So you’re interested in buying one of Meta’s standalone VR headsets. But Quest 3S and Quest 3 look very similar, so which one should you buy? Read on for our no-nonsense recommendation.

Let’s make this real easy:

If you’ve never owned a VR headset before (Google Cardboard and Gear VR don’t count in this case): Buy Quest 3S.

Why: Not everybody who buys a VR headset continues to use it for the long term. Many people don’t find something that keeps them coming back, and within six months their headset is sitting in a drawer somewhere. Quest 3S is the most affordable option to find out if you’re someone who will use VR for the long term. It looks a bit worse visually than Quest 3, but has the same power so it plays all the same games and will be supported for just as long.

If you’ve previously owned a PC VR, PSVR, or Quest 2 headset: Buy Quest 3

Why: If you already know you like VR and use it regularly, you’re going to appreciate the sharper image, slightly wider field-of-view, larger sweet spot, and increased storage size of Quest 3 compared to Quest 3S. Especially if you’re coming from Quest 2, Quest 3S isn’t going to look that much better because it has the same screen and same lenses, which means it isn’t going to feel like as much of an upgrade.

If you want to dig into more detail, check out our full specs comparison of Quest 2, Quest 3S, and Quest 3 here.

That’s it. That’s the whole article.

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Ben Lang
Ben is the world's most senior professional analyst solely dedicated to the XR industry, having founded Road to VR in 2011—a year before the Oculus Kickstarter sparked a resurgence that led to the modern XR landscape. He has authored more than 3,000 articles chronicling the evolution of the XR industry over more than a decade. With that unique perspective, Ben has been consistently recognized as one of the most influential voices in XR, giving keynotes and joining panel and podcast discussions at key industry events. He is a self-described "journalist and analyst, not evangelist."

  • Well… yes and no. If someone owned a Quest 2 but it's broke and want to experiment with mixed reality, he should buy the Quest 3s

    • javon27

      Or do like I did before the 3S was announced and sell the 2 and buy a 3. I know, not helpful, but with all the leaks, the conclusion from this article could've been made back then

      • Christian Schildwaechter

        We've seen Quest sales peak yearly around Christmas, with player numbers/software sales shooting up and then dropping again 3-4 months laters. Indicating that a lot of Quest buyers are not actively following VR, but the wishlists of their teenage kids instead..

        And even of those already actively using a Quest, the vast majority doesn't engage at a level that would allow them to strategically sell shortly before a new hardware launch.

        "Then, from an ecosystem perspective, we believed that if we get to 10 million units active, then that’s kind of a critical magic number. At that point, you have a self-sustaining ecosystem. […] And that will really be a new stage of VR." – Zuckerberg 2020

        We now seem to be finally close to the 10mn active Quest users supposed to make the platform attractive enough for developers, though still far from profitable for Meta. similarweb estimates total monthly visits for uploadvr as 850K and roadtovr as 450K. Unique monthly visitors will be a small fraction of that, but even if it was a whopping 25% with no overlap, 96.5% of 10mn active Quest users would never visit either of the most popular VR news sites. We just live in an enthusiasts bubble, massively overestimating both general interest in VR and the engagement of average VR users.

        • XRC

          It's true, very few care outside our bubble, but hey what a great bubble!

          Lost count of the amount of friends, family, guests, occasional visitors that got to try my PCVR systems since 2016. All amazed, but not enough to purchase.

          During early 2017 I ran "roomscale plus" sessions in London's Canary Wharf had about 30 people visit over three weeks including two members of big G's London AR/VR team.

          Again, all amazed, including an actor from a neighbouring building hosting a film shoot – who proclaimed it was witchcraft and fled back onto her set! (In hindsight a horror title wasn't a great choice) but no purchases…

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.

            Arthur C. Clarke's third law

          • XRC

            Still waiting for his space elevator to be built ;)

          • We need more diamonds for that.

    • eadVrim

      Possible, but Mixed Reality, even though it's cool and fun, but it is still not sharp, and it's even less sharp than the Quest 3.

      • Christian Schildwaechter

        Mixed Reality isn't sharp on either Quest 3 or 3S due to passthrough cameras/compute limits. Fresnels add fuzziness, but pancakes have a much higher impact in rendered games with a clear image than with the noticeable low resolution of MR.

