This is the Pico Neo 3, and this is the Pico Neo 3 PRO.
Yes, they look a ton like the Quest 2.
Yes, I know.
You can also play a ton of Quest 2 games on it now… like Apex Construct, Superhot, Red
Matter, Contractors, and more.
You can also stream PC VR games on it or wire it up to your PC for native 4K 90hz resolution.
And all that without a Facebook account.
So why is this not a competition to the Quest 2 yet?
Well Pico has so far avoided direct competition with Oculus by only bringing their headsets
to Enterprise in the West.
Only in China, can consumers buy them because Facebook isn’t allowed there.
However, competition could be coming soon in the West because Bytedance, Tiktok’s
parent company, recently bought Pico.
This was confirmed like a month ago, which is huge news.
It may surprise you to know that Pico is the third largest maker of VR headsets in the
world, estimated by this IDC report.
This is followed by DPVR and Facebook on number 1 of course.
So with Facebook pushing hard into VR, Apple rumored to enter the market, and Sony’s
coming with the PlayStation VR 2 [Hype intensifies]
I guess ByteDance is letting us kindly know that they are also interested in the space.
Understandable, this is the best space ever.
Okay, this may not be the company you want to dive into the standalone VR market, but
competition is always good as it’ll drive companies to find better ways to deal with
us 😉 At least I hope.
Pico sent me the Neo 3 Pro as a loan, so it’s going back after this.
But today, we’ll take a closer look at the Pico Neo 3 and see what is interesting compared
compared with the Quest 2.
This video is also an introduction to the company.
At the end, I have some exciting news to share on what’s coming in the standalone market.
So make sure to stay tuned until the end, hit that like button to support us for free,
and now join me beyond reality.
This is the headset sold in China right now by Pico Studios.
Interestingly, it’s being sold in China with a lot of Quest 2 content.
Then we got the Neo 3 Pro.
This is the headset being sold to businesses in the West by Pico Interactive.
It’s more expensive since enterprise headsets usually get business services like extra support
and options.
This price range is already strong competition to the enterprise versions of the Oculus Quest
2, which goes for $800, and the HTC VIVE Focus 3, which goes for $1300.
But what’s the difference between these two?
Not much.
The inside is even super similar to the Quest 2.
The Pico Neo 3 has a Qualcomm XR2 chip and 6GB of RAM.
It is available in storage sizes 128 and 256GB.
The display is a single 5.5 inch LCD, and the resolution is 3664 x 1920 in total, 90
Hz refresh rate, and it has fresnel lenses.
But it does have a slightly larger field of view than the Quest 2.
Most else is similar, a fixed IPD adjustment in 3 settings.
Inside-out tracking with 4 cameras.
They’re even at the same spot!
Integrated audio and a 3.5 mm audio jack.
Between the two Neos though, the obvious difference is the strap!
The Pico Neo 3 Pro comes with an Elite strap look-a-like, except this one can go 90 degrees
up, which is nice if you just want to peek at something without putting it on.
Then the Pico Neo 3 PRO line also has an Eye variant.
That one has the same specs, except the RAM is 8 GB instead of 6, and it has Tobii Eye
Tracking hardware.
What Pico has always been good at is the weight balance for comfort.
They were the first to put the battery at the back, allowing for near-perfect balance.
So the headset is comfortable, even with their ‘soft strap.’
Something I hope all standalone headsets will have in the future until we get tiny headsets.
The battery in here can also carry more power.
The Quest 2 has 3640 mAH, while the Pico Neo has a 5300 mAH battery.
Interestingly, this doesn’t really give that much more battery life.
Maybe 15 to 30 minutes max, depending on what you do.
So I’ve been testing the Pico Neo 3 with games installed on the headset natively.
And well, it’s a solid headset.
The image quality looks good, and I notice the larger field of view, which is nice, but
honestly, it’s just kinda the same compared to Quest—the colors.
The latency.
The sweet spot is just as big, or I should say just as small…
I’m impressed by the passthrough cameras, though.
It seems to have a higher refresh rate than the Quest 2 so it’s super comfortable to
secretly watch what Chary’s doing….
I’m just kidding I don’t do that :P
The previous Pico Neo 2, which we reviewed as well, link is below.
That one had an interesting controller tracking mechanism.
It used electromagnetic tracking, which allowed for controller tracking even out of sight
of the cameras.
While that mechanism was very cool and worked, there was also a more considerable risk of
drifting issues.
Maybe that’s why Pico moved away from this and is now using optical tracking sensors,
32 of them to be exact.
This combined with four cameras on the headset, it can track well in bright or dark rooms.
I think it performs similar to Quest 2, but I do believe the Quest 2 has better tracking
prediction software.
So I’ve caught myself losing controller tracking more often on the Pico Neo 3 than
on Quest.
Not that much to make it annoying, though.
And yes, the Pico Neo 3 also allows you to play PC VR games by streaming it wirelessly
with WiFi6 using their own streaming software.
It works, but I couldn’t get the same image quality as with Oculus Air Link or Virtual
Desktop.
This can probably be improved but for now I guess the Pico VR streaming software just
lacks behind.
What’s cool though is that the Neo 3 supports NVIDIA’s Direct Mode to provide native 4K
at 90Hz via a special DisplayPort cable.
They didn’t send me this cable, so I couldn’t try this but this would make it a capable
all-in-one headset.
And if you don’t own a VR ready PC, the Neo 3 also supports NVIDIA’s CloudXR, which
lets you stream VR and AR across 5G and Wi-Fi networks.
This could be the first headset that makes use of this, I’m not sure, but it is cool
because that is where we’re all headed eventually.
So yes!
This headset is similar to Quest 2, but it also offers a couple of different new features,
like Cloud streaming, eye tracking, ergonomics, and of course, it’s more accessible because
there’s no FB account needed, which is kinda important for businesses.
Although, I did expect a bit more from Pico as they were pretty innovative with the Pico
Neo 2.
The Neo 3 just didn’t wow me as much.
If you’re interested in getting one, you can contact Pico through their website.
The link is below.
And now, let’s talk about where I think we’re headed.
The next Quest is rumored to have a newer chip, new lenses, 2.2K resolution per eye,
controllers with cameras in them instead of tracking rings, so better tracking.
There’s already talk about micro OLED displays on the Valve Index 2.
Headsets seem to get smaller and smaller form factors could possibly making them way more
comfortable.
Besides these big companies, we also got standalone headsets coming from startups like the Lynx-R,
which is an actual mixed reality headset, so VR combined with AR.
This one, I’m excited to share that we’ll be trying it out next week, so expect a video
on this soon.
I think that’s also where we are headed, true standalone mixed reality headsets that
will be truly comfortable, and they’re coming faster than I thought they would.
This article I mentioned earlier?
The title said: “Facebook Leads the VR Headset Market in Q1 2021 But There’s Plenty of
Room for Others”...
Who is it going to be?
Pico or other companies, what do you think?
Are you ready for it?
Let me know in the comments below as well as what you think of the Pico Neo 3.
I’m giving away a SteamVR game key this time to the one who answers these questions
below in 3 days.
Thanks for watching; leave me a like if you enjoyed it, and a special thanks go to all
our Champions, especially these Patrons down below.
As always, VR on!