Goal This afternoon it held the presentation of its annual conference for developers, Meta Connect. During the event, which started a quarter of an hour late and lasted nearly an hour, Mark ZuckerbergCEO of Meta, has announced the company’s next developments in software and hardware with a great role for artificial intelligence and mixed and augmented reality glasses, many glasseswhich are the type of device that Meta considers ideal for interacting with artificial intelligence.
Quest 3S goals, much cheaper than the Quest 3
Meta’s mixed reality glasses will have a cheaper ‘high quality’ version from next October 15. The Quest 3S maintains the ‘defining characteristics‘of the quest 3released a year ago, but for a couple of hundred euros less. The reason is that both models use the same processor, Qualcomm Snapdragon XR2 Gen 2 with 8 GB of RAM, and Touch Plus controllers, which allows them to access the same features.
What is removed? Mainly, sensors, resolution and field of view. The resolution is not 4K as in Quest 3, but 1,832 x 1,920 pixelsa sort of 1080p. The depth sensor disappears and the field of view is somewhat smaller. The Quest 3S is slightly larger than the Quest 3, but it also offers greater autonomyup to 2 and a half hours on a charge. Its price in Spain is 329.99 euros with 128 GB of storage and 439.99 with 256 GB. The Quest 3 with 128 GB costs €549.99 and with 512 GB, €699.99.
For Zuckerberg, the Quest 3, in its two variants, are the best ‘mainstream’ virtual and augmented reality glasses. They are, of course, much more accessible than Apple’s Vision Pro and Meta has made an effort to show a very similar user experience, but for much less cost. Its purpose is to convert them into a general computing platform that Let you do everything you can with a standard computer and more.
Other new features in the Quest are optimized spatial audio and Dolby Atmosnew apps instagram and Facebook redesigned for Quest and improvements to the social experience with a Horizon Worlds with better avatars. The company is also working in avatars and photorealistic spaces. The Quest 3S will include the video game Batman Arkham Shadow and will receive releases like Just Dance VR either Supernatural Unreal Fitness. The announcement of Quest 3 has also meant that Meta discontinued the quest 2 and Quest Pro.
Meta AI with new language model
As expected, new developments in AI have been abundant. Meta AI will reach many more devices and will do so powered by a new iteration of the open source Llama language model, 3.2which will have lighter versions so that it can be run locally on mobile phones. This version is capable of process imagessomething that other competing models have, but had not yet reached Llama.
Zuckerberg believes that voice is ‘a much more natural way to interact with AI’ and gave several examples of technologies being tested by Meta. Some of them, quite surprising. For example, he had a video call that was answered by a photorealistic avatar of the person who was currently with him on stage, content creator Don Allen Stevenson III. Using a Meta tool called AI Studio, Stevenson had created an AI that was responsible for answering video calls for him, generating both the image and the responses and the voice.
Meta also taught that he could dub Instagram reels into another language, including lip syncingwith a remarkable result.
Another Llama app that Meta is working on is Meta AI Translation. This allows automatic translation and dubbing in real time. In another live demonstration, Zuckerberg had a conversation with mixed martial arts fighter Brandon Moreno, in English and Spanish, which the AI automatically translated into the listener’s languagefluidly. The device used was Ray-Ban of Meta, about which there has also been news.
Ray-Ban
Meta Ray Ban smart glasses are updated, in software, and add a new variant that has the peculiarity of using a transparent structurewhich allows you to observe all the technology inside.
The device already made use of artificial intelligence, but a series of software updates will make it work more agilely and with more applications through voice, something that makes it, according to Meta, in a new product category.
It will be possible to control apps such as Spotify, Amazon Music and Audible. The function Reminders It will allow you to take a photo of what you are seeing, such as where you parked the car, and have the AI remind you later. You can also scan QR codes and call a phone number you are looking at. In general, you can ask for information and take actions on what is in front of you.
The glasses will also have Live Translationa function that reproduces through the speakers what the interlocutor is saying in your language. When this feature is available in the coming months, you will be able to translate between English, French, Italian and Spanish. It is also planned that the Ray Ban AI will support real-time video processing so you can immediately understand what is around you. However, that feature won’t arrive until later this year.
The Orion prototype
The third and final glasses presented by Zuckerberg have been a previously rumored Meta project, but it is a prototype that has no intention of being commercialized because it is currently too expensive to manufacture. Orion is what was supposed to be Meta’s competitor to the Vision Pro, but it seems that the initial cold reception of the Apple device has led Zuckerberg to think better.
Orion looks like the classics plastic glasses, but even thicker. Even so, they are still augmented reality glasses and not a helmet, much more cumbersome, like the Quest or Vision Pro. And they do much of what these do without having to separate the user from their environment.
They have LED micro projectors in the frame that emit digital content on lenses made from silicon carbidenot plastic or glass, which allow you to see the environment directly through them. Weight 98 gramsoffers a field of vision of 70 degrees and the structure is made from magnesium. In addition to voice and gestures, Orion is controlled with a ‘neural bracelet’which will be marketed by Meta for use with other devices. It is made of a high-performance textile material and uses electromyography to interpret the neural signals associated with hand gestures, which according to The Verge, after testing the device, allows a more precise response to gestures than a Vision Pro or Quest.
Orion has seven built-in cameras to precisely position virtual objects — Zuckerberg calls them holograms — in real space, help with eye and hand tracking, and allow Meta’s AI assistant to understand what you’re looking at. The device is completely independent and does not need a mobile phone or computer to work.