        And huge amounts of Quest players play ONLY Gorilla Tag, Beat Saber/fitness games or one of the golf simulations. These games in a brutal way outperform the high profile, high fidelity graphics games that really benefit from pancakes on the Horizon store, often staying in the top 20 for years, while the AAAs quickly drop out. Regarding actual play time, they leave Asgard's Wrath 2, AC Nexus, RE4 or MoH even further behind. Many of the most active Quest players with a limited sets of games using simpler graphics won't benefit a lot from extra clarity.

        With MR still most useful as a comfort feature and very few Quest 3 exclusive games, a lot will get even a Quest 3S only once their Quest 2 breaks. VR golfers be an exception, as many were never gamers, bought a Quest only for Golf and still don't play other games, but apparently can afford expensive VR-golf-only Quest accessories. Those probably won't be bothered by USD 500 for a Quest 3 with limited benefits for them either.

        • Traph

          >And huge amounts of Quest owners play ONLY Gorilla Tag, Beat Saber/fitness games or one of the golf simulations

          Afaik, the only traditional game to ever (briefly) compete with the above titles in terms of hours played was the Zenith MMO. It snagged the top spot in the overall sales chart on Steam, something no other VR title has ever accomplished besides Alyx. While we all know how that particular tragedy ended, it was entirely the fault of the self-sabotaging studio on nearly every level.

          I’m still baffled that Meta hasn’t entered the MMO genre considering it clearly has major unmet demand and plays heavily into the social angle where they have yet to see any successes despite literally being Facebook. Prestige titles like Batman are fine and all, but they’re not driving retention one bit – and all of the third party shovelware is going to catch them in the Nintendo Wii trap if they don’t course correct.

  • sfmike

    Just give me a Quest 3 with high rez OLED screen and I would buy it in a heartbeat.

    • Just give me true VR interactivie SQID's as in the films "Brainstorm" and "Strange Days"…..

      • XRC

        Where is Lenny with my SQUID clip?

        Want to experience that restaurant robbery….

    • MeowMix

      you're spouting some fundamental ignorance with your VR knowledge…. OLEDOS and such…..

    • Andrew Jakobs

      Yeah ofcourse everybody would, but at this time it just isn't possible to put a headset like the Quest 3 on the market with OLED displays and still keep that 'low' price. For mainstream price is the bottleneck.

      • They don't want to hear reality, they just wanna armchair develop their own dream headset. "I want the size of Cardboard with the weight of a XReal with 4k OLED screens and Pancake lenses and a DisplayPort connection and full passthrough 12k MR and I wanna pay $199 for it" …. again, reality does not compute in their mental equations.

        • ApocalypseShadow

          OP never said for a low price or mainstream. He said make an OLED display version and he'd buy it. At best it would be $600-$700. Just over the $500 version. It sounds like he can afford it. But both of you jumped to reading something he didn't type.

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            OLED panels cost ~30% more than LCD panels, but there are no OLED panels bright enough to work with pancake lenses. They'd either have to switch back to Fresnel or aspheric lenses, or use still very expensive microOLED displays (similar name, different technology), or stack two panels for tandem OLED, new tech at ~250% the price of regular panels not yet available for VR.

            Many assume that all it take is replacing the LCD panel with an OLED one like in the past, and criticize Quest 3 for still using LCD or PSVR2 for still using Fresnel. But compared to Fresnel losing < 20% of the light, pancakes lose ~90%. They need much brighter displays, achieved by cranking up the backlights on microOLED or LCD, not an option on self-illuminating OLED panels. The only HMDs offering pancakes with OLED are AVP with Sony 3.5K microOLEDs costing USD 700, and Bigscreen Beyond with less bright and somewhat cheaper 2.5K microOLEDs from BOE.

            So Meta could build an OLED (panel) Quest 3S with Fresnel for USD 400, but not an OLED Quest 3 for USD 700. They could build a Quest 3 with microOLED, but at probably 60%-100% higher cost due to both expensive displays and selling in much lower numbers. They will wait for microOLED prices to significantly fall first.

          • Arno van Wingerde

            Some Quest3 users, myself included, would happily pay double the price for a Quest3OLED version. But not all that many, which would result in AVP like prices. And that device would also be obsolete for most users within a few years when there are many Quest4 exclusives….

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            TL;DR: Don't buy a microOLED XR2 Gen 2 HorizonOS HMD from Asus, if by some miracle 3rd party HMDs actually make it to the market.

