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Category: Virtual Reality

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  • Apple’s low-cost Vision Pro headset could land sooner than expected

    Apple’s Vision Pro headset, despite being the most advanced XR gear of its kind, wasn’t quite the roaring success the company may have expected. An asking price worth $3,500 was certainly a deterrent for enthusiasts, but the lack of a full-fledged computing ecosystem built around it was also a lackluster show.

    The company has, however, no intention of giving up. On the contrary, Apple is working on a more affordable, watered-down version, and it could arrive sooner than expected. According to Bloomberg, there’s a chance the headset might make an appearance later this year, possibly around the same window as the iPhone 17 series.

    A few analysts had recently predicted that Apple’s new XR headset with toned-down hardware could take a couple of years, at the very least, before it lands on the market. It seems the white-hot competition has inspired Apple to pick up the pace.

    When can we expect Apple’s next XR headset? 

    Christine wearing the Apple Vision Pro demo unit.
    Christine Romero-Chan / Digital Trends

    “All signs point to the lighter model arriving between the end of this year and the first half of 2026,” says the Bloomberg report. In the past, we’ve come across rumors of an alleged “Vision One” model being in development, so there’s that.

    The report, however, sheds light on an interesting conundrum. 

    Will Apple retire the Vision Pro, or keep it on the shelves alongside the lower-cost version? “The main uncertainty is whether the lighter version will be considered a replacement for the Vision Pro or a cheaper alternative,” it adds.  

    It’s a tricky question because the company is reportedly developing a flagship successor as well. It will come with an interesting twist, however. As per the outlet, this model will work in a tethered mode, hooked to a Mac to deliver peak performance without any latency or battery life woes.

    What’s the low-cost Apple headset all about? 

    A man wears an Apple Vision Pro headset.
    Apple

    As far as the cheaper Vision-series headset is concerned, Bloomberg has previously reported that it could come equipped with the upcoming M5 silicon. Apple is expected to launch Mac gear and a new iPad Pro powered by the same processor later this year. 

    The biggest change is going to be the size and bulk profiles. It is expected to be lighter and might tip the scales at less than a pound. As far as the pricing is concerned, it could go for around $1,500 to $2,500. For comparison, the Vision Pro carries a sticker price worth $3,500. 

    To go with the lower asking price on its affordable XR headset, Apple will reportedly equip it with a lower-resolution display unit. Details about just how Apple is reducing the weight, and if there’s going to be any major design change, remain under wraps. 

    But if the Vision Pro is anything to go by, Apple needs to do more than just shed some weight. Wearing the current-gen Vision Pro is an uncomfortable experience. It would be interesting to see how Apple fixes that ergonomic situation on its upcoming low-cost headset. 

  • It was a bad day for Nvidia

    It was a bad day for Nvidia

    Nvidia (NVDA) fell with other Magnificent 7 stocks on Thursday as the market reacted to new tariffs — but the company also may’ve slipped because a major bank downgraded it for unrelated reasons.

    Read more…

  • VR isn’t just fun. It’s a new hope for early detection of Alzheimer’s

    Over the past few years, virtual reality (VR) has emerged as a remarkably useful addition to the field of medical science. From offering physician training and helping people cope with pain to delivering at-home physiotherapy and reducing stress, VR platforms have proved to be of immense help. 

    The next VR breakthrough could help with the early detection of a well-known neurodegenerative disease. In its current form, the diagnosis of Alzheimer’s disease requires expensive neurological tests, brain scanning, blood analysis, and more. There is no single, or definitive, biomarker test. 

    A team of experts is now exploring how VR-based experiences can help assess spatial memory and check for signs of Alzheimer’s disease. Research shows the development of Alzheimer’s proteins affects a person’s memory and navigation functions. Or to put it more specifically, allocentric navigation and spatial memory.

    How VR can help detect Alzheimer’s?

    Cognitive tests for detecting signs of Alzheimer’s also rely on gauging episodic memory, but the usage of VR enables healthcare experts to check the brain’s memory functions in an even more granular and immersive fashion.

    Due to weakening memory functions, people with Alzheimer’s commonly misplace objects, and this gets worse as the disease progresses, suggesting it could be an early sign of the illness. Alzheimer’s is also tied to the development of certain proteins in the brain, which helped researchers verify the efficiency of their VR-based detection system.

    A man uses a VR headset while playing a game.
    Gorodenkoff / Shutterstock

    The team focused on plasma Aβ42/Aβ40 and pTau217 protiens as part of their VR test. They asked participants to remember the location of various objects in nearly two dozen virtual living rooms. Based on the memory performance and body fluid tests, the team discovered a link between these proteins and object location memory as well as location precision. 

    “We found decreased object location memory, as well as decreased precision for the object location memory, between young adults and older adults and unimpaired participants and those with mild cognitive impairment,” says Tammy Tran, a neuroscientist who presented her findings at the annual conference of the Cognitive Neuroscience Society (CNS) this month. 

    A more accessible future for Alzheimer’s detection

    As part of their tests, the team tested healthy young (and old) people as well as folks diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease. The latter category, showing symptoms of mild cognitive impairment (MCI), struggled with memory-related tasks in the VR atmosphere. 

