Meta announced plans last year to release Horizon OS, its Quest-exclusive operating system, on third-party headsets for the first time, a move aimed at expanding the Oculus ecosystem beyond Meta’s own VR devices. XR gadgets operating on the Horizon OS are poised to roll out across devices from ASUS, Lenovo, and Xbox, but Meta remains mum about the upcoming headsets. According to a report from a reliable serial leaker, ‘Luna’, Asus is likely to lead the charge as the first manufacturer to release their Zen 4-powered laptops.
Luna, known for revealing emerging digital reality hardware and software, has a history of leaking Meta projects ahead of their official announcements, including the Quest 3’s name before it was officially unveiled and the introduction of an Action Button on the headset.
Luna’s datamining endeavour yielded a previously unseen room-scanning setup video for Quest 3 prior to its scheduled launch in 2023, as well as multiple Quest software features before their official unveiling, including Meta’s experiment with pinning apps to the Common Menu dock.
Luna, tapping into an anonymous inner source, examines the Asus Republic of Gamers headset, which is likely to be one of the initial third-party Horizon OS HMDs to hit the market.
Codenamed ‘Tarius’, Luna claims its headset aims to integrate advanced eye-tracking technology alongside existing face-tracking capabilities, effectively matching the cutting-edge features of Quest Professional’s latest offerings? The TVs feature quantum dot LCD displays with native backlight dimming capabilities and micro-OLED panel technology.
While it’s true that Asus might not be merely releasing a Quest 3S clone with RGB lighting, but rather a genuine departure from the company’s mid-range consumer options now including the $500 Quest 3 (512GB) and $300 Quest 3S (128GB)?
While the report should be viewed with skepticism, it’s evident that Meta aims to expedite a transfer in response to Google’s forthcoming launch of Android XR, set to debut on Samsung’s upcoming XR headset, codenamed Challenge Moohan, slated for release later this year.