            Quest 3 is an odd interim product. Its XR2 Gen 2 allows for up to 3K per eye and offers 2.5x the GPU performance. But to get that performance boost while keeping total power consumption/heat manageable, Meta underclocks the CPU in games to only 17% more performance than on Quest 2. And they only increased the resolution by about 11% in each direction, to use the extra GPU performance for improved graphics and higher details instead of only more pixels. The more important/successful model will be Quest 3S, basically a Quest 2 speed bump, with Quest 3 the more expensive enthusiast version with better lenses, tracking and resolution, but still no big new features, and still not good enough for regular XR productivity user.

            I'd expect Quest 4 to provide a much bigger jump. Hopefully hires microOLEDs will have become cheap enough to actually go for 3K+ resolution. At current yearly SoC performance increases an XR2 Gen 3 won't be fast enough to drive that, so they will have to rely on eye tracking, dynamic foveated rendering, DLSS-like upscaling and a lot of AI driven performance tricks. XR2 Gen 2 already offers 8x the AI performance of Gen 1, currently mostly used for full-body tracking for avatars., but NPUs are where SoC now see the really huge gains, making it a much bigger factor on Quest 4.

            Quest 4 should therefore allow for a new class of games and apps not possible on previous generations, while Quest 3 mostly allowed "prettier" games. For now most developers will target both Quest 2 and 3 simply because of the larger Quest 2 install base. With increasing Quest 3S sales, more games will offer improved graphics for the newer generations, but Quest 3 exclusives no longer targeting Quest 2 are extremely risky, requiring more effort for a much smaller install/sales base, so those will stay limited.

            With Quest 4 expected for 2026 and very likely including hardware for which creating exclusive games makes a lot more sense, everybody buying a (hypothetical) microOLED Quest 3 from Asus/Lenovo will be pretty much screwed. You'd get the nice OLED display with pancakes, but for an HMD that will see only a limited amounts of exclusive titles that really benefit from it due to the Quest 2 dominance, while not getting the exclusives for Quest 4, which will be driven by high resolution and interaction with eye tracking simply not available on Quest 3.

            IMO Quest 3 is mostly a Quest 2 Pro as in PS4 Pro, that won't see any benefits from Quest 4/PS5 games. Of course most games, esp. more casual titles, will still also target older Quests for a long time after 2026. But with Quest 3S only having two years to gain market share as the entry level model compared to four years for Quest 2, many games might then target either Quest 4 only for its exclusive capabilities, or still Quest 2 for the largest possible audience. Making Quest 3 an odd interim product, and a significantly more expensive OLED Quest 3 very likely a bad investment, bringing limited advantages only for a short time.

          • Arno van Wingerde

            Yes, that is what I meant about a Q3OLED model risk. But I disagree a bit on the time table and Q4 expectations. I am not yet convinced of the blessings of the NPU, and I definitely do not expect a permanent jump, unless Meta switches to and external compute part… or streaming games. Standalone performance will grow, but using even the current chip fully will require much larger cooling/battery options. I would expect the Q4 to be about as much of an improvement over the Q3 as the Q3 is over the Q2. If the current pattern holds, you would see Q4 exclusives getting a major share of the market by 2028, leaving 3 years if a party steps in with a Q3+ , somewhat higher performance and OLED. If the set offers decent wireless streaming, it could still be a good PCVR headset in 2028.

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            TL;DR: GTA San Andreas original/with AI side-by-side youtu_be/FJ-uJdknNVc

            I expect bigger improvements on Quest 4 not because CPU/GPU compute would go up. If anything, yearly performance increases have gone down over time.

            The real improvements will come from doing things differently, and we already see the first signs. It turns out to be much more energy efficient to train a network on recognizing body postures from just head/torso/arm position than deriving a skeletal mode from camera images. Hand tracking with lots of occluding fingers also gets better thanks to AI trained on thousands of hand positions. These "smarter software" improvements go far beyond what regular performance improvements would make possible. Not really a new thing, I remember a 90s presentation on weather prediction stating that over the previous decade hardware improvements allowed for a 1000-fold increase in detail, while better algorithms allowed for a 4000-fold increase.

            Meta is betting on AI/NPUs for e.g. realistic avatars with detail levels similar to what Unreal Engine's MetaHuman allows today on high end desktop GPUs. Given the improvements AI image generation has made in just a few years, that might actually work without having to wait a decade for mobile GPU performance to catch up. Which is why they'll throw AI at anything, from tracking to upscaling and visuals.

