"Quest Pro": Zuckerberg shows new VR headset

The principle remains unchanged: You slip the headset over your head, take the two controllers in your hands to steer and, with the display in front of your eyes, either plunge completely into a virtual environment - or stay in the real world and pepper it with virtual elements.

This is particularly useful for collaboration from the home office.

This, he says, is particularly useful for home office collaboration. The Quest Pro is primarily aimed at users in the work environment. For this purpose, it brings some innovations compared to the Quest 2, which Meta launched on the market in 2020. The Quest Pro is significantly slimmer in design, but at 722 grams it is 219 grams heavier. According to Zuckerberg, however, it is more comfortable to wear because the battery is now located at the back of the head.

Inside the ski goggle-like device sits a Snapdragon XR2-Plus processor from Qualcomm. Wearers of the Quest Pro are served 1800 x 1920 pixels per eye - the animated content flickers across the display at a maximum refresh rate of 90 hertz. Cameras on the outside of the headset can bring the real environment onto the display.

Meta is including two new controllers and a charging station with the headset. In addition, the new VR headset comes with these specifications:

• 12 GB RAM
• 256 GB of storage
• Bluetooth 5.2 / Wi-Fi 6E
• Spatial audio
• 1-2 hours battery life

With the help of small cameras on the inside, the Quest Pro recognises your facial expressions. According to Zuckerberg, this "expression tracking" ensures that your avatar in the Metaverse naturally reflects your facial expressions.

All the fun is in the audio.

All this fun comes with a hefty bill. The Quest Pro costs 1599 Swiss francs - more than three times as much as the Quest 2, which is resold in parallel. You can pre-order the Quest Pro from the international Meta shop for Switzerland. Meta will start shipping the devices on 25 October - it is still unclear if and when they will be available on Digitec.

Working in virtual workspaces

Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella also made a brief appearance at the Meta event. This to highlight the collaboration between Meta and Microsoft. Microsoft's Word, Excel, PowerPoint and Outlook programmes are coming soon to the Quest Pro and Quest 2, according to the two executives. That, via "Horizon Workrooms" - the virtual workspaces Meta released in beta last year.

Until now, users could only enter these workrooms with a VR headset. Soon, however, this will also be possible via the desktop. The communication platforms Zoom and Microsoft Teams will be the entry gates for this. According to Zuckerberg, the Zoom integration will come in 2023 - when we will be able to enter Metaverse meetings in Microsoft Teams via the desktop is not yet known.