This is the arpara.
On Kickstarter they are selling it as the World’s First 5K Micro-OLED All-In-One VR
headset.
It’s supposed to be the Meta Quest 2 competitor.
They also have a similar separate version with a cable, so for PC VR gaming.
You can already back the project for between 430 to 630 US dollars depending on which version
you want and they expect to ship it in March, this year.
But I’m here to tell you that you should be weary of this.
The Kickstarter is ending Saturday and still, no one other than the company has tried the
all-in-one version so far.
This can be okay since many Kickstarter projects are usually in the prototyping phase but arpara’s
estimated delivery is next month.
So I think it’s strange that it’s not ready to be reviewed yet.
They did however send me the tethered PC VR version, which I think is still interesting
to look at because the displays specs are similar so it can give a good idea of both.
And that’s also what makes this headset special.
There are OLED microdisplays in here that can achieve high resolutions whilst being
only at a fraction of the size of most current VR headsets.
This is how they were able to make this headset so tiny.
Biggest advantage of these smaller form factors is that it SHOULD make VR more comfortable
for longer play sessions as it’s lighter, and of course, this is awesome, you can drink
whilst in VR.
Way to feed my addiction :')
However, these displays are really new and they come with disadvantages.
This is why it hasn’t been used yet in other headsets.
So can arpara, a company we’ve never heard of before, actually make it happen before
any other company?
Well...
I’m pretty skeptical because of things that happened, which I’m sharing today.
We’ll also take this headset under the loop to see whether they had to compromise anything,
and I’ll let you know if I think it’s worth backing.
I’m Cas, and this is your channel for content about XR that you can watch for free.
All I ask in return, is to smash that like button and maybe watch the ads 😉. And now,
join me beyond reality.
So like I said, I don’t have the standalone all-in-one version, sadly.
They sent me this tethered version that needs to be connected via cable to a PC to work.
Just like most other PC VR headsets, you connect it with SteamVR.
What is fun is that they also made it possible to connect it to a laptop or mobile phone.
It’ll then act like an external display, which can be handy if you want to use it to
watch movies or to work.
Maybe you don’t have a TV or monitor at hand.
You can just bring this thing.
Now, the strangest things happened when they send me this headset.
Not only did Arpara send me a cable that didn’t fit in the headset, so I had to shave my own
cable to make it fit.
But they also send the headset with Nolo tracking.
I had a glimpse of hope that it was improved after all those years.
Sadly, it still not good tracking.
So I spoke out about it (as well as others) and I guess arpara decided to not include
the Nolo tracking completely now, which is a good thing.
So this is what you get if you back it now.
The cheapest version doesn’t come with external tracking so it only supports 3-degrees-of-freedom
tracking, which means very limited movement.
Probably just enough to use it as an external display.
That’s it, and frankly, I would not get this version.
The more expensive Kickstarter pledges after this will come with an arpara Tracker.
That’s this tiny external module that you can mount on the headset.
This makes it possible to use SteamVR and get 6-degrees-of-freedom tracking, so natural
movement like we’re used to with all headsets nowadays.
This works with any SteamVR base stations and compatible controllers.
So keep in mind that these are extra things you would have to buy with this headset.
Now, as you may know SteamVR tracking doesn’t have the easiest setup but is still the most
reliable and best tracking method so far.
Getting SteamVR setup with the arpara was easy.
I didn’t need to do much, just turn on my base stations that were already setup and
start up SteamVR.
Aside from some software bugs that definitely needs polishing, it worked well.
I could use it with the Valve Index Controllers and the tracking is as expected.
This makes it possible to play most SteamVR games.
However, interestingly, I couldn’t use the headset to play Hitman 3.
To me, that says that certain games also need to support the headset and given that this
brand isn’t very known, it could be that you’ll bump into SteamVR games that may
not work.
Something to bare in mind too.
Here’s the headset without the tracker on it.
It’s tiny AF
This is with the tracker.
Still tiny AF.
I actually adore this part of the headset.
It comes with two straps if you purchase the tethered unit.
This Elite headstrap and this soft headstrap, both can be mounted and demounted easily.
Comfort could be better with the Elite strap though as there is not enough flex to make
it feel nice.
It’s kinda opposites world with the Quest 2, because here, the soft strap actually feels
way better.
