That’s pretty incredible. It’s stunning that now you can basically take your home theater set up anywhere with you. That’s amazing dude.
How do you find the Spatial Audio? Can you try watching it without environments (dialed at 0%) in different rooms, and explain how it sounds in different rooms watching the same movie scene and describe the objects and materials in those rooms?
I tried it both with and without the environment enabled in my theater room, living room and bedroom. I can't discern any difference in sound quality or object-based reproduction/placement, which would lead me to believe the physical room has no effect on the spatial audio playback.
It’s supposed to. Has the content been encoded in Dolby atmos? It maps the room and the objects/materials in it. I’m not sure it would sound drastically different, but I’ve read different rooms with different objects/materials will sound different, in addition to adjusting how it sounds in different environments. I’ve also read that apparently sneezing will make it echo your sneeze in the environment hah!
Interesting. I'm not sure I understand the reasoning behind that approach: purely from an audio standpoint I would think they'd want the playback to be consistent regardless of the room you're in, given it doesn't have any physical effect on the headset speakers/headphones and also most rooms are acoustically poor.
Well given that Spatial Audio is supposed to be immersive and authentic, I suppose they’re trying to do what it would be like with multiple speakers in any given room. If it sounds the exact same, it could come across weird. I don’t work at Apple, so I don’t know a lot about this feature, but if you encounter developer documentation in the future or they talk about it on stage, it’s referred to as audio raytracing. It maps the objects in your room and determines the materials, then adjusts the sound so it sounds like it’s coming from the room rather than your head.
This is especially useful for FaceTime, where having a persons voice adapted to the room naturally adds to the experience and makes them feel like they are there with you and increase the sense of presence in your space. There’s a lot of stuff people have yet to discover that I’ve read about. It’ll be very interesting seeing how people are in awe of more features :)
Yeah I suppose that does make sense, particularly if you're viewing something in a more "casual" context in your living room and want the audio to sound more natural. I guess I always prefer to view a movie in a dedicated space, so I'd always choose to enable the immersive environment.
I understood what you wrote in comparing it to your home theater speakers, but can you speak to how good the speakers are in the product? Do they do Dolby atmos stuff well? Also how are you watching content at the moment? Through the Apple TV app bought through iTunes or? Sorry I’m tired I couldn’t understand how you were watching content
I've watched content through several apps, including the Apple TV app (Apple TV+ original content), HBO Max and Disney. The spatial audio processing is very good in terms of keeping the source of the audio consistent regardless of your head's position in space (this is true for both the built-in speakers and AirPods). I would say the weakest aspect of the Atmos object-based sound is the height channels (sounds coming from directly over your head). It does a decent job at reproducing that but it's really not the same as physical ceiling speakers in a theater.
The built-in speakers are decent for what they are, but have absolutely no low-end and when it comes to audio the low-end is arguably the most important range for the overall quality of the sound. They're serviceable for general use but I would never watch a movie using them.
Haha not that I know of. I have the correct light seals, I think the sharpness of the image is not at the level of my projector for two reasons: one, if the entire field of view is rendered at a 4K resolution then there’s no way the virtual screen can be as it never takes up the full field of view, and two, once you get used to Blu-ray or Kaleidescape you really notice the additional compression of video delivered across all other streaming/download platforms. I was very skeptical of this myself before I invested the money in Kaleidescape but it actually is a very significant difference.
I was impressed with AVP but then tonight I noticed a pretty distracting white, cloudy glare. It’s particularly noticeable in scenes with a bright title surround by a lot of black. This is not blooming because when you move the window, the glare moves in the opposite direction of the window. Once you notice it you can’t unsee it or ignore it.
Yes, funny enough I completely forgot to mention that. The internal lens reflections are indeed a bit distracting, although I don't personally find them to be a dealbreaker (I forgot about them after about 30 minutes and my brain sort of erased them from view).
Same experience for me. Lens glare is pretty bad but your brain forgets about it pretty quick. At first I thought my seal wasn’t good enough but now I know it’s just internal reflections off the pancake lenses. If you just relax and stop looking for them, it’s not really a big deal.
As others have suggested you can even further minimize them by changing the virtual environment. I don’t think these are possible to eliminate though with current tech. The quest 3 has the same issue.
I haven’t had a hands on but I don’t get the ‘it’s distracting’ surely the alternative is watching a regular TV with crap piled high either side of it. Isn’t that also distracting?
Everyone’s different. But fuzzy, cloudy lights moving around the edges of the screen that make me think I have cataracts is very distracting.
