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North Focals Review: Stealthy, Stylish Smart Glasses
Focals are currently only available after two in-person fittings (for more on North's detailed fitting process, see our first hands-on with Focals) in their Brooklyn, New York or Toronto, Canada stores. The trip is tempting as Focals cross a huge smart glasses barrier by offering functionality in a form that stands a good (but not perfect) chance of passing for regular glasses. However, while we enjoy apps like Amazon Alexa and Weather, more apps and better image quality would make the $999 / $1,200 CAD price tag (with or without prescription lenses) more forgivable.
Focals use a Qualcomm APQ8009w system-on-a-chip (SoC), which runs on four Arm Cortex A7 CPU cores at a clock speed of up to 1.09GHz. The SoC is marketed for smartwatches, with features like Bluetooth and WiFi connectivity and a Qualcomm Adreno 304 GPU.
[...] The left arm of my review sample is bare black on the outside, while the inside subtly reads "Focals by NORTH" near the temple and "CLASS 1 LASER PRODUCT" near the tip. The right arm is also bare on the outside. The inside, however, holds the holographic display projector, which uses a display technology called retinal projection to project photons, or light, or raster graphics, onto the retina. When the projector is activated, it's not visible from the outside. It projects images onto the right eye only. This advanced retina display also calls for precise measurements in the aforementioned fitting process.
On the bottom of the right arm is a small square area for connecting the charger, a small speaker/microphone and the power button.
The Loop controller ring comes in black and is mostly made of polycarbonate with gold-plated charging contacts. You'll hear a clicking noise in the glasses every time you use the joystick, unless you turn all sound off.
[...] The most impressive part of Focals' is that no one will know when you're using apps, since the AR display is only visible to the wearer. It works by creating red, green and blue light that is manipulated to make text and images the Focals' projector sends out. Next, there's a holographic lens in the right eye that's embedded with a transparent film designed to interact with red, green and blue wavelengths only. Everything else passes through. According to North, "when our specific wavelengths of light hit the transparent film, it acts like a mirror and bounces the light back towards your eye placing the image directly in your line of sight where only you can see it."
[...] After playing with the Focals for 5 continuous minutes at maximum brightness and volume, the right arm's hottest point was 44 degrees Celsius (111.2 degrees Fahrenheit).
No cameras, no wireless charging. Lame.
Previously: Intel's Vaunt Augmented Reality Smartglasses Concept Lives on at Canadian Company North
(Score: 2) by YeaWhatevs on Thursday February 07 2019, @06:42PM (4 children)
Looks like the graphics aren't all that great and they don't do AR, but it's an improvement.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday February 07 2019, @07:00PM (3 children)
You need a camera, or better yet 2 cameras, to do AR.
I'm confident that the cameras could be blended into a black frame or otherwise hidden, to avoid lunatics going into assault mode.
The damn thing has a quad-core CPU in it, but not much for it to do.
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(Score: 2) by Immerman on Thursday February 07 2019, @08:17PM (2 children)
>lunatics going into assault mode.
While I'm unlikely to go into "assault mode", I must say that I rather strongly disapprove of public surveillance devices myself, and can completely understand why some people get especially aggrieved when they're worn into bathrooms and other situations where a certain amount of discretion is normally assumed. Just for the perv-factor alone - do you really believe pervs *wouldn't* take advantage of the ability to take photos undetected?
Pervs aside, it might be different if the camera feed were somehow isolated from the internet, but as it is all of these devices make full continuous surveillance streams available to the manufacturer, governments, criminals, and any other hacker who chooses to access it.
(Score: 2) by deimtee on Friday February 08 2019, @06:22AM (1 child)
https://www.zetronix.com/hidden-covert-cams/spy-pens.html [zetronix.com]
What do you do when someone walks in with a pen in their pocket?
No problem is insoluble, but at Ksp = 2.943×10−25 Mercury Sulphide comes close.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Friday February 08 2019, @02:41PM
If I recognize it's a surveillance device? Express my disapproval.
Also, spy pens and other such gadgets are usually not internet-connected, so you only have to worry about the malfeasance of the person carrying it.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by captain_nifty on Thursday February 07 2019, @06:46PM
So it works by selectively reflecting a laser directly onto the users eye.
What could possibly go wrong?