    Alan Truly sits in front of a Windows PC and adjusts a virtual screen while wearing a Meta Quest 3 VR headset.
    I can adjust virtual screens while using my Windows PC via a Meta Quest 3 VR headset. Photo by Tracey Truly / Digital Trends

    Experts behind the project developed VR gear equipped with head and eye tracking sensors, similar to those you will find on devices such as the Apple Vision Pro or the upcoming Meta Orion holographic smart glasses. In a separate test, healthy adults were asked to remember corridors and hidden landmarks in a VR space. 

    Following the tests, it was discovered that navigational abilities differ across different age groups. “We expect that the presence of different complexity levels across trials will amplify differences between younger and older participants, and between older participants and those diagnosed with early Alzheimer’s disease,” adds Manu Madhav, a robotics expert and neuroscientist who is also working on the project. 

    “Designed for use by both clinicians and caregivers, this tool will facilitate early AD detection, enable long-term monitoring, and guide restorative interventions,” the team adds. The overarching goal is to deploy VR as a non-invasive and immersive tool to measure age-related memory decline that is a clinical symptom of Alzheimer’s onset. 

  • Mobile-based free VR tool is helping people beat speech anxiety

    Virtual Reality was once considered a niche for video games, but over the years, it has found application in many areas. From finding a place in medical education and paving the way for immersive concerts to helping teens and adults deal with psychological distress, the applications of VR are now an ever-expanding domain.

    The latest VR innovation comes from the University of Cambridge, and it aims to help people overcome speech anxiety and the fear of public speaking. The institution’s Immersive Technology Lab has launched a free VR training platform that focuses on accessibility and provides expert-curated course material.

    Terrified of public speaking? This Cambridge VR solution could eliminate your fear

    To that end, the team has created a system that doesn’t necessarily rely on an expensive VR headset. Instead, all it needs is the smartphone in your pocket to provide an immersive experience, fitted atop a mounting kit that can cost as little as $20 a pop.

    The training material, on the other hand, is freely available via a website to anyone across the world. Moreover, it is also one of the first products of its kind with a dual-compatible VR player architecture, which means it works just fine with iPhones and Android devices.

    Smartphone-based VR kit for speech training.
    Lucy Cavendish College

    “The platform has been built in such a way that whether a participant is using the latest standalone VR headset or an old smartphone inserted into a device mount, they will get the same content and the same experience,” says the team.

    The idea is not too different from the Google Cardboard, which cost $15 roughly a decade ago and offered a low-cost route to experiencing VR content by using one’s smartphone. But unlike Google’s approach, we have now entered a market phase where “converter kits” are a lot more polished and use higher quality materials.

    How does the VR training program work?

    Putting a phone inside a VR kit.
    Lucy Cavendish College

    The training material created by Dr. Chris MacDonald, a behavioral scientist and founder of the Immersive Technology Lab, has passed clinical validation. It has been tested by students at Cambridge and UCL, delivering a 100% success rate in helping adopters with speech and public speaking anxiety.

    The training material follows roughly the same pattern as psychological exposure therapy. In a nutshell, to help a person overcome fear and anxiety, they are gradually exposed to mild forms of their fear. Over time, the exposure intensity increases, eventually helping people get rid of their fright and trepidation.

    Scenarios of VR-based public speaking.
    Lucy Cavendish College

    In this case, when participants log into the VR training platform, they see various kinds of audience setups. It can be an empty room, anchoring a TV studio, a cabin with a few people in front of them, a radio interview, or an entire stage-like setting with people across their field of view.

    The training scenarios can be filled with all kinds of noise, light, and camera effects to provide a realistic feel. The objective is to help participants face their fear and then grow mental resilience.

    For the VR training platform, however, Dr. MacDonald upped the ante with Overexposure Therapy, which is essentially putting people in hyperbolic scenarios they will likely never face in their real lives, like performing in a packed stadium. Think of it as the “psychological equivalent of running with weights or at high altitudes.”

    The end goal

    The VR training material has been created to help people with speech anxiety and fear of speaking in public. Dr. MacDonald notes that these challenges are not only a mental health concern, but also pose a hurdle to academic progress as well as professional opportunities. At the end of the day, it’s simply obstructing sheer human potential.

    Person holding a VR kit for speech anxiety training.
    Lucy Cavendish College

    So far, the VR-based training platform has proven its efficacy. After one week of independent use, participants reported positive outcomes in improving their well-being, a feeling of increased preparedness, more adaptability, resilience, a boost in confidence, and improved management of anxiety and nervousness.

    He is now at work to expand the scope of his novel VR training platform, add more features into the mix, and reach more platforms. So far, the VR training platform has clocked over 50,000 remote sessions, and hundreds have tried it in lab settings as well as in-person events.

    “I am also collaborating with organisations that seek to support specific groups such as children who stammer. The goal is to create more targeted treatment options for those who need it the most,” says Dr. MacDonald. The VR training platform is now accessible to all enthusiasts globally via an official website.