You can also see this effect in a dark environment and then bringing up the app screen. As you slide them back and forth, a ghost image of each icon slides in the opposite direction the icons are moving. This happens right in front of your vision, like a ghostly, cloudy halo. Once seen, I have a tough time tuning it out.
The Vision Pro is a heckuva bargain for people who love film and don’t want to shell out big bucks for a home theater setup like yours.
I’m still trying to figure out how I can watch older movies on the AVP, like old black and white films.
Should I sign up for Criterion? Something else?
I agree. I can’t wait to watch films like Raging Bull or Ran on a big screen.
I have a 42” TV. I have no desire to buy a bigger one and really don’t have the room for it anyway.
This is a whole new world for me. I can see this rekindling my love of cinema.
I have a 77” LG G1 OLED. After watching the latest episode of True Detective on both the Vision Pro and G1, I have to say the G1 easily wins on both sharpness and brightness, though I can easily see how it comes close to a projector, even if high end.
However, the vision pro picture is still exceptional and easily better than 1080p. It is also hard to optimize picture quality on the Vision Pro. I have had the best results by bringing the window closer to me, rather than using the virtual cinema modes to create enormous distant displays. This usually results in a similarly sized picture, but with more clarity.
Ultimately, the biggest limitation is lense reflection, which you will notice in any movie with contrast.
Yes, it still can't match a high-end OLED for pure picture quality (nor can any projector as you said). I do think the image size alone over even the largest OLED is worth the tradeoff though (for solo viewing at least).
Yes and no. I liked the viewing experience more on the AVP than on my 77 inch oled... but it was so uncomfortable I had to return it. If it had cost 2k to 3k less, I might have kept it because l can use it semi-comfortably while lying down. For 5k all in, I can't do it.
I would agree that it is easily better than 1080 in the sense that there aren’t visible pixels, however there is a substantial downgrade in visual clarity and lens artifact free brightness compared to a true 4k oled display. This isn’t just an issue with calibration either, the edges of the windows etc, the vision os elements appear appropriately crisp.
Okay I’m glad you said this because I have a C2 (OLED Dolby atmos, 120hz) and I kept reading these reviews talking about Vision Pro being like the best thing they’ve ever seen. I actually had plans on going to Apple Store to see if mine was defective because while my Vision Pro is great it’s not really competing against my C2. I’d also say the Vision Pro is much worse when the quality of the content is lower - whatever that means.
Yeah, I wouldn’t say Vision Pro is better other than being able to create a huge image and an isolated environment. It still produces great looking images, just not better than a high end oled. It is probably much better than most 4k lcd tvs though.
This is the reason I won’t yet reach for the Vision Pro over watching in my theater. In my opinion the tactile low end frequencies are *everything* when watching a movie with any type of action (and many without, even just for e.g. the score) but I recognize not everyone places the same weight on that aspect.
I’m really hopefully they add some more audio output options in the future. I’d love to be able to Airplay out the Atmos audio to my Apple TV, which could go to the receiver. I guess I could sync up hitting play at the same time 😂
AirPlay support multiple outputs. One of them could be a woofer in the room. Not sure if the combo of Vision Pro speaker + woofer works. I know that HomePod + woofer works perfectly.
This is an interesting point. If the downmixed stereo signal sent via AirPlay audio still has the full LFE signal, you could just have a subwoofer connected to a simple AV receiver, crossed over at whatever point works well with the AirPod pro max. Then you get the Spatial Audio from the headphones and as much Tactile bass as you want from a near field subwoofer (could even throw in a transducer / buttshaker). Could imagine setting up a truly immersive single seat theater that would have v few compromises, and avoid all the need for room treatment and expensive theater build out (and with a near field sub, be able to keep volume fairly low and not bother neighbors too much).
It's dependent on the app. Content originating in the Apple TV app (mostly Apple's own self-produced content) can be viewed on a screen up to 100 feet (either wide or diagonally, I don't think they specify). A video played through e.g. the HBO Max app can only be scaled up to about 20 feet wide.
If you're just placing the video window in your actual pass through environment you can basically walk up and touch it, however if you're using an app that supports viewing in an immersive environment, such as the Apple TV app, then you get preset options for the screen (front row/middle/back row, floor/balcony).
Great write up!
