that work. I don't really care for docks, but maybe the Jsaux hub?
Hi, wizardpajamas. The glass can be used with many other devices instead of only Beam. You can use the glass with your Mac, PC, mobile phone, and even gaming consoles. And for play&charge method, we are still exploring the solution internally, please give us some more time.
Hi, peter. The Freesync/Gsync is mainly dealt with by the graphic card. The AR glasses just display the dealt images/videos. Our XREAL glass is refresh-adaptive, and the maximum refresh rate is 120Hz. There should be no stutter or latency.
I got all my charging to work while playing, pulling it out of my bad so I can let you know the model. Gofanco HDMI 2.0 to USB-C 4K60Hz - Also bought this to account for things like switch vs. steam deck. YCCTEAM Switch Dock for Nintendo Switch/OLED it's around 50 for all of it and covers everything. I bought the beam but too busy messing with quest 3 :) That first adapter has a spot for usb C in and power, then provides usb out with power, so plug and play for switch.
Everyone is chilling AR these days...Cinema Massacre, Wolf, BeatEmUps, though they are SUPER convinced Viture is better...yeah...none is. Just get a TV for that price. No one will use it on public nor the train, nor an airplane. They think they would, but they won't. I like the fact that Viture glasses allow you to adjust the product itself for your eye prescription, so you don't need to get lenses which is dumb to be honest (getting lenses I mean).
I used mine on the plane, actually! The built in correction on the Vitures also doesn't work for me since it can't do an astigmatism and I can't get good prescription lenses for it, so they're basically useless for me 😞
ok investigated the issue, found that with Y hdmi-usbpower to typeC dispkay cable it allows to use usb hub. so hook up usb hub to SD and charge cable to PD input of hub, than standard usb cable end of hdmi cable power to hub, than hdmi plug to hub, than usbc display end of hdmi cable to glasses... I ordered a 1m Y cable from ALI, will test it if possible. My usr case is using glasses while touring with my electric motorcycle in helmet. Will see how it fits.
Cryo please help! I have discovered that my steam deck starts having frame drops consistently after a while playing (and this is not because of temperature, the games I am playing are retro which run perfectly on 3 wats of power). This appears to be a bug. After I restart the game (not the deck itself) it works fine for another 30-60 minutes or so. This happens to multiple games in the same fashion, it’s not restricted to one game… Do you have any knowledge of such a frame drop bug? Thank you Cryo!
You have to download the software update on a PC before you use it on the steam deck. Im getting mine friday and have looked into everything i need to do to make sure it works properly on the deck
It doesn't get said enough around here: Your hair is majestic my man. Also, nice product review 😄 It would be helpful to check out the microphone volume. I have my phone on max volume but you're noticeably quieter than the ads.
I bought sound last yr & I rarely use them. The UI is sloppy in my opinion & price point is way to much. You have to spend another $125 just to get some extra features after spending almost $400
Will buy these for air travel - can i still use these glasses with my air pods to block out ambient noise? Thanks for the review. Your review pushed my over the edge and decided to buy this!
My thoughts. I've had the first air on my "to buy" list since your last video, but didn't pull the trigger on them 1. Create a tiny dock, lightweight and hopefully no larger then it will fit in the palm of your hand. One end has a single USB-C and is for the glasses, the other end have two USB-C female sockets, one is power in, the other is signal + power out. The power out should power the device you'r plugged into as a pass-through of what ever your adapter is, and should at least be able to handle up to 6 Amps, and then let the glasses power of the device. This way we will be able to replace cables for both ends as we all know it will break at some point. 2. The beam should not be an option but a part of the package. I get that AR glasses like this is a niche market, so you need to get as much add-on sale as possible to make it a proper business model, but the price for the complete package is a deal breaker for me, and this part also ties into my third point below. 3. Get "rid" of the pro model and just have one skew of the product, and for this it's the pro skew they should keep. Why? When ordering parts the batch for parts is larger and they will be able to get a better price, in the end be able to make the pro model cheaper to produce, less tooling and over all a better product experience for the end user. I really hate products that has so many skews. Just make your product and diversify in the colors available, but otherwise make the product the best it can be while keeping the price relative low. oh and great video, but please go a bit in depth of the beam if you can, i still don't fully understand what it does, how it does and what can it do :)
was all of the testing done with the beam? I just got my air 2s today and was not pleased with how the screen wasn't locked in place since the edges are blurry. I found a plug in that will lock the screen with Vulkan games for the meantime, but i am looking for a smoother experience while charging my deck. The beam seems like the way to go, but i don't want to buy it if it won't work with the deck, or makes the performance worse.