            There is a whole series of Half-Life/Skyrim/GTA IV "with ultra-realistic graphics Gen 3" YouTube videos by SOUNDTRICK and others with decade(s) game footage reimagined with Runway AI. Still flawed with the same old, janky animations, but when you split-screen compare the visuals for GTA San Andreas, which Meta considered simple enough to run on Quest, to what is achieved with an AI someone threw at it in their basement without game specific training, AI looks like a very promising way to skip ten years of waiting time for faster hardware. Whether this actually works out, or whether we are already reaching a plateau regarding AI performance and glitches, remains to be seen.

          • Thank you for injecting actual information into this. I swear, these guys know nothing about how anything is built, yet they have ALL THE OPINIONS on how it should be done.

  • David Glenn

    The good news is that the Quest 3 got a little cheaper, but how long is that going to last? Best odds is that the Geek Glasses will be the next big thing, or they will come out with the Quest 4 that will just be a slightly improved Quest Pro!

  • Nomad

    I think I disagree with this logic. The difference in optics alone could be the difference between an enjoyable or an unpleasant experience. Buying a 3S could turn people off from VR all together.

    • Mateusz Jakubczyk

      Sorry, but that's bullshit. Regular, new users don't care about the lenses. If the Quest 2 was still on sale, it would still be breaking sales records and no one would be bothered by its lenses. PSVR2 fans don't mind them either…

    • Nevets

      Yes.

    • Christian Schildwaechter

      For years people claimed that Cardboard was bad for VR, that the experience might turn off people from VR all together, despite 50mn+ distributed by reputable sources like the NYTimes and 160mn+ Cardboard apps downloaded before Rift and Vive even launched, making it the biggest promotion VR could ever have hoped for.

      So it is only consequent to now claim that using the same lenses as the most popular VR headset ever, Quest 2 with ~25m sold, could lead to such an unpleasant experience that it could again drive people away from VR.

      But of course that's utter nonsense. If people didn't understand that price and available technology impact experience, all Black Friday sales would end in riots. Nobody will assume a 2024 USD 299 HMD is the limit of what VR could ever achieve and therefore give up on VR forever.

      But the core thing, once we took this, not very great experience and anybody you can go get essentially the same experience where — really Google cardboard is better than what the first cut of the stuff from Samsung was like. And by the way I think Google cardboard is a wonderful thing. I think that it’s been great for Oculus and for VR, for Google to have done that, where they — I think it was a very wise choice position — is actually make it out of cardboard, so people will not judge it too harshly. – John Carmack at OC 2014

  • Whatever happened to the Quest Pro 2?

  • Michael Speth

    You shouldn't buy any Meta VR headsets because you are being mined for the future that Meta intends which is to filter everything you see and hear. Meta loses billions of dollars every month to bring you their cheap VR knock off headsets. You are the product and you are enabling meta by buying into their products.

    • mwbrady

      Maybe, but it's so awesome.

      • Michael Speth

        There are better options like PSVR2 than Meta Quest. PSVR2 is designed to be a gaming device without the intention of harvesting your data to create a device that attempts to replace your eyes with their content as Meta is openly doing. Comparison of a Quest 3S to PSVR2 is that PSVR2 is superior in every way when it comes to gaming except for price.

        • Dr Dub

          Huh?

          I have a Quest 3 and PSVR2, and in my view the Quest is superior by a significant margin.

          Primarily a lens and screen issue. The claimed benefits of the PSVR2 OLED panels are rendered void by the mura grain and light flaring/blurring with the fresnels.

          It’s a blurry headset with a narrow sweet spot, and incredibly uncomfortable as you have to crank the strap up so tight to prevent the sweet spot shifting.

          I’d recommend the full fat Quest 3 over the cut down version as in my view fresnels no longer have a place.

          • Michael Speth

            The stock strap on Quest 3 is a laughing stock. PSVR2 is better but getting the 3rd party Globular Cluster strap for the PSVR2 is really good bc it keeps the HMD locked into the sweet spot with also several different cushions maximizing comfort.

            The OLED is far superior to Quest 3 with it's grainy blacks. I don't see Mura, have u checked that u haven't damaged the lense anti-glare? Alot of people use harsh chemicals which cause the anti-glare coating to come off and cause issues.

