I used the Quest Pro for 8hrs/day for a week— Is it good enough for work?
I’m extremely bullish on virtual desktop computing being the killer-app for VR/MR headsets in the near-to-long term future.
I think head-mounted-displays (HMD’s) can help supercharge users for productivity and entertainment use cases — once they’re comfortable and high-res enough.
I was able to work full 8-hour days for around about 2 weeks with the Quest Pro specifically because I was using my 1080p, 15-inch laptop, which wasn’t ideal for productivity.
I plugged in the Quest Pro to my laptop using Oculus Link and used Virtual Desktop to bring my PC’s monitor(s) into VR. I wanted to see if the Quest Pro could supercharge the productivity capabilities of my laptop.
Is the Quest Pro good enough headset to do “computing” with?
Um… almost.
Comfort
Physical
A big problem with most VR headsets is achieving a comfortable fit, especially to use for longer sessions. Users often have to buy secondary straps (HTC Vive DAS, Quest 2 Elite Strap) or often make their own (FrankenQuest 2).
Quest Pro is miles better than the Quest 2 due to:
- Smaller “display box” — pancake lenses allow of the display panel to sit closer to your eyes than traditional fresnel lenses.
- Better weight distribution. The battery and other components being moved to the rear.
To fill up a full 8-hour workday, I wore the headset for 2–3 hour stretches without much issue. This is an immense improvement over the other headsets that I’ve owned (Quest 1, Quest 2, Oculus Rift, HTC Vive).
After 3 full hours, I did start to “feel” the headset on my forehead, which I alleviated by removing the headset and immediately putting it back on, which suddenly felt comfortable again. I do think the headset good be improved with thicker foam/padding for this reason.
Optical
Another big comfort problem with VR headsets results from the fixed-focal optics leading to “vergence-accommodation conflict”. This, of course, isn’t a recent issue with VR headsets (there aren’t any consumer headsets on the market that have varifocal lenses), however the issue is exacerbated due to “computing” use cases.
Let me explain a bit more simply. The Quest Pro’s displays are tuned to be comfortable to look at things about 1.5m away. You can look at things that are closer than that, but if you do so for a long period, such as staring at a virtual monitor 30cm away from you for a few hours, your eyes and head will hurt.
I made the mistake of not accounting for this on my 1st full day of work with the Quest Pro and a few hours; I realized that I was in quite a bit of pain, had to stop working, and needed to rest.
However, all hope is not lost as there is a simple workaround for this issue.
The way to not experience the vergence-accommodation conflict is to not look at things closer than the lens’s optimal focal distance — meaning, if you’re staring at a virtual monitor that’s 30cm away, you can push that monitor 2m away and increase its size.
Effectively, you’re still looking at a monitor at the same size/resolution/FOV as before, but it’s just at a much more comfortable, viewable distance now.
By doing that, I did not experience any visual discomfort over the 8-hour workday in VR.
Peripheral Vision Blockers
The Quest Pro has removable peripheral vision blockers which open up your peripheral vision to the room that you’re in while wearing the headset.
This is fantastic from a productivity perspective because “immersive-ness” isn’t the most important metric for productivity.
Being able to see the keyboard on your desk, peep at your phone, and see your coworkers around you is a massive improvement for headsets becoming standard-issue office devices.
This, combined with mixed-reality apps with the color passthrough feature bring this VR headset into the realm of AR, where you finally feel like you can have the benefits of VR’s spatial computing without the isolating drawbacks. I loved being able to make eye-contact (at least one-way) with my coworkers when talking to them.
However, when playing active VR games without the peripheral vision blockers, I did feel motion sickness.
I suspect this is due to your brain detecting the slight tracking inaccuracies that are only noticeable when your brain has IRL sight to directly compare the VR 6DOF tracking to. As good as Quest’s 6DOF tracking is, it’s not as seamless as your vision IRL, so by opening up the peripheral vision for your brain to see both, it notices the discrepancy between the two and makes you feel sick.
Display
Resolution
The most important question from a “computing” perspective is: is it finally good enough to be on par with 1080p monitors?
While the Quest Pro display resolution isn’t really higher than Quest 2’s display (at 1800 × 1920 per eye), the display does feel sharper. I set my monitor display resolution at 1080p at 100% scaling, and for the first time, it did feel “sharp enough”, especially compared to the Quest 2 at the same desktop monitor resolution.
However, I still think it could be better though, because at 1080p at 100% scale, it just barely passes my minimum expectation of display resolution and sharpness.
Text Clarity
I noticed that black text on white backgrounds has a fair bit of aliasing (more than text on other colored backgrounds). You also notice a fair bit of shimmering when trying to keep your head still.
I suspect that it might be related to the display’s sub-pixel layout. Or perhaps it’s an issue that native Quest apps might not have (but desktop apps through Link do).
Brightness uniformity
While the pancake lenses do have significant improvements over Fresnel lenses, they do also bring about certain drawbacks, in particular, the lack of brightness uniformity across the entire FOV.
The center of the FOV is the brightest while the periphery of the FOV is noticeably dim. This is a factor to keep in mind for visual design and video production work.
Battery
A final note on the battery life of the headset.
Since I had it plugged in to my laptop for Oculus Link, the headset was being charged. However, it seems like the headset wasn’t received enough power to prevent any discharge at all (using an Anker PowerLine II USB-C to USB 3.1 cable, a USB-A 3.1 port on my laptop, and the USB C port on the Quest Pro).
This isn’t a problem if you start using the headset when it’s at 100% battery but I did have situations where the headset wasn’t properly seated on its dock and so it didn’t charge overnight. In that situation, I did deal with the headset dying in the middle of my workday which wasn’t great.
Conclusion (TLDR)
So, is the Quest Pro good enough headset to do “computing” with? Almost.
The comfort finally feels good enough for productivity work. The optics have improvements as well as some drawbacks (the lack of brightness uniformity in particular). The removable light blockers are fantastic for removing the isolating feeling of VR but they introduce motion sickness when playing active games. The display resolution feels like it’s almost as sharp as you’d want it to be.
Would I like to own and use one? Certainly.
Will I be buying one? No.