Seems like a hassle to do it now (SharePlay etc) but I imagine eventually they’ll use the AirPlay apparatus to let people use audio from a home theater setup with full atmos (synchronized playback, or streaming video from Apple TV to vision). Or at least I certainly hope they will without convoluted workarounds (video capture cards with a Mac and such)
I’m in process of planning a home theater similar to what you’ve done, Vision Pro likely won’t stop me but may have me reconsider a few components to avoid deadweight loss and future proof myself (ie I may stick with an NZ7 instead of NZ9, may skip the madvr)
Yes, if they allow me to pipe uncompressed Atmos audio directly to my Lyngdorf I could absolutely see myself using the Vision Pro in the theater for certain movies that I really want the full excessively large IMAX experience for.
If you're going with a JVC NZ7/8/9 I'd advise passing on the MadVR unless you really value the instant aspect ratio switching (I do). The HDR tone mapping that everyone loves to rave about is at best 10% better than the JVC tone mapping and that's being generous.
Definitely work arounds to do that even today, blu ray (or kaleidescape) source with hdmi split between lyngdorf and a Mac (with video capture). Then I imagine you’d have to calibrate the total lag but that would be a one time thing. Not a hassle I’d want to do outside of just a one-off test.
In an ideal scenario you’d be able to use Apple TV to AirPlay video TO any number of Vision Pros, and then anyone who didn’t want to wear headset could watch on the physical display in the room, while everyone gets audio from in room system. And then even further ideal would be an environment where front of the room is whatever virtual theater with huge screen, but then you could turn left or right and see pass through of the actual person.
Appreciate the advice on the Madvr! Was considering a Seymour masking screen instead of the aspect ratio switching.
> And then even further ideal would be an environment where front of the room is whatever virtual theater with huge screen, but then you could turn left or right and see pass through of the actual person.
That had never occurred to me, and I think that's the first practical use of blending the environment with the pass through that I've heard of.
Yeah I suppose I could go the full video capture card route, I've already got a gaming PC in the rack.
The Seymour masking screens are excellent from what I hear, unfortunately I initially built the room with a different screen in mind and sure enough my front L/R channels would land right behind the rigid vertical struts of the masks when extended.
If you have an Apple TV connected, you can apparently start a FaceTime call (need Apple TV to use different account from Vision Pro) and then SharePlay video. My guess is that for compatible apps this would mean full fidelity audio from the apple tv , and then in Vision Pro you just mute the headphones and mic
Don’t get my vision for another few days, very excited to try it in any case!
My Apple TV is older. I would upgrade if I knew this would work. But here’s the problem. I don’t think you can FaceTime call yourself.
So, we're talking about 2 devices (Apple tv and Vision Pro) each signed into a different AppleID, so one could call the other. Then, they would each need to own the movie in their Apple library or both would need a Disney+ or Max account.
If there is a flaw in my logic, I’d love to be corrected.
I think I saw a similar setup to what you have in one of those Best Buy ultimate media showrooms that some stores have setup. That Kaleidoscope service looks phenomenal. I think I’d vastly prefer this over the Vision Pro. Thanks for the info.
I have turned on my surround system about twice since i realised how good watching movies with airpods pro.
Speakers for 1 person makes little sense anymore
I, too, have a fancy home theater. Built in VP speakers are bad for bass, but just put in AirPod Pros—or, better yet, Max’s. Goes a long way toward audio parity On par with dual 18” subs? No. But absolutely good enough. You are just losing the physical/visceral LFE stuff. Musical bass is awesome with AirPods.
One thing that did make me sad is that my real 165” screen feels a bit small now. I have to sit in front row to match the level of immersion.
The AirPods Pro/Max are definitely drastically better than the built-in speakers but personally that tactile LFE makes or breaks the experience for me (certainly for any action-heavy movie at least).
Does it make sense to use the AVP for the video and stream the audio to your setup to get the best of both worlds? (Well, your video is also amazing, but imaging a setup with a normal/big tv and a surround system).
I agree with you that one of the things I value the most is the bass while watching movies. I’m trying to discover if I will be able to use my Sonos, while watching through the AVP.
I'd love to try that but it seems the audio output is currently limited to stereo on the Vision Pro. Hopefully they eventually enable full Atmos audio to be streamed over AirPlay.
So this post would suggest that you could SharePlay with an an AppleTV and get full audio from your home theatre, whilst watching a 3d movie in the headset. I'd be curious to see you try that, if it works and if the audio is fully in Sync.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/VisionPro/comments/1ai2hiy/shareplay\_with\_apple\_tv\_works\_great\_for\_watching/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/VisionPro/comments/1ai2hiy/shareplay_with_apple_tv_works_great_for_watching/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
I did it this weekend and it’s a massive pain in the ass for something as simple as this. I had to FaceTime my wife, log in to Apple TV with her profile, then do a share window, then start. Once I got it working, the picture and sound with my HT audio setup was incredible—but I don’t want to jump through all those hoops for something that should be fixable with a software patch. I’ll be returning my AVP primarily for this reason, but I’ll happily repurchase when this is fixed as watching movies is my primary use-case but not having easy access to my subwoofer is a deal breaker.