            Quest3S has fresnels but Meta cheapes out and put the garbage LCD panel from Quest2. The reason for Fresnel on PSVR2 is bc pancake constrain the lighting too much. Even micro OLEDs are dim.

            I would never recommend Meta garbage for the above reasons but also the games are generations old graphics. VR games have been retarded due to the success and failure of the Quest 2.

          • Dr Dub

            I just put a cheap after market strap on the Quest as does everyone.

            If you are going down the road of denying the very well documented mura exists, then this entire conversation is a waste of time as it’s not good faith.

          • Michael Speth

            Did you try the cheap Globular Cluster on the PSVR2? Otherwise you are denying the very well documented easy to achieve fixed sweet spot then this entire conversation is a waste of time as it's not good faith.

          • Mateusz Jakubczyk

            So what, will Mura disappear then? :P What's the point of achieve a sweet spot if the screen is still blurry at the edges? Try using a headset with pancake lenses, then you'll know what the difference is :P

          • Michael Speth

            So what if the image is clear when the image is garbage tier graphics that is produced on Meta Quest 3. Or you can clearly see the Decompression Artifacts due to the indirect connection method. You can also clearly see the latency introduced by the indirect method as well.

            The PSVR2 doesn't have compression artifacts nor latency which the Quest 3S and Quest 3 have. On top of that, the Quest 3S has the inferior low resolution LCD panels which are a joke for a modern HMD.

          • Andrew Jakobs

            At least no wire with the Quest headsets, and used as a PCVR headset the Quest 3 shows perfectly awesome graphics. To me any headset with a wire, no matter how good the displays/lenses are, are crap headsets and only good for flight- or drivingsimulations, and those are not the games/experienced I play.

          • Michael Speth

            I have kiwi design ceiling mounts. The cable is not an issue at all for me.

            How do you like your compression artifacts and latency?

          • Andrew Jakobs

            Yep, in the end before I switched over to the vive wireless module I too used the kiwi pulley's, they certainly are an improvement, but still nowhere near as nice as fully wireless. With the vive pro wireless module I hardly see any difference compared to wired and latency isn't a problem at all.

        • Andrew Jakobs

          Nope PSVR2 is out of the question do to the wire. And maybe you should get your head out of your ass, Meta Quest is not Meta Facebook.

          • Michael Speth

            You should get ur head out of Meta's ass. Enjoy ur world filtered by Meta and be a good zombie.

          • Andrew Jakobs

            How is the Quest 3 filtered by Meta, especially if used as a PCVR headset?

          • Michael Speth

            Quest never implemented a direct connection from PC to their HMD. Everything you see goes through Meta's Operation System including PC content. This affirms Meta's intentions for the future.

            If meta cared about you the customer, they would have implemented direct connection to PC. They don't even provide direct connection with a wire.

            The 2 technical limitations with their way of streaming PC content is latency and compression artifacts. But the biggest is that Meta maintains it control over what you see.

          • Michael Speth

            My comment was deleted. I guess bc I put a link to imgur that shows how Meta didn't implement direct connection from the PC. Is it that links are not allowed or proof that meta is garbage not allowed?

          • Andrew Jakobs

            If you imply that the Quest wireless PCVR connection is running through Meta servers then you are really diluted.

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            Unless this was an intended pun on (water) running through something.

            https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f5e82bb7ca933e028c64dd8238163c00eb34d0528b79caec8601b635db26dbec.jpg

          • Michael Speth

            The primary method for a computer to send output to a device is via a direct connection method. For instance, a monitor connected to a PC will use a graphics card to render the image and then directly send the image to the monitor. Drivers generally are necessary to ensure outputting the correct image formatting.

            https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/96feaf9f3dca2e2e0ee1c17a5fa884c4cd051f0495049f50335a0f069c338d40.png
            HMDs have adopted this direct connection method since HMDs inception. PSVR2, Vive, and all non stand alone HMDs use this method as the sole method.

            Stand alone HMDs use direct connection for content that is directly rendered on the GPU. However, the HMD uses an indirect connection method to display images rendered on a PCs GPU.
            https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/0e7a4a12009beeb9f20e0c4eef9c6b28de8dcdd6cd9597ad6ea8b76498e9af8a.png
            Meta could have implemented a direct connection method for PCs but opted not to. This means that all content that comes from a PC regardless if it's via a wire or wireless will pass through Meta's Operating System. There is no way around this as Meta Controls the OS and the hardware simply is not available for direct connection.

