Acer & HP's Mixed Reality Dev Kits Now Up For Pre-Orders

The Acer Windows Mixed Reality Headset Developer Edition has been made available for pre-orders to developers a few months ago, and back in May, it was reported that Acer began shipping around 1,000 units to content creators. Today, it appears that the Acer’s Mixed Reality developer kit is available from the Microsoft Store to a wider audience, and the device can be pre-purchased for the price of $299. Additionally, the Windows Mixed Reality Headset developed by HP was also made available on pre-order terms, however, as of this writing, HP’s Developer Edition HMD is listed as being out of stock.

While the Acer Windows Mixed Reality HMD is still listed as being available only to developers, recent reports indicate that the development kit can now be acquired by anyone willing to pay the $299 price. Either way, it should this is not the final product meant for the general public, so certain features might differ once the head-mounted display will be ready for a commercial release. As far as hardware specifications are concerned, the headset features a couple of 2.89-inch LCD displays, each with a resolution of 1440 x 1440, a 90Hz refresh rate, and a 95-degree horizontal field of view. The HMD is equipped with an HDMI 2.0 port for hooking it up to an external display, as well as a USB 3.0 port for data transfers. Although the HP Windows Mixed Reality Headset Developer Edition is currently out of stock, both headsets share many similarities in terms of specs, including the display size and resolution, as well as supported input and output ports. The HP variant carries a higher pre-order price tag of $329, however, it is arguably more comfortable thanks to a double-padded headband and the inclusion of a knob for easy adjustments.

The headsets need to be backed by fairly powerful PC components, including an  Intel Desktop i7 CPU with at least six cores or the AMD Ryzen 7 1700 at a minimum. They also require the NVIDIA GTX 980 / GTX 1060 or the AMD Radeon RX 480 or better graphics cards, and a PC running Windows 10 – Creators Update with an enabled Developer Mode. According to the pre-order pages for both head-mounted displays, the pre-order period should end at some point this month when both units will be officially released.