I guess since it’s light enough, even with the tracker, so this is my preferred way of
using it.
It’s a pretty sturdy headset, but the material is almost all plastic and every part feels
a bit loose.
It doesn’t feel like great build quality because of that, but I can tell you I dropped
the headset twice by accident, and it still works.
That’s something.
What I don’t like is this cable’s position, it’s weird and it’s always in the way.
Ok, now the most interesting part, saved for last because it helps the youtube algorithm
if you watch the entire video.
Love you guys :D
It's the display!
There’s two OLED microdisplays in there and pancake optics.
There’s a manual IPD adjustment and individual diopter dials on the lenses.
I don’t wear glasses, but for some reason I actually do need to set them individually
to make the screen look sharp.
I guess I need that checked.
Too bad, the diopters are a bit annoying to adjust as you need to wear the headset while
adjusting it
I was surprised I could fit these glasses in there too but my goodness, it’s so uncomfortable.
So the diopters will definitely help some people.
And this is interesting.
The headset supports different resolutions that you can set by pressing a button below
the headset.
For VR with the SteamVR tracker, 2 resolutions are supported:
For other use cases like watching movies or playing non-VR games, it supports a maximum
refresh rate of 120Hz at these resolution modes.
Nice options.
I’ve mostly been playing VR games on 70Hz as that’s the one with the highest resolution,
but I also tested the almost 4K resolution at 90Hz.
And I think those OLED micro displays look absolutely gorgeous.
One of the disadvantages of the displays is the lower screen brightness.
Arpara optimized the screen brightness recently with a firmware update and while it’s still
darker than what I’m used to, I don’t think it’s bad at all.
It still looks sharp and it has a good color contrast.
There’s no screen door effect and the sweet spot is larger than what I’m used to.
There’s maybe a slight glare because of the lens rounding here in the middle, but
it’s so little, it’s not distracting at all.
What you can probably tell is that the field of view can’t be the best because of the
smaller lenses and yes, it is smaller than most headset’s I’ve tried.
As always, here are my personal measurements and as you can see the FOV is smaller than
most, but the visual acuity is better than most.
Honestly, I don’t think the smaller FOV is bad.
I don’t mind it.
But while the clarity is almost edge-to-edge, you can see the colors change and a slight
blur if you look far to the sides without moving your head.
This combined with the smaller FOV, it does give games a bit of a permanent vignette look.
But it’s not so bad that it bothers me, I think it’s actually better than shape
distortion that some headsets have, some other headsets...
So while playing, I tend to forget about the vignette on this headset.
However, what does bother me the most that the display has some kind of smearing at even
the slightest movement of my head.
I can’t exactly pinpoint what it is, but it looks like ghosting.
It makes me think that arpara had to compensate in screen latency or response time or something.
You won’t notice it playing standing games, but if you play games where you move your
head a lot (which is most games).
Then even at the highest refresh rate you’ll have this smearing effect and frankly, it
makes me a bit motion sick.
Ok, I think I should stop here as I wanted to cover this headset because there’s so
many interesting things about it and that from an unknown company with probably a small
budget and team.
Making a VR headset and calibrating displays for eyes and faces that are so different per
person is just very difficult.
We’ve learned about it first-hand.
So I do respect arpara for being able to achieve so much, but I just can’t recommend it at
this price because I think there are better value for your money headsets out there.
If it was just the ghosting, I might have been more inclined to recommend it because
they may be able to fix that.
However, it’s not just that but it’s also everything else we talked about today.
Like it’s strange that the all-in-one version isn’t ready even a month before the expected
shipping date.
And even if they were able to ship it, there’s still one problem and that’s content.
There won’t be much to play unless developers see the value to spend time and make games
for it.
On top of that, oled microdisplays are facing manufacturing issues right now, so I just
don’t have much trust that arpara can fix it in a reasonable amount of time.
By the time they did, I’m pretty sure there will be more headsets out there with these
specs that are more well-rounded.
Don't get me wrong, I really do hope Arpara will succeed, and that hopefully they will
take this as feedback instead of critique but for now until that’s all fixed, I would
suggest waiting for better.
Let me know what you think of the arpara headset in the comments below.
Thanks for watching.
A special thanks to all our Champions, especially these Patrons right over here.
As always, VR on!