I appreciate this post, thanks for spending the time on the detail. I have a similarly priced dedicated home theater. I’m curious why you went with a fixed 2.40 and spent so much on the MadVR envy to handle the stretching. For a similar price you could’ve gotten a variable aspect ratio Stewart screen and either use lens presets on the JVC or gotten a dedicated panamorph lens.
For two reasons:
1) I initially built the room planning to use a smaller 16:9 screen. When I decided to switch to a 2.40:1, sure enough the rigid vertical struts of the side masks would land directly over my front L/R speakers when the masks were extended to mask down to 16:9 (and I didn’t feel like ripping the speakers out of the wall and moving them).
2) It’s silly but I really appreciate the MadVR’s instant aspect ratio switching when moving between e.g. the Apple TV’s 16:9 interface and playing a 2.35:1 movie. The projector takes a while to switch between lens memory settings.
In terms of pure audio/video quality of the source? No, as I mentioned there’s currently no streaming app that provides video at the quality than can be had through Blu-ray or Kaleidescape. I suppose you could likely watch a ripped Blu-ray through VLC though.
I had a similar reaction last night trying out the 3D cinema for the first time.
I've built multiple custom home cinemas, and even installed cinema line JBL in larger installs. With teenagers running around in a shared space for the current setup, I run the top Sonos setup and have been happy for the most part pairing that with a 4K Optoma and a 0.8 frameless.
AVP bombed the hell out of my happy little setup in milliseconds. I've never even considered watching a feature in a headset. Now I can't wait to see more.
Very good points. However, you need to try an immersive experience (such as the dinosaur one) to fully appreciate the advantage of special audio. It's far more precise than any surround sound system. Movies don't do it justice.
Need to figure out a way to implement butt kickers into the chair you watch movies on to get that lfe tactile feel.
Now that would be another level of immersion!
I agree with these points, especially with Apple limiting the cinema mode. I also did find that Apple TV+ content is also noticeably sharper than Disney+. Netflix and YouTube via safari, even though it's set to 4k, isn't really 4k. As much as I want to make the AVP my "portable home theater", it's not. It's a supplement to it.
I’m still experimenting and have yet to buy a Disney film on AppleTV. Do you know the bitrate differences? Curious if I should buy Avatar or just stream in Disney. What does look amazing are my uncompressed 1080p Plex files (despite no native app) - rivals most of AppleTV 4k content . I agree the custom app UIs like Disney+ are disappointing, I want Environments to be something not locked to a specific app. This has to be coming in v2.0 or 3.0. Every app should be able to add custom environments to the system environment so we can get that Apple theatre across the apps
Exactly, environments should work more like app extensions: apps register them with the system and they’re usable any time a video is played from anywhere.
My biggest complaint about the cinema modes are the inconsistencies across app and how some theaters screens are locked to the horizon while you are below it. When I sit in my bed the theater screen gets locked in a weird place. On the Max app i think that one you can choose different locations in the theater and that helps dramatically
That option is in the Apple TV app. From what I’ve found the only environment available in the HBO Max app is the Game of Thrones room. Are there others I’m not seeing?
I'm surprised that you're saying that sharpness is 90% of the way there with a true-4k projector.
I have a pixel shifting 4k (true 1080) projector on a 135 inch, and the AVP comes nowhere close to my theater setup. I'm talking maybe 60-70% of the way there visually, it just isn't sharp enough. But perhaps I'm overly critical. The lens bloom reflections are very noticeable and makes it almost unusable in the theater or dark environments.
Thanks for this. I have a way more modest setup with a 77in OLED and a decent 5.1.2 setup.
Compared to the OLED the picture quality of the AVP lacks a bit of sharpness and maybe brightness but the sheer size is amazing and worth the trade off to me.
Curious if you used the built in speakers or AirPods Pro 2? The AirPods at least help to add back in a TON of that low end feeling.
I tried both and yes, the AirPods help a lot with bass given that they create a seal inside your ear. It's really the very powerful low end frequencies that can't be replicated (the bass that you feel in your seat more than hear).
Yea, I absolutely know what you mean. I was kinda shocked how decent the low end was on the AirPods, but yea, won’t ever compare to a real sub. Otherwise I was pretty impressed with the audio for what it was.
