Random Chit Chat

[PP Mguire]

PC VR hasnt taken off but Quest 2 has sold 10 million units, has high retention rate and lots of developers with profitable games. One of the changes they just announced is detaching Quest login from Facebook if you want.

That's still not that much. It's better than say the Vive (or any of them) in a year but in the grand scheme of things the PS5 has been largely unavailable and still sold 13.4 units in the same time frame. That number would be much higher if we weren't in the current scalp/bot/shortage market we're in. When we add in Xbox that almost doubles that number. When comparing in terms of popularity, VR is still low with adoption. Due to the requirements, the niche nature of it, and lack of overall decent content or relevance I just don't see it taking off. And anything AR related lately has just been gimmick BS.

 

[kmanmx]

That's still not that much. It's better than say the Vive (or any of them) in a year but in the grand scheme of things the PS5 has been largely unavailable and still sold 13.4 units in the same time frame. That number would be much higher if we weren't in the current scalp/bot/shortage market we're in. When we add in Xbox that almost doubles that number. When comparing in terms of popularity, VR is still low with adoption. Due to the requirements, the niche nature of it, and lack of overall decent content or relevance I just don't see it taking off. And anything AR related lately has just been gimmick BS.

It is still low relative to other popular electronics but the important figure is really the trajectory and growth rather than actual figures. Quest 2 has outsold all other Oculus devices combined in their entire history and its the first VR device where developers are reliably making good money and it's a viable platform to them. It's a long way off being as popular as a PS5 etc, sure. But the trend is good. The original iPhone sold 6 million units. I think the trend in content is pretty good too, Resident Evil VR just launched to great reviews and GTA San Andreas VR is coming soon. Meta's next generation headset Project Cambria is looking like it's going to be much more ergonomic due to smaller form factor and some significant technical upgrades. Apple is also launching its VR/AR headset (to developers atleast) in 2022/23. So I don't see it dieing. I think the technical challenges are just extremely difficult to make something that will be truly popular with everyone, whereby it is very small, lightweight, sociable, affordable, yet powerful enough to offer high quality experiences. It will probably be a another 10 or more years until we have that kind of device where non-enthusiasts are interested, but both Apple and Meta are pushing for it. Apple have pretty much banked their future on it and are expecting it (AR glasses) to replace iPhone in the long term. So overall i'm expecting a slow to moderate rise in popularity.

I don't expect pure VR headsets to ever become as popular as current consoles because most people most of the time want to just lay down in front of the TV to relax and game, not stand up in an open area and tire themselves out. But once genuinely useful AR features get implemented and they are small enough that people want to use them outside of just gaming, that will be a key inflection point.

 

[PP Mguire]

GTA San Andreas VR is coming soon

It's gonna be a worse shit show than this "remaster" lol.

So I don't see it dieing. I think the technical challenges are just extremely difficult to make something that will be truly popular with everyone, whereby it is very small, lightweight, sociable, affordable, yet powerful enough to offer high quality experiences. It will probably be a another 10 or more years until we have that kind of device where non-enthusiasts are interested,

Yea never said it would die, just it won't take off. Common folks not interested don't want to strap a device to their face to do the things they can do with a normal screen. The duration of time is also because of what you mentioned, making it more like how 3D TVs went down all 3 times. So yes, the Quest is more popular in terms of VR than any other device launched thus far, but VR won't ever become a common mainstream staple that everyday folks talk about for decades to come. I'm a good example, I actually like VR and have fun with it but 9 times out of 10 I'd just prefer to have a more comfortable gaming experience in my chair with my amazing monitor. The common casual gaming plebs are that way with their TVs, and the bottom feeder phone people and boomers definitely won't want to move from their phone to a headset to browse Facebook and share shitty memes.

Laziness is also another factor here. 99% of people on our swirling ball of water don't want to take the time to learn something new, especially if it does the same thing they already have just "fancier" if that makes sense.