            Because of this design decision, there is an opportunity for meta to filter or modify the image before it reaches the HMDs screens.

            This design decision complies with Meta's eventual goal which is to have their device render your reality. Because this gives meta the ultimate control over what you see and hear. There are great Black Mirror episodes that explores this like being able to filter out people due to court order or make "terrorist" look like zombies so soldiers have an easier time murdering them.

            As for delusional, you are delusional by purchasing meta hardware and thinking meta has your best interest when they lose billions every month selling you garbage hardware that eventually will enslave you.

          • Arno van Wingerde

            Oh, the discussion has just gone from PSVR2 fanboy to Meta world dominance by VR: get help help quickly, maybe join a flat Earth group instead?

          • Andrew Jakobs

            Meta could have implemented a direct connection method

            Yes they could have using extra hardware making the headset more expensive. None of the standalone headsets have a real DP connection, probably because the XR2 chipset doesn't support it directly. Even the Focus Vision is questionable as it requires an extra adapter. Personally I don't care about DP on my headset, I don't want a wire to my headset, never again (already hate the wire from the wireless module to the battery).

          • Michael Speth

            You don't care about Direction Connection means you don't care about the future of VR. Direct Connection means you could have the freedom to use the device how you want it without Meta interferring. Not caring means you are accepting that Meta will control what you see and hear.

          • Andrew Jakobs

            But I can already use it how I want to. You really need to get your head examined if you think Meta will block/change any imagecontent you stream from your PC to your headset. Real direct connection is on no headset as the image can all be changed by the OS which controls the chips.

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            You are trying to build a straw man argument here. There are hundreds of more valid reasons for not trusting Meta to respect user privacy, they were involved in countless scandals in the past and it is sufficient to look into their EULA or quarterly reports to see that they are treating user data as a commodity.

            But while Sony isn't as much of a data hoarder, they too allow ads and track data, so this wouldn't allow you to separate it into a simplified Sony good/Meta evil scenario to then declare those still picking Meta as shortsighted, naive or not caring about the future of VR, which they aren't. How about Sony selling PS5 in China with a version region locked to the PRC, with estimates of more than half of the Chinese market relying on grey imports to avoid the content restrictions and surveillance set in place by the Chinese government, which Sony complies with? Facebook doesn't sell anything in China due to their refusal to comply with these content rules. [Another stupid straw man argument vastly oversimplifying the real situation.]

            So instead you picked something that seemingly was a clear pro for Sony and contra for Meta, but as there are very few things that one does and the other doesn't, you went for overemphasizing an obscure technical difference that, as described in my previous comment, isn't even technically valid.

            This is as nonsensical as trying to define one headset as superior to another without first naming the use case. There is no universally "best" for anything, you always end up with a list of pros and cons involving things like cost, content, comfort, availability, usage restrictions and an endless number of things that fall under personal preference. So the mere idea that anyone could "prove" that PSVR2, Quest 3, Valve Index or Varjo XR-4 is the currently best VR headset without first asking for which use case, budget and user is ludicrous. And IMHO every attempt to break down a complex world into a black and white picture of good and bad/evil choices is mostly immature.

            It's hard enough to come to somewhat reasonable decisions after looking into the various details impacting what would be the best solution for one specific case without lots of people running around and making absurd over-simplifications. In the end everyone is somewhat shitty, each one in their own, special way, with the height of the shit pile depending on current perspective. So whenever someone claims that (only) their preferred pile of dung is actually made of gold, it is obvious that they are either clueless, or, more likely, lying through their teeth to convince themselves that they are not stuck in similar muck as anybody else. It smells the same though.

            This world would be a much better place if people accepted that they cannot simply see themselves as on the good side, as everyone is always somehow unavoidably also involved with the evil side too. This would of course then require to actually listen and talk to each other, trying to understand the other side and admitting that there is more than just one way to look at things, and often more than one valid answer. More arduous and less satisfying, but also more constructive and less a waste of everyone's time.

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            There is a fundamental technical flaw in you interpretation of direct vs indirect connection. The direct connection as you see it only existed while we used analog connections like VGA, where the GPU directly controlled the output on the screen. HDMI is a digital protocol where the information is send over several parallel lines in packages that are reassembled on the other side and then stored in a frame buffer by a separate controller driven by a (minimal) OS, meaning HDMI by you definition is an indirect connection .