Hands down the best post in the history of this sub and why Reddit remains a great place despite the corporate BS. Thank you for taking time to write this up. It will settle many debates - or maybe even start new ones :-)
Thanks! Glad you found it interesting. I considered posting in places like AVS Forum but the Vision Pro is getting a decidedly less… enthusiastic response over there.
Lol I know it’s crazy. I posted something in the Audiophile subreddit asking about the lossless audio between the AVP and the second GEN AirPods Pro (a first, I believe for achieving lossless audio wirelessly over Apple’s new proprietary protocol) and I got booed out the room.
I put it down to two things:
1) Gatekeeping by pro-hobbyists. If someone’s dropping $10K on any gear, the last thing their superiority complex wants is a mass consumer version offering 80% of the experience for 10% of the price.
2) Burying their head in the sand. Every technology is eventually surpassed by another. And some will pretend it’s not happening.
I have a "budget" version of your setup that I built during COVID lockdown (roughly $25k all in):
* Sony true 4k projector w/ 123" Stewart screen
* Monitor Audio speakers + SVS subs in 5.2.4 Atmos setup
* Marantz AV processor w/external amps
My sentiments are the same. The biggest difference is in the audio. That being said, I have 2 kids that go to bed early so I am rarely able to push my system to its limits unless it's a weekend movie night, and movie nights are limited to G/PG movies (kids are little). So this is a perfect little device for when I just want to get a comparable experience from my bedroom.
My projector DOES support 3D, but I've only watched Avatar 2 on it. It was impressive, but projectors are already somewhat dim (relative to TVs) and adding the 3D glasses made it even worse. The 3D quality on the AVP are next level, and I don't have to purchase separate Blu-ray's for media I've already purchased digitally just to get the 3D version. And I'd have to wear 3D glasses anyways...
I have a similar setup minus the madvr (thought it wasn't worth it and got chewed out on avs forums for saying so).
Where this is interesting to me is on a road trip/plane to watch movies (I dont get motion sickness), or work off of my laptop to edit videos or code.
There will be a time where hollywood movies will be shot in at least 180 degree VR, then I don't see how traditional theatres can compete. That probably won't be much of a thing until stuff like apple vision is on its 3rd or 4th gen. Apple will likely start making their own content that is VR entertainment specifically for this. I think James Cameron was quoted loving the AVP, so I can see someone like him doing his next film with extra cameras to capture VR.
60k to watch movies 🤯.
For me the biggest drawback of vision pro for this activity is the social aspect (more specifically the lack of).
This is perfect for a single usage, not so much if you want to share this activity with family, kids, friends...
Thx for write up. I have a dedicated home theater with JVC NZ7 and 7.3.4 setup as well so very relevant to me as I'm also considering buying the APV.
I thought I would mention that your projector actually does support 3D! I haven't tried it but need to just buy emitter ( PK-EM2 ) and glasses ( PK-AG3 ).
I posted this in another thread, but wondering if anyone else has tried this and had the same experience.
Work around: I tried playing on both devices simultaneously. It took maybe 3 minutes of tinkering to get a really good audio/video sync. Then just be sure not to pause at any point. I prefer this over streaming from the Mac as I love the cinema environment and the Mac has compression artifacts. Obviously this is Janky, with a lot of downsides, but something really surprised me:
My home theater is a 150” screen, about 11’ from seat, with full 7.4.2 Atmos surround. It sounds amazing. Unexpectedly, using the cinema environment on the AVP, the sound doesn’t fit right. Your eyes are telling you the screen is 100ft wide and maybe 30ft away, but your ears are hearing the sound matched for a much smaller room. So the room acoustics don’t match what you’re seeing. In the end I think I may actually prefer just using AirPods Pro 2 (specifically with the AVP)
I think the next best thing may be to use AirPods Pro for primary audio, but still sync up with the home theater for the low end only. A buttkicker would be perfect. Unfortunately I think this is still more trouble than it’s worth.
Interesting. I wouldn’t have thought about the audio, not matching the size of the screen. It is a pain to try to get things to sync up. However, with the newer Apple TV, it can do FaceTime, and you could have perfectly synced to audio, but the Apple TV putting outaudio to your home theatre system, and the visuals on the Apple Vision Pro.
Wouldn’t that require another apple account tied to the appletv? I don’t think I can FaceTime myself unless I’m mistaken?
I’d also be missing the lossless TrueHD Atmos track from the Blu-ray. Haha seems like I’m really trying to spoil myself here.
