Is the best way to watch a movie on a pair of sunglasses?
A review of the XREAL a01 smart glasses explores their utility as a portable monitor for watching movies and gaming. While the display quality is praised, the reviewer questions the practical necessity of wearing glasses to watch content that is already available on a nearby laptop screen.
Why it matters
The article examines the practical application and consumer value proposition of emerging wearable display technology.
I am nothing if not a huge movie buff. I watch way too many of them, and I’m always on the hunt for a new format in which to experience them. So when XREAL, the smart glasses company, sent me an a01 — one of its newer models, which it released in May of this year — I was eager to give them a spin as the newest vector by which to satisfy my media fanaticism.
The a01 isn’t a particularly sophisticated smart glasses model. Unlike more software-heavy AR glasses like, say, the Meta Orion or Snap’s Specs, it’s basically just an external monitor. It also doesn’t have a battery or an internal power mechanism. Instead, a simple USB-C cable plugs the glasses into a device of your choosing, which then becomes the headset’s power source. It’s also not so expensive, at an accessible price point of around $300 .
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