            And PSVR2 doesn't even use HDMI to transfer the image. It uses USB-C with DP Alt mode, so it is a USB connection just like connecting a Quest 3 via USB. DP Alt means that USB takes one, two or all four of its superspeed data lines and switches them from the rather complex, bidirectional USB protocol to the unidirectional DisplayPort protocol, which results in more bandwidth available for the video signal. But it is received the same as any other USB signal and still runs USB in parallel, with the USB controller then redirecting the DP signal to a dedicated decoder connected to a frame buffer. On e.g. the Pico Neo 3 Link there are both a DP decoder and the XR2 Gen 1 connected to the frame buffer/display, so you could send either native DP or a compressed h.264/h.265 video over the USB-C cable, albeit to different ports for technical reasons.

            As PSVR2 needs to send back more data than would be possible with all four superspeed lines occupied with DP, they only use two of them and leave the other two as USB3 superspeed for sending e.g. camera images back for tracking. But you'd need the bandwidth of all four to run the PSVR2 @120Hz even for only RGB, with HDR10 already exceeding it. Sony solves this by using the DSC (Display Screen Compression) that is part of the DP 1.4 standard at a rather high compression rate. This option is integrated in the GPU on the PS5 and the SoC on the PSVR2.

            But in the end on both PSVR2 and Quest 3 you get a queue of GPU generated image on PC/PS5 -> compressed on GPU with DSC/h.264/h265 -> send via a digital protocol over USB (or Wifi) -> received by USB controller -> video part of the data send to either DSC/h.264/h.265 decoder that is part of the graphics hardware connected to the frame buffer driving the display. The main difference is that decompression of h.264/h.265 (currently) requires rendering the whole image into a frame buffer, while DP is written to the display while later parts are still received, but there are attempts to (in the future) split video streams into smaller sub-images too, not requiring waiting for the whole picture either, for various benefits. And any digital signal could be intercepted at any point and changed, but currently this is completely impractical due to the compute power needed and the massive amount of latency it would add.

            So your distinction between direct and indirect connection as evidence for Meta planing to control the content is based on a misinterpretation of how the signal is actually transferred, your assumption about PSVR2 not having the digital signal routed along a very similar way via USB, making it just as interceptable, is incorrect, and your idea how this could be used to censor the image is highly impractical.

            For an ultra-primitive porn filter any HMD/display could connect a simple chip to the data line feeding the frame buffer, count the number of incoming data packages setting a pixel to something considered skin-colored, and block the whole screen once this exceeds more than 15% of the total pixel count. That is possibly on any device receiving any digital video signal, including those where the signal itself is encrypted by HDCP for copyright protection. Companies/governments interfering with content is no doubt a real danger, but the scenario you are trying to build here makes no sense at all, there are way easier ways to do this, and the (incorrect) distinction between direct and indirect connection simply is not a valid indicator. The different types of connection/transfer pretty much only impact latency, compression artifacts and system load for purely technical reasons.

          • Christian Schildwaechter

            All comments containing links will automatically be flagged for moderation regardless of the actual content, but then won't be checked by a human and instead remain in limbo forever. It's not censorship or even moderation, only a not particularly smart spam filter.

            But nobody is stopping you from uploading the image to disqus and embedding it in your comment, or giving the URL with all dots replaced by underscores, which will prevent it from being flagged, while those interested can easily restore the original address. Not ideal, but an actually effective way to prevent bots from spamming every discussion.

          • Michael Speth

            Thank you for this information. I will try to upload the images.

        • Sony has been harvesting your data since before Facebook even existed you fucking shoe. Are you really crying and screaming about something that you're literally begging for from Sony? As they say, "There's a sucker born every minute."

    • NL_VR

      Sony is mining data as much, forcing PSN login on singleplayer games on Steam.

      • ViRGiN

        That's actually a great thing, will make moving out of Steam more accessible for people in the future.

        Enough with Steam monopoly.

        • NL_VR

          You can buy Steam keys on other stores than Steam. You can even buy steam keys directly from developers if you want.
          Steam is actually the only store that “isnt” monopoly.
          if you want a completly drm free store you should go for GoodOldGames.

          • ViRGiN

            I’m not talking about buying Steam keys from other “stores” (that whole side has been exposed in many situations as completely shady btw), or about DRM.

