Here is a news that will delight more than one! The Pico Neo 3 Pro is about to land in our regions under the name Pico Neo 3 Linkan appellation freed from the professional dimension.
This week was held one of the essential events of virtual reality, the European show Laval Virtualdedicated to immersive technologies such as virtual and augmented reality. The opportunity here for many professionals to make their ideas speak, to give them visibility and to show what the world could look like AR/VR of tomorrow. The opportunity here too, for us curious people and journalists, to stock up on all kinds of information and to offer this direct visibility to our communities on future projects.
Big names in the sector were therefore invited to the show, as were pico the helmet manufacturer VR autonomous owned by ByteDancethe owner of TikTok. Rumors had been rife for several days/weeks and the craziest speculations had emerged, as the giant announced that it was making the trip from China especially.
The most likely turned out to be the one announced to us this Wednesday live from Laval Virtual. The Pico Neo 3 Link arrives in Europe for pre-order from today, April 15, in limited quantities, in France, Spain, Germany and the Netherlands for delivery scheduled from May 24. The United Kingdom and Italy, for their part, will be served in the middle of June.
Be that as it may, as soon as the first units were dispatched, pico intends to launch an extensive beta test program to ensure the reliability of its solution in our countriesbut also quite simply for take the pulse of this new market which is still foreign to it. For the occasion, he announces that he wants completely rethink its ecosystem, its website and its services to adapt to the West.
Available at a price of 449 €i.e. in the price range of Meta Quest 2 256 GB, it will be possible to obtain it from authorized resellers which are for the moment:
Before concluding his speech, the general manager of Pico EuropeLeland Hedges took the liberty of presenting us with a commercial discount, a serious sales argument allowing the acquisition of its equipment and customer loyalty. It is not less than 35% off the next model that is promised. Should we see here the glimmer of a next version? However, we would like to qualify this marketing argument. As nice as it is, the mention at the bottom of the image mentions that this discount will be honored if the expected effect in Europe is indeed that expected.
However, there is no doubt that his arrival should appeal to the greatest number and is timely in a market saturated by the supremacy of Meta. The latest device pico has a data sheet almost similar to the Meta Quest 2 :
- LCD panel of 3664 x 1920 pixels or 773 PPI;
- Fresnel lenses;
- 98°FOV;
- 3-position IPD adjustment (58, 63.5 or 69 mm);
- Wi-Fi-6 and Bluetooth 5.1;
- Wireless PC VR streaming, but also wired with a DisplayPort cable provided for an uncompressed image;
- Snapdragon XR2 processor;
- 6 GB of RAM;
- 256 GB of storage;
- 90Hz refresh rate;
- 6 DoF tracking with 4 cameras;
- Ring controllers very similar to those of the Quest;
- But without the native hand-tracking offered by the cameras… We will have to wait for the bundle with the Stereo IR 170 tracker from Ultraleap, which we were however able to test and which left us with a much better impression in terms of fluidity and of occlusion, compared to what the Quest offers.
However, contrary to Questthe use of this helmet will not require any connection with any social network and all these througha big snub to Meta. This argument alone could tip the scales in his favor, because many are dissatisfied. However, to press even more where it hurts, pico specifies that the Neo 3 Link is equipped, in addition to a USB-C 2.0 solution, with a DisplayPort sold directly with the product and which represents, compared to the cable Link USB-C type that we know, day and night. This is a very high fidelity wired streaming without loss or image compression. Therefore the Neo 3 Link stands out as a fully autonomous helmet, but at the same time as a real PC headset VR. As AirLinkthe manufacturer also offers its own wireless streaming solution.
Finally, the group director wanted to reassure future users that there will be no shortage of games, because the experiences are really very numerous. First of all, the operating system embedded in the helmet is the Android system, the very one that equips the Quest.
He assures that the porting of existing applications will be simplified. He specifies that the store of pico already contains more than a hundred titlesthat the company works hand in hand with many studios like Vertigo Gamesallowing it to offer After The Fall, Walkabout Mini Golf, Eleven Table Tennis, Larcenautsbut also SUPERHOT or Demeobut last but not least, that the shop SteamVR is fully compatible. So only the exclusives that will bicker pico and Meta.
In any case, we are looking forward to it here at the editorial office. Here it is on the head of our editor Samuel in his version Neo 3 Pro Eyewitheye tracking, a very promising technology. The result blew us away and will surely serve as a dedicated post on the site.