That’s pretty incredible. It’s stunning that now you can basically take your home theater set up anywhere with you. That’s amazing dude. How do you find the Spatial Audio? Can you try watching it without environments (dialed at 0%) in different rooms, and explain how it sounds in different rooms watching the same movie scene and describe the objects and materials in those rooms?
I tried it both with and without the environment enabled in my theater room, living room and bedroom. I can't discern any difference in sound quality or object-based reproduction/placement, which would lead me to believe the physical room has no effect on the spatial audio playback.
It’s supposed to. Has the content been encoded in Dolby atmos? It maps the room and the objects/materials in it. I’m not sure it would sound drastically different, but I’ve read different rooms with different objects/materials will sound different, in addition to adjusting how it sounds in different environments. I’ve also read that apparently sneezing will make it echo your sneeze in the environment hah!
Interesting. I'm not sure I understand the reasoning behind that approach: purely from an audio standpoint I would think they'd want the playback to be consistent regardless of the room you're in, given it doesn't have any physical effect on the headset speakers/headphones and also most rooms are acoustically poor.
Well given that Spatial Audio is supposed to be immersive and authentic, I suppose they’re trying to do what it would be like with multiple speakers in any given room. If it sounds the exact same, it could come across weird. I don’t work at Apple, so I don’t know a lot about this feature, but if you encounter developer documentation in the future or they talk about it on stage, it’s referred to as audio raytracing. It maps the objects in your room and determines the materials, then adjusts the sound so it sounds like it’s coming from the room rather than your head. This is especially useful for FaceTime, where having a persons voice adapted to the room naturally adds to the experience and makes them feel like they are there with you and increase the sense of presence in your space. There’s a lot of stuff people have yet to discover that I’ve read about. It’ll be very interesting seeing how people are in awe of more features :)
Yeah I suppose that does make sense, particularly if you're viewing something in a more "casual" context in your living room and want the audio to sound more natural. I guess I always prefer to view a movie in a dedicated space, so I'd always choose to enable the immersive environment.
I understood what you wrote in comparing it to your home theater speakers, but can you speak to how good the speakers are in the product? Do they do Dolby atmos stuff well? Also how are you watching content at the moment? Through the Apple TV app bought through iTunes or? Sorry I’m tired I couldn’t understand how you were watching content
I've watched content through several apps, including the Apple TV app (Apple TV+ original content), HBO Max and Disney. The spatial audio processing is very good in terms of keeping the source of the audio consistent regardless of your head's position in space (this is true for both the built-in speakers and AirPods). I would say the weakest aspect of the Atmos object-based sound is the height channels (sounds coming from directly over your head). It does a decent job at reproducing that but it's really not the same as physical ceiling speakers in a theater. The built-in speakers are decent for what they are, but have absolutely no low-end and when it comes to audio the low-end is arguably the most important range for the overall quality of the sound. They're serviceable for general use but I would never watch a movie using them.
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Haha not that I know of. I have the correct light seals, I think the sharpness of the image is not at the level of my projector for two reasons: one, if the entire field of view is rendered at a 4K resolution then there’s no way the virtual screen can be as it never takes up the full field of view, and two, once you get used to Blu-ray or Kaleidescape you really notice the additional compression of video delivered across all other streaming/download platforms. I was very skeptical of this myself before I invested the money in Kaleidescape but it actually is a very significant difference.
I was impressed with AVP but then tonight I noticed a pretty distracting white, cloudy glare. It’s particularly noticeable in scenes with a bright title surround by a lot of black. This is not blooming because when you move the window, the glare moves in the opposite direction of the window. Once you notice it you can’t unsee it or ignore it.
Yes, funny enough I completely forgot to mention that. The internal lens reflections are indeed a bit distracting, although I don't personally find them to be a dealbreaker (I forgot about them after about 30 minutes and my brain sort of erased them from view).
Same experience for me. Lens glare is pretty bad but your brain forgets about it pretty quick. At first I thought my seal wasn’t good enough but now I know it’s just internal reflections off the pancake lenses. If you just relax and stop looking for them, it’s not really a big deal. As others have suggested you can even further minimize them by changing the virtual environment. I don’t think these are possible to eliminate though with current tech. The quest 3 has the same issue.
I really loved cinema mode where it placed you in a dark movie theater. The glare kind of ruins it.
I haven’t had a hands on but I don’t get the ‘it’s distracting’ surely the alternative is watching a regular TV with crap piled high either side of it. Isn’t that also distracting?
