If you're after a better head strap than what comes with the Quest 2 out of the box,
and you want your playing time to be beyond the 1.5 - 2 hours that you get
from a single charge, then a head strap with a built-in battery is what you need.
And here I have the latest offering from Aubika. This is their “Excellence Strap With Battery For
Meta Quest 2”. This will give you up to two and a half times more playing time on a single charge
than the headset does by itself. Plus it's 40% cheaper than the official Quest 2 Elite
Strap from Meta itself. But, is it well built? Will it snap like the official elite strap did?
And what's it like to use?
Welcome to my Tech Gear.
Let's get into it!
Now Aubika did send this to me to review, but they are not sponsoring
or paying for this video so the opinion you'll get will be honest and my own.
So, I was going to do an unboxing for this video but I've actually been playing with it
for the last couple of weeks and I've already assembled it. I was going to unassemble it,
put it back in the box, and then unbox it. Unfortunately, once you put this back plate
into the head strap itself, um, I haven't actually been able to take it back out again!
So I can't actually fake the unboxing! So there's a bit of honesty for you!
I will say that's a really good thing though because this back plate now is
really securely in the head strap. It's definitely not coming off.
So other than these two things that come in the box, it does come with a cable that is pre-molded
into the back plate itself. That is what goes into the headset, which I'll do in a little bit.
It's also got this strap over the top, which is a velcro strap, that hooks into the back and then
will go into the front of your headset as well. All of this, inside the box, comes inside this
cloth case. Which, I don't know, I kind of thought it was initially kind of cool, and then I thought,
well actually, really, what's the point? If it was with a pair of headphones I'd get it because then
you could actually use it to put the headphones in your bag and you can travel it with you.
But once you've assembled this, what are you gonna use this for? It's a nice touch,
which kind of makes it feel a bit more quality when you unbox it. But in reality you're not going
to use it. But if you've got a pair of headphones you need a case for, you've now got a bag for it!
So now I'm just going to stick it on the headset. If you already have a head strap
on your headset then you are going to need to take it off to put that on.
First thing you need to do is take off the facial interface itself.
Then you need to unthread the strap from the top,
and then unclip the two sides on the left and right hand side of your old headset.
Which I'm just going to do now…
One…
Two…
Unclip one side…
Unclip the other…
And throw that away… Bye Bye!
Right, so now we've got the Aubika strap itself. Now this actually attaches really easily.
Before I put this on the headset I must point out that the arms here are
really nice and flexible. So I've got absolutely no qualms about it lasting.
It's actually going to give rather than snap when you're wearing this which is really good.
The battery strap is fixed to the battery at the back of the head strap,
and then this USB-C port will actually plug into the headset once we install it.
To install it to the headset just take either side. You want to just clip it on the back
and then it just clips right on the front. And then same on the other one. Start at the back
and then just push down on the front. Easy!
So because this head strap has this overhang at the front it's really easy to take off as well
as put on. So to take it off you can just kind of get your fingers underneath the front and it
comes off. To put it back on again, clip on at the back, push down at the front, and then it's on.
To put the head strap on, you just take the head strap, it's got two velcro pieces on either side
on the back, it will go through the hook, or the loop hole, in the back
and then from here you thread it through the front, which you can probably see about here.
And then just velcro that down, then put your facial interface back on.
And then last but not least, take the USB-C cable here and plug it into the front.
There is a big adjustment dial at the back and it's a nice big
solid dial. It actually has quite a big range to it as well. If you do
all the way wide that is as far as it goes. I just see plenty of cable length there.
If you have it as short as it will go then it fits as well. You do get a bit of cable
excess there but that's to be expected when you've got a small headset.
So now that it's fully assembled I really want to try and put some stress testing on this to
try and break it. It really doesn't matter how much pressure you put on this. You can
try and wiggle it from side to side. You can try and bend it one way or the other.
You can even put some torque on it one way and the other and the head strap itself
will give. Will go with the tension. So it's unlikely to break going forwards.
And if it doesn't break under this I'm pretty sure it's going to last for the long term.
So I have been using this for a while now and I've been really impressed with it. I've tried some
other headsets that haven't been as comfortable and this is actually pretty comfortable to wear.
Now the battery in here is a 5000 mAh battery which will give you up to two
and a half times play time compared to just the headset on its own. It will also charge
using the provided USB-C cable that goes into the USB-C port underneath.
There is a button on top here as well which you can click to either
charge or not charge your headset. So it's good to be able to have that option because you might
not want your headset charging all the time. There are also four led dials across the top,
or four led lights across the top, that will actually tell you how charged the battery pack is.
So comfort is really important when you're wearing VR headsets, and let's face it,
VR headsets in general aren't that comfortable. That's primarily because they are very front
heavy. So the Quest 2 itself is about 500 grams in weight, and especially if you've got it with
the default elastic strap that it comes with, all of that weight is not only at the front of your
face but it's in front of your head. So it kind of forces everything to be very very front heavy.
The benefit of an elite strap with a battery pack is that there's more weight at the back
so that starts to act as a counter weight. So it does add more weight to your headset but because
there's weight at the back of your head as well as the front it actually balances it out and
actually makes your headset seem lighter and more comfortable because it's more evenly balanced.
So you can kind of see here, if this is roughly the center of gravity… If you go too far back it
will slip… But your center of gravity is about there, and that's about where your head is. So
that's evenly balanced between weight at the front weight, at the back. It actually makes
the headset seem a lot lighter and makes it more comfortable for long gaming sessions. Which is
useful because the battery pack now means that you're probably going to be gaming for longer.
The head strap by itself weighs about 304 grams
if you're interested. That's actually slightly lighter than the official Elite Strap from Meta.
So far this has all been good things to say about their head strap. But I must say
it's not all plain sailing. There is one negative about the headset, and you'll have
to decide whether this is a deal breaker for you or not… and that is the lack of padding.
The strap at the top doesn't have any padding. So it is just a webbing here. So that can put
some pressure on the top of your head when you're wearing it compared to other headsets.
The plate at the back is just a rubbery plastic, similar to the elite strap, but it also has
no padding. Now I actually didn't find that a problem. I actually found it one of the
more comfortable elite style straps to wear, and found it cupped my head well. However,
we've all got different head shapes so that might not be the case for everybody.
So if you do want a little bit more padding then this isn't going to give it for you.
What you could do is go and get a third-party padding. VR cover do one for the official
elite strap and it also fits this one too. So if you went out and got that,
I think it's about $20, and you could put that on this head strap. I've done that.
It definitely adds a bit more comfort to this and it's worth a go if you want more padding.
I will place the link to that in the description down below for you.
So should you buy it?
Well, if you want to extend the battery life of your Quest 2 and
you want a more comfortable head strap at the same time,
then I don't think you can go far wrong than with the Aubika Elite Strap with Battery.
Plus, it is only $65 USD which is 40% cheaper than the official Elite Strap from Meta themselves.
All of that in a slightly lighter package and also giving you slightly more battery life too.
I will place purchase links to it in the description down
below so you can go check it out for yourself.
If you'd like to look at some more great Quest 2 accessory ideas then
be sure to check my link in the video up here.
Thanks for watching. If you have enjoyed the video please don't forget to like and share it.
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And as always…
I'll see you in the next one!