In other news, came home from court yesterday to a cut fiber line. Contractors on the street are laying new fiber for high band 5G for AT&T and a pole for that is across the street from me. When Verizon originally laid the lines in 2005 they were sloppy about it and it's not marked or ran properly so my line got cut in front of my water main, when it was supposed to be on the other side of the sidewalk. Tech also told me that there's supposed to be 3 junction boxes on my road but there's only two and warned me if another house gets their service to the north of me I'll probably be unplugged. In the meantime my fiber is raw doggin it in the street and I'm afraid some kid will fuck with the line. Good news is, if I stay here next year I'll be upgraded to 2Gb as we're all Xpon and my ONT has a 10Gb port I didn't notice until yesterday.

 

[kmanmx]

Still on 80Mbit here but don't really care. Don't do much downloading these days and everything streams at max quality on 80Mbit easily.

In other news, for some strange reason a month ago I was bored and decided to watch Dawsons Creek. I've no idea why. I watched first episode and it was some stupid teen drama with some ridiculously obnoxious shakespearean language from some 16 to 20 year olds. Well something about it still interested me so I carried on watching it. I ended up binging the hell out of it, and now i've finished the last episode of the last season and I have no idea what to do with my spare time in the evenings now lol. I tried some other shows but none hit the same spot. It was so obviously bad and yet...... it was addictive as hell.

Also damn Windows 11 taskbar is buggy as hell for me lately. On my 2nd monitor it doesn't display app icons and the taskbar turns off autohide itself several times a day (I have it on autohide so it doesn't burn in on my OLED). But 2,3,4 times a day I go back into taskbar settings to find "autohide" unchecked.

 

[Smart_Guy]

100mbps here, but only cuz of a series of free upgrades from 20mbps. Still expensive compared to world wide.

I always believed that Windows needs at least couple of years before moving to newer versions. That's how long it requires to get rid of killer bugs. Or to safely consider them killed. It might take less but don't wanna risk it.

 

[PP Mguire]

Funny thing is, we're looking at areas that offer 10Gb because I want faster.

In other news, for some strange reason a month ago I was bored and decided to watch Dawsons Creek. I've no idea why. I watched first episode and it was some stupid teen drama with some ridiculously obnoxious shakespearean language from some 16 to 20 year olds. Well something about it still interested me so I carried on watching it. I ended up binging the hell out of it, and now i've finished the last episode of the last season and I have no idea what to do with my spare time in the evenings now lol. I tried some other shows but none hit the same spot. It was so obviously bad and yet...... it was addictive as hell.

That's weird because last week I added it to Plex out of nowhere. That and One Tree Hill which are similar in era but both sucked hard to me when I was younger. I remember seeing the first episode of One Tree Hill as a high school teen and rolled my eyes so hard my head fell over.

Also damn Windows 11 taskbar is buggy as hell for me lately. On my 2nd monitor it doesn't display app icons and the taskbar turns off autohide itself several times a day (I have it on autohide so it doesn't burn in on my OLED). But 2,3,4 times a day I go back into taskbar settings to find "autohide" unchecked.

I just fixed a customers machine with W11 that was just straight up booting a black screen. Windows was loaded, no explorer.

 

[kmanmx]

One Tree Hill was on my list of replacements to watch after Dawsons Creek. In the end I chose The OC, which is pretty meh. It gets rated better than Dawsons Creek but I find it less interesting mainly because it's just less serious and generally about some teens/young adults going to parties and getting in fights. I think I enjoy these shows now as they are just a form of escapism from my actual adult life full of boring stressful bs.

 

[PP Mguire]

I find myself watching the same shows and movies from past years to do that. Things like Stargate Atlantis, Harry Potter, LOTR, Star Wars TCW, etc.

 

[Joe C]

Normally I do not watch much tv.... But I do like Dangerous Catch and Gold Rush. Other than that.... just the local news in the morning to see the weather. In fact I started watching Oh Brother Where Art Thou? on a cable channel but I got so frustrated with all the commercials I downloaded it so I could see it in it entirety without interruptions.

 

[PP Mguire]

Normally I do not watch much tv.... But I do like Dangerous Catch and Gold Rush. Other than that.... just the local news in the morning to see the weather. In fact I started watching Oh Brother Where Art Thou? on a cable channel but I got so frustrated with all the commercials I downloaded it so I could see it in it entirety without interruptions.

Quite literally why paying for "cable TV" is pointless. The whole point back in the day was to not have commercials since you're paying for it. I don't even like ads interrupting my Youtube videos, I for damn sure won't have ads in my TV and movies.