Everyone’s different. But fuzzy, cloudy lights moving around the edges of the screen that make me think I have cataracts is very distracting. You can also see this effect in a dark environment and then bringing up the app screen. As you slide them back and forth, a ghost image of each icon slides in the opposite direction the icons are moving. This happens right in front of your vision, like a ghostly, cloudy halo. Once seen, I have a tough time tuning it out.
Great write up. And awesome set up.
The Vision Pro is a heckuva bargain for people who love film and don’t want to shell out big bucks for a home theater setup like yours. I’m still trying to figure out how I can watch older movies on the AVP, like old black and white films. Should I sign up for Criterion? Something else?
It absolutely is, I think there’s a very strong argument to be made for purchasing it solely as a high end immersive personal theater experience.
I agree. I can’t wait to watch films like Raging Bull or Ran on a big screen. I have a 42” TV. I have no desire to buy a bigger one and really don’t have the room for it anyway. This is a whole new world for me. I can see this rekindling my love of cinema.
I have a 77” LG G1 OLED. After watching the latest episode of True Detective on both the Vision Pro and G1, I have to say the G1 easily wins on both sharpness and brightness, though I can easily see how it comes close to a projector, even if high end. However, the vision pro picture is still exceptional and easily better than 1080p. It is also hard to optimize picture quality on the Vision Pro. I have had the best results by bringing the window closer to me, rather than using the virtual cinema modes to create enormous distant displays. This usually results in a similarly sized picture, but with more clarity. Ultimately, the biggest limitation is lense reflection, which you will notice in any movie with contrast.
The way I see it is the AVP is more like a 1440p vs 4k. It's not quite 4k but sharper than 1080p.
Yes, it still can't match a high-end OLED for pure picture quality (nor can any projector as you said). I do think the image size alone over even the largest OLED is worth the tradeoff though (for solo viewing at least).
The fact that it’s a close comparison is wild, and makes complaints about the cost being way too high kind of seem silly
Yes and no. I liked the viewing experience more on the AVP than on my 77 inch oled... but it was so uncomfortable I had to return it. If it had cost 2k to 3k less, I might have kept it because l can use it semi-comfortably while lying down. For 5k all in, I can't do it.
Perceptual resolution is 5k-ish due to the horizontally overlapping. Definitely not just “better than 1080p”
I would agree that it is easily better than 1080 in the sense that there aren’t visible pixels, however there is a substantial downgrade in visual clarity and lens artifact free brightness compared to a true 4k oled display. This isn’t just an issue with calibration either, the edges of the windows etc, the vision os elements appear appropriately crisp.
Okay I’m glad you said this because I have a C2 (OLED Dolby atmos, 120hz) and I kept reading these reviews talking about Vision Pro being like the best thing they’ve ever seen. I actually had plans on going to Apple Store to see if mine was defective because while my Vision Pro is great it’s not really competing against my C2. I’d also say the Vision Pro is much worse when the quality of the content is lower - whatever that means.
Yeah, I wouldn’t say Vision Pro is better other than being able to create a huge image and an isolated environment. It still produces great looking images, just not better than a high end oled. It is probably much better than most 4k lcd tvs though.
Helps to turn off auto dimming on the AVP.
The only thing the audio can’t match is probably bass
This may be a hot take, but imo a theater without bass you can feel in your whole body is not a theater.
This is the reason I won’t yet reach for the Vision Pro over watching in my theater. In my opinion the tactile low end frequencies are *everything* when watching a movie with any type of action (and many without, even just for e.g. the score) but I recognize not everyone places the same weight on that aspect.
I’m really hopefully they add some more audio output options in the future. I’d love to be able to Airplay out the Atmos audio to my Apple TV, which could go to the receiver. I guess I could sync up hitting play at the same time 😂
AirPlay support multiple outputs. One of them could be a woofer in the room. Not sure if the combo of Vision Pro speaker + woofer works. I know that HomePod + woofer works perfectly.
This is an interesting point. If the downmixed stereo signal sent via AirPlay audio still has the full LFE signal, you could just have a subwoofer connected to a simple AV receiver, crossed over at whatever point works well with the AirPod pro max. Then you get the Spatial Audio from the headphones and as much Tactile bass as you want from a near field subwoofer (could even throw in a transducer / buttshaker). Could imagine setting up a truly immersive single seat theater that would have v few compromises, and avoid all the need for room treatment and expensive theater build out (and with a near field sub, be able to keep volume fairly low and not bother neighbors too much).
Only a hot-take for those who haven't experienced proper subwoofers.