(Score: 2, Touché) by John-S on Thursday February 07 2019, @06:51PM
And the weather app will give you a clear view of what's outside your window provided your standing in front of your window.
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 07 2019, @07:18PM (5 children)
The manufacturer have learned one important feature to not add: a camera. Google got burned on that.
The device is not yet ready for a mass market: it heats up, it has low resolution, you cannot choose the eye, you cannot select both and have stereo overlay, you have limited selection of corrective lenses, no eye tracking, no wireless charging, face measurements needed for ordering. Perhaps, it is already acceptable for some users (a Lyft|Uber driver?); but the majority of potential customers has no need for a 200x200 pixels screen, we got used to 2000 pixels. I have seen a HUD with 1024x768, it was pretty nice. Something like that will be popular.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday February 07 2019, @07:34PM (4 children)
Maybe some people will find smartglasses useful without a camera. But it is certainly a lot less useful. No photos, videos, or AR.
The problem with Google Glass is that you looked like a Borg while wearing it. If this thing had a noticeable display (no retinal beaming) but no camera, people would still probably get attacked over it.
The solution is to hide or miniaturize the cameras (there should be two of them).
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 07 2019, @08:44PM (3 children)
(Score: 2) by takyon on Thursday February 07 2019, @10:12PM (1 child)
Eventually it will [soylentnews.org] come [darpa.mil], and then there'll be no more excuses.
But is 44°C/111°F a deal breaker? This page [anandtech.com] suggests 40°C/104°F as a limit for comfortable skin temperature.
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(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 08 2019, @02:00AM
When it comes, I will buy and others will buy. Not a problem. Just make them.
With regard to +44°C, I do not know if that is even close to being a deal killer. The other deficiencies are more important, the low resolution is first among them. Make it close to a modern screen, so that we can read a common text. Camera is highly optional for me personally, unless it's AR.
(Score: 2) by deimtee on Friday February 08 2019, @06:29AM
Any lag at all is a dealbreaker for AR. The way around it is to pipe the video direct to the screen, not process it. You process and add the overlay as a separate stream. Having labels appear on things 50ms late doesn't matter, but being 5ms late with the field of view does.
No problem is insoluble, but at Ksp = 2.943×10−25 Mercury Sulphide comes close.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by hemocyanin on Thursday February 07 2019, @07:21PM (2 children)
When I saw the headline I was hoping this about my fantasy product: "glasses" that have an actively adjustable lens and some form of frame mounted distance measuring module which would allow the lenses to autofocus based on what you are looking at. Something like this: https://www.coolthings.com/adlens-eyeglasses/ [coolthings.com] except you get an eye exam, program certain values for different distances, and the lenses use the measured distance to make the change.
Now THAT would be smartglasses!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 07 2019, @10:01PM (1 child)
Add porn and I'm in.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday February 08 2019, @02:03AM
Being able to see porn without squinting ought to be enough for anyone.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by stretch611 on Thursday February 07 2019, @07:22PM (1 child)
Wow I thought, $1,000... thats pretty expensive just for some geeky tech.
Then I remembered the cost of recent iPhones...
Okay, $1000 is quite cheap for some specced out glasses.
Now with 5 covid vaccine shots/boosters altering my DNA :P
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 07 2019, @07:44PM
Not just iPhones: many frames at the optometrist's run $800 - $1200 nowadays.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday February 07 2019, @07:35PM
"However, while we enjoy apps like Amazon Alexa..."
lmao. tom's hardware are hilarious windows using slaves.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by PartTimeZombie on Thursday February 07 2019, @07:53PM (4 children)
Am I the only one looking at the awful, horrible, backlit to hell photo at the top of the article and wondering who the idiot was that decided that shot was good enough?
Maybe they ran out of film in their only camera?
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Captival on Thursday February 07 2019, @10:30PM
It's Uncle Tom's Hardware. They threw quality and objectivity out the window in their haste to sell out. A few months ago, their expert recommendation for the new 2000-series Nvidia cards was "just shut up and buy it" despite the fact that they cost $1000+ and had next to no benefit over the current series.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Friday February 08 2019, @01:16AM (2 children)
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Friday February 08 2019, @01:41AM (1 child)
I'm sticking with the "ran out of film" theory.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Friday February 08 2019, @03:45PM
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves