Lenovo G0A20001WW Explorer Mixed Reality Headset

A Fantastic Entry Point Into VR
Until the Mixed Reality headsets came out, the only options you really had were buying a $400 Oculus or $600 Vive, and they essentially held a duopoly on the market, refusing to reduce pricing. Thanks to the magic of the free market, the mixed reality headsets have quickly become an affordable entry-level headset as the prices have begun hitting $200 on Amazon (1/2 the price of Oculus, 1/3 the price of a Vive). For a fraction of the price, you’ll be receiving the bulk of the “virtual reality experience”The Lenovo headset specifically is the best Mixed Reality offering available, besides the much more expensive Odyssey. It offers 110 degree field of vision, whereas the other headsets are just at 100. The Oculus and Rift offer 120 and 145 respectively. I believe all the Mixed Reality headsets besides the Odyssey offer 2880×1440 resolution (better than the Vive and tied with Oculus) with 90hz refresh rate. While comfort is a personal metric, I find this headset to have a very comfortable fit to it. Another reason I chose this headset is that people reported that it works great for people with glasses, and I can confirm that they do. In summary, you get a resolution on par or better than the industry leaders and you compromise on your fov with this headset for a fraction of the cost, and for what it’s worth, I’ve had no trouble with 110 fov. It’s pretty negligibleThe real compromise of this headset isn’t the fov at all really, it’s the tracking. The Mixed Reality headsets use two internal cameras to track your controllers and the results are functional but leave a lot to be desired. If you raise your hands above your head, it’ll lose track. If you drop your hands all the way to the ground, it *can* lose track. If you throw your hands behind your body, it’ll lose track. When you use this headset in practice, you’ll observe that it calculates the trajectory of your movements and do a good job of guessing where you threw your hands. You can swing your hands behind your body in fluid motions and it’ll figure it out, but you have to move them back in front of the cameras or your hands will wonk out on you until you do return them. In essence, there’s a bit of an art to moving your arms fluidly that you’ll want to learn but on the whole, it is functional.This is the real compromise of the headset, and it’s up to you if you’re willing to spend a lot more money on headsets that don’t have this issue.There is an upside to this flaw. Because the tracking is all done internally, this headset is very easy to setup. You don’t have to spend hundreds of dollars on “lightposts” either, sensors that you place around your room to externally track your movements.You also don’t need 4 4.0 USB ports to manage your headset alongside a massive amount of batteries to power the whole operation. You just plug the Lenovo into your hdmi and USB, and you’re good to go in basically 10 minutes of installation. The controllers themselves use 2 AA batteries, so 4 between the both of them, and you may want to invest in rechargeable batteries if you intend to use this a lot as it’ll save you money in the long run. I went with EBL 8 Bay AA AAA Battery Charger with AA 2800mAh (4 Pack) and AAA 1100mAh (4 Pack) Ni-MH Rechargeable Batteries for a battery charger and purchased 8 additional batteries EBL 8 Pack High Capacity 2800mAh AA Ni-MH Rechargeable Batteries, Battery Case Included which brought me up to 12 rechargeable alongside the 4 AA that come with the charger station. It’s a totally optional move, but I digress. The quick plug and play functionality of this headset also makes the Mixed Reality headsets far more portable. Finally, Grab Steam VR for Mixed Reality to play Steam VR games, many of which are free.That just about covers everything. The head movement is very fluid all around and the bulk of your hand movements are going to be in front of you where the tracking is great, and the whole thing feels very fluid. The prices on Amazon seem to fluctuate pretty dramatically so you should know that they’ve hit $200. The Acer is supposed to also be a great option but has 100 fov instead of 110 namely. Hopefully you can grab a pair when the prices go low!

Good headset, but try them all on before you buy if you can.
I work in IT and I spent a *lot* of time reading reviews and watching YouTube videos on Windows Mixed Reality headsets before buying this one, and, to be honest, the Lenovo Explorer was not going to be my first choice. As an owner of a PSVR, this is not my first experience with VR, so I will mainly be comparing the experience with that headset, and providing specific information that I have not seen discussed in other reviews.First, the pros.- The headset comes in a single box, was delivered on time and as described. This seems a minor point, but if you read the reviews of the HP headset (one that I was actually going to buy were it not for the delivery issues), you’ll see this is actually quite important as the fact that the HP comes in two boxes has resulted in a lot of problems for people, particularly when ordering from Amazon.- The headset is comfortable and works well (though not as comfortable as the PSVR), though the software can be quite buggy (more on that later).- On paper, at least, the field of view on this headset is wider than some of the others, particularly the HP. That said, I personally don’t feel it’s as wide as the PSVR.- Inside out tracking is good and easy to setup and works well in most cases. There will be times when you move your hands outside of the camera’s view and you may find that controller suddenly jumps in front of your face as the software doesn’t know what to do since it is not getting the tracking data.- The flip up display is *really* helpful, and a big plus over the PSVR, though all Windows MR headsets, with the exception of the Samsung odyssey, have this feature.- The controllers work pretty well and the batteries last ok, but you will definitely want to invest in some good quality rechargeable AA batteries. While some reviews say they are uncomfortable, I have not had an issue and don’t find that I’m thinking about them during game play.Cons:- People with particularly large heads might have a problem – While the headset is quite comfortable, once you get it adjusted, even for someone with a big head and large nose (like me), it’s not at all as adjustable or comfortable as the PSVR. First, the headband does not expand as far as the PSVR, so in my case I can only just use it at it’s maximum size. If you are someone with a very large head who can’t fit “one size fits all” hats, for example, this may be an issue for you.- Not as much nose clearance as the PSVR – the nose cutout is definitely not as big/forgiving as the PSVR. I have a large “roman” nose and the tip of my nose ends up touching the hard plastic at the base of the headset. It’s not actually a problem for me and I quickly forget about it, but anyone with a larger nose or more angular face may find this a problem. For the same reason, the foam around the nose can be difficult to adjust comfortably, and may result in pressing on your nostrils, making it feel like you have a partially blocked nose. You can adjust it to alleviate this somewhat, or buy replacement padding for around the eyes that doesn’t include the nose part, but who wants to do that?- The headset gets quite warm after extended use. This is not a problem I have with the PSVR, which I have played for several hours of constant gaming without issue. After only a couple of hours of playing with this headset, I find my eyes get very dry and uncomfortable, something that has never happened to me before. After noticing this on more than one occasion, I realized that it is most likely because of how hot the displays are getting (again, something I have not noticed on the PSVR). I haven’t seen this mentioned on any other reviews, so it’s possible that it is only my headset, but YMMV.- No hardware IPD (inter-pupillary distance) adjustment – This has been mentioned in most reviews and is common in all the Windows MR headsets, except the Samsung Odyssey, but one thing that didn’t occur to me is that this can have the effect of reducing the field of view for those that have wider spaced eyes, even if the software adjustment is enough for you to get a good image.- Despite the higher resolution, I don’t find the image as good as the PSVR: I have read this in other reviews, so I guess it’s not just me. The PSVR has an OLED display and apparently the pixels are spaced differently. It also has better lenses with a better “sweet spot”. The result is that the “screen door effect” (the feeling that you are looking through a screen door into the VR world) seems less noticeable on the PSVR than on this headset. That said, I don’t find I notice it after a few minutes and this doesn’t detract from the experience once you get into it. The effect on this headset is more like looking through a fine linen, rather than a screen door, and you really only notice it if you are looking for it (or if you are expecting VR to look as good as your desktop monitor, which is unrealistic as none of the current VR headsets will achieve that)..That’s really all about the headset. The rest is more generally about Windows MR. While this is a great platform and works well, most of the time, it’s still early in it’s lifecycle and so you should expect to have some bugs. Some issues I have had include:- Controllers tracking poorly and jumping all over the place in all applications. This was solved by moving the Bluetooth 4.0 dongle I bought from the USB 3.0 port I had originally used to a USB 2.0 port at the front of the computer. It should be noted that Microsoft actually recommend using a USB 2.0 port for the Bluetooth, so this is expected behaviour, but I mention it in case it may help someone.