On Tuesday, Valve launched an early beta version of its Steam Link app for the Vision Pro. You’ll need to download it through Vision Pro’s TestFlight app. It is clear that this is a very early version. After connecting it to my PC, I was brought to Steam’s Big Picture mode. This makes it easier to navigate with the controller. However, there were significant delays in rolling out these menus. The UI would flicker constantly as I moved between my different games.
View Vision Pro at Apple
© Raw Fury; Screenshot by Gizmodo
© CD Projekt Red; Screenshot by Gizmodo
I have now spent a few hours playing with my PC at home, relaxing comfortably on my sofa. The Vision Pro is heavy and it gets heavier the longer you try to keep your neck straight. It’s nominally better for passive content – like streaming movies, semi-interactive shows, and a sparse selection of live sports events.
For mirroring non-VR games from PC, Vision Pro is excellent. The latest M5 chip version of the headset has increased the refresh rate to 120Hz. You can increase both the frame rate and resolution in these games, and they’ll come across striking and clear through the headset’s Micro OLED lenses.
Finally, Easy PC Mirroring on Vision Pro
It’s still streaming, and it comes with the slightest hint of latency. To ensure you don’t suffer from packet loss or blurry visuals, you’ll need a relatively fast home Wi-Fi network. I can still play my games from my PC from the other side of my apartment. This caused some connection issues and input latency, but the titles were still perfectly playable.
But it gets even weirder than that. In its current version, the Steam Link app is the easiest way to perform Vision Pro mirroring from a Windows PC. It also supports eye tracking and pinch gestures for clicking with the mouse cursor. I can move between multiple connected displays through the Vision Pro’s twin 3,660 x 3,200 screens and view web pages and other apps with stunning clarity.
There are still some oddities in the Steam Link app. If I leave the game by pressing the select button on the controller, it will also close Steam Big Picture mode and take me back to the desktop. That’s how I learned about Steam Link’s shortcut for PC mirroring. I could zoom my PC screen as big as I wanted and even click around using eye-tracking and gesture controls. It wasn’t as easy as Vision Pro’s Mac mirroring. That mode lets you create a pseudo ultrawide screen with a mirrored Mac. You can’t get the window nearly as big when mirroring a PC.
Vision Pro could become amazing for PCVR too
Other means of streaming PC games also exist through apps like ALVR. That app also allows access to virtual reality gaming through SteamVR and PCVR titles. There’s also ClearXR, a new app that allows streaming favorites. To break this, Apple worked with Nvidia to add support for its CloudXR SDK. This allows the headset to use Apple’s precise eye tracking to reduce image quality outside users’ field of view. By doing this, it reduces bandwidth, making it much easier to stream content.
As great as it sounds, ClearXR does not currently support SteamVR, so sorry you won’t be able to play Half-Life Alyx Without any extra work. ALVR requires users to download a supported VR runtime on PC. Many of these third-party efforts are still in their early stages. Even Valve’s software is still in beta.
While Meta has almost abandoned VR gaming on Meta Quest headsets, Apple has only now realized that games are intrinsic to the virtual reality experience. What’s even more exciting is that it’s all happening at once. But at a price of $3,500, it could soon become one of the best headsets for streaming game content right before your eyes.
View Vision Pro at Apple
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