            Steam has monopoly purely by market share alone. And given how tiny Valve team is, about 350 heads for record-breaking 33 million concurrent users online, and given their lack of any real spending on anything, it’s just not a healthy situation for the entire industry, VR or not. There is nothing to dispute here. Google was found to be monopoly, and sooner or later Valve will have it’s time too.

          • NL_VR

            But you can choose to buy none steam games on got, epic, ea and ubi if you want.
            You cant buy Sony pc games on PSN.

          • ViRGiN

            Doesn’t matter. It’s about redistribution of wealth.
            But since you are nothing than mere peasant consumer, you don’t care that about half of game cost will be steam tax + game engine licenses alone. And all steam has ever done is to host your files; maybe promote it on front page if you are a giant.

            Why not let Amazon take over the entire world? Wouldn’t it be better for consumers if they could order everything, everywhere, from a single store? Other stores exists for years and continue to thrive. With PC gaming, you got Steam, and then nothing else that matters.

            But hey, Steam fanboys will remain Steam fanboys, and there is nothing in the world to make you even question their monopoly.

          • NL_VR

            Lol, I buy most of my games on GoG if they are avaible.
            I'm the steam fanboy peasant what are you?

          • ViRGiN

            “if they are available” and if they don’t you go where?

            I am the last righteous one.

          • NL_VR

            If it’s a game I want I buy it where its avaible of course.
            What makes you so righteous than anyone else?

          • Just so you know, the VRincel is well-known as the trolliest of trolls on these boards. It is an angry, immature, obnoxious, uncouth, vitriolic nightmare of a basement-dweller. We try to ignore it, but it is just so f#%king LOUD.

    • Mateusz Jakubczyk

      Lol, another whine from a PSVR2 fanboy who desperately wants to prove the superiority of his outdated and Sony-forgotten hardware. Sad.

      • Michael Speth

        Lol you are praising the outdated Quest3S hardware before it is even released. LCD panels are horrible for displaying blacks so you will never experience the high fidelity of the PSVR2's panels. Sad

        • eadVrim

          Yes, when you tried Oled in VR hard to return to Lcd

          • ViRGiN

            You either return to LCD, or die trying pretending PCVR is awesome thanks to OLED. Shitty games becomes good games thanks to perfect blacks.

          • eadVrim

            Good VR games often have a PCVR version. And it is even better.

          • kakek

            There's so very few good VR games.
            Quest doesn't have the power to push graphics to an immersive level.
            PCVR doesn't have the confort and audience to justify development cost.

            Maybe in a couple more generation of quests, if Meta had enough money to keep pushing until the tech catch up to the ambitions.

        • Mateusz Jakubczyk

          Lol, I don't have Quest 3s and I'm not going to buy it :D PSVR2 is backwards compared to the regular Quest 3 and that cheap, crappy OLED they installed there (with Mura, high persistence and motion blur problems) doesn't change anything here :P

        • Did you really make a whole statement and then just put "Sad" as a qualifier on the end there? That's pretty pathetic. At least put a period on the end of your sentence if you want anyone to even take you a TINY BIT seriously.

    • Corporations have been mining your data for DECADES. If you honestly think that it's just Meta and the other social companies doing it, then you have your head WAY buried in the sand about the facts, son.

  • VR5

    Good article, agree 100%.

  • Kyokushin

    The price difference is too small to even consider a 3s. Quest 3 is far better and buying the 3s is a waste of money.

    • Mateusz Jakubczyk

      So why did the Quest 2 outsell the Quest 3 4-to-1 a year ago? Why did people buy it? Because the most important factor and entry point for people into VR is price.

    • Andrew Jakobs

      For you and me the price difference might be too small, but for a lot of people 220 euro's is a lot of money.

    • Maybe for you. Your use case is not the same as everyone else's.

    • Arno van Wingerde

      A Quest 3 is a larger waste of money than a Q3S if you find you do not like VR after all – many users find they do not like VR after all, e.g. due to motion sickness. Start cheaper, than upgrade as desired.

  • Alex Soler

    I love how I started to scroll down and up looking if there wasn't moreand then I read the last sentence as if you had just read my mind :-D

  • Yeshaya

    Just the cover the last corner case, if someone has only ever owned the Quest 1 and is looking to upgrade, I'd say it's worth the extra money to upgrade the the Quest 3 instead of the 3s. It's not a perfectly vertical upgrade bc they'll be losing the LED panels in exchange for LCD, but all the other benefits more than make up for it.