- Some Steam VR games are not yet fully compatible with Windows MR headsets. The main culprit I’ve found is the Contagion VR demo, which they have specifically stated does not support Windows MR headsets due to a bug in the current version.- Random crashing in “the lab”. This could just be my computer, but I have found that “the lab” will sometimes just crash in a loading screen. It’s not at all evident, either, as the loading screen still tracks normally and everything still seems to be working, but you will just never get the application or world to load. The first few times I tried it wouldn’t load at all, but the last time it worked fine and I was able to try almost all the experiences, but it crashed again when I tried to load the “secret shop” world.- Poor tracking/lag in the “Cliff house”. This is a weird one as it only started yesterday and seems pretty intermittent. The controllers and headset track fine, and I can see them exactly where they should be, but they don’t respond properly, with button presses not responding, or “getting stuck” (turning uncontrollably). The strange thing is that everything will work fine if I load up a Steam VR game, even from within the cliff house, so this seems to be something specific to the MS cliff house, rather than my setup. I did find it was improved if I disconnected all other USB devices, however, so maybe it’s something specific to my computer.Ultimately, this is a good headset for a good price, but there are some drawbacks that you should be aware of. The best thing, if you can, is to go to a Microsoft store where you can try on the headsets before making your choice, as it will really depend on your own head and facial structure as to which you will find the most comfortable. Alternately, you can just buy one and return it if you don’t like it, I suppose.Despite the issues I mention above, I’m happy with this headset and do think that the Windows MR headsets are a great way to get into VR for a very reasonable price. The biggest benefit these have over the PSVR is simply the variety of games and experiences that are available for you to try.

It arrived and the screen kept blacking out. After some trouble with what seemed like support not taking me seriously I finally got the go ahead for the refund.

J’ai longtemps hésité avant de franchir le pas et d’acheter un casque VR. Au vu des tarifs surtout et aussi des avis sur les différents casques disponibles.J’ai mis 5 étoiles bien que l’on ne touche pas la perfection mais parce que le rapport qualité / prix est bien là.Les 2 points négatifs sont : en premier la légère présence de ce que certain appelle une “grille” (présente pour tous les casque en fait) qui pourrait faire peur mais qui au bout de quelques heures d’utilisation se fait vraiment oubliée. Notre cerveau doit la faire disparaitre en quelque sorte surtout quant on est pris par ce que l’on regarde ou “vie” dans le casque.Le second point c’est le contenue disponible à ce jour. Il y a pas mal de chose à faire, payantes mais gratuite aussi, mais ça reste un peu trop accès sur les jeux de tirs à la première personne ou des trucs un peu trop simplistes. Les casques WMR offre moins de contenus que certains autres casques (qui coûte le double !!)Les points positifs : Il y en a beaucoup et en premier le côté bluffant de la VR. Se retrouver dans une maison immense dans un lieu enchanteur que l’on peut aménager. On peut vivre dans un garage de 15m² parce qu’avec un casque devant les yeux il se transforme en une villa sur la côte !Je vous invite à tester apollo 11 car vous marcherez sur la lune avec N. Amstrong et le voyage est incroyable. Avec le portail de Steam pour avez également des environnements très beau et marcher sur Mars à côté du rover Oportunity est une chose à faire.Côté jeux j’ai pas encore vraiment testé ce qui est proposé mais je dispose du jeu simulateur IL*2 et se retrouver dans le cockpit d’un P40 c’est incroyable . On tourne la tête et on voit le bout de son aile, on suit une cible des yeux en virage, etc… incroyable.Bon vous comprenez que je suis conquis et que je ne regrette pas mon achat.Techniquement rien de compliqué, on branche le casque et il est reconnu sans problème. J’ai acheté des rallonges USB3 et HDMI en 3m pour pouvoir me déplacer sans problème car le câble est un peu court.J’ai également acheté un dongle Bluetooth pour les manettes car mon PC n’a pas de carte Bluetooth. Ca fonctionne très bien.Conclusion : je conseille ce produit.