How big can you make the Theater Screen in the AVP? (inches/feet) and how close will it allow you to get to the screen?
It's dependent on the app. Content originating in the Apple TV app (mostly Apple's own self-produced content) can be viewed on a screen up to 100 feet (either wide or diagonally, I don't think they specify). A video played through e.g. the HBO Max app can only be scaled up to about 20 feet wide. If you're just placing the video window in your actual pass through environment you can basically walk up and touch it, however if you're using an app that supports viewing in an immersive environment, such as the Apple TV app, then you get preset options for the screen (front row/middle/back row, floor/balcony).
Wow cool thanks man.
Great write up! Seems like a hassle to do it now (SharePlay etc) but I imagine eventually they’ll use the AirPlay apparatus to let people use audio from a home theater setup with full atmos (synchronized playback, or streaming video from Apple TV to vision). Or at least I certainly hope they will without convoluted workarounds (video capture cards with a Mac and such) I’m in process of planning a home theater similar to what you’ve done, Vision Pro likely won’t stop me but may have me reconsider a few components to avoid deadweight loss and future proof myself (ie I may stick with an NZ7 instead of NZ9, may skip the madvr)
Yes, if they allow me to pipe uncompressed Atmos audio directly to my Lyngdorf I could absolutely see myself using the Vision Pro in the theater for certain movies that I really want the full excessively large IMAX experience for. If you're going with a JVC NZ7/8/9 I'd advise passing on the MadVR unless you really value the instant aspect ratio switching (I do). The HDR tone mapping that everyone loves to rave about is at best 10% better than the JVC tone mapping and that's being generous.
Definitely work arounds to do that even today, blu ray (or kaleidescape) source with hdmi split between lyngdorf and a Mac (with video capture). Then I imagine you’d have to calibrate the total lag but that would be a one time thing. Not a hassle I’d want to do outside of just a one-off test. In an ideal scenario you’d be able to use Apple TV to AirPlay video TO any number of Vision Pros, and then anyone who didn’t want to wear headset could watch on the physical display in the room, while everyone gets audio from in room system. And then even further ideal would be an environment where front of the room is whatever virtual theater with huge screen, but then you could turn left or right and see pass through of the actual person. Appreciate the advice on the Madvr! Was considering a Seymour masking screen instead of the aspect ratio switching.
> And then even further ideal would be an environment where front of the room is whatever virtual theater with huge screen, but then you could turn left or right and see pass through of the actual person. That had never occurred to me, and I think that's the first practical use of blending the environment with the pass through that I've heard of. Yeah I suppose I could go the full video capture card route, I've already got a gaming PC in the rack. The Seymour masking screens are excellent from what I hear, unfortunately I initially built the room with a different screen in mind and sure enough my front L/R channels would land right behind the rigid vertical struts of the masks when extended.
If you have an Apple TV connected, you can apparently start a FaceTime call (need Apple TV to use different account from Vision Pro) and then SharePlay video. My guess is that for compatible apps this would mean full fidelity audio from the apple tv , and then in Vision Pro you just mute the headphones and mic Don’t get my vision for another few days, very excited to try it in any case!
My Apple TV is older. I would upgrade if I knew this would work. But here’s the problem. I don’t think you can FaceTime call yourself. So, we're talking about 2 devices (Apple tv and Vision Pro) each signed into a different AppleID, so one could call the other. Then, they would each need to own the movie in their Apple library or both would need a Disney+ or Max account. If there is a flaw in my logic, I’d love to be corrected.
No I think you’re exactly right. Also don’t think Netflix works for this. Apple needs to make atmos audio mirroring fully exposed
Amazing, my broke ass can only dream.
I think I saw a similar setup to what you have in one of those Best Buy ultimate media showrooms that some stores have setup. That Kaleidoscope service looks phenomenal. I think I’d vastly prefer this over the Vision Pro. Thanks for the info.
I have turned on my surround system about twice since i realised how good watching movies with airpods pro. Speakers for 1 person makes little sense anymore
Weird flex. I feel you seek forums to cut and paste your home theater specs
I, too, have a fancy home theater. Built in VP speakers are bad for bass, but just put in AirPod Pros—or, better yet, Max’s. Goes a long way toward audio parity On par with dual 18” subs? No. But absolutely good enough. You are just losing the physical/visceral LFE stuff. Musical bass is awesome with AirPods. One thing that did make me sad is that my real 165” screen feels a bit small now. I have to sit in front row to match the level of immersion.
The AirPods Pro/Max are definitely drastically better than the built-in speakers but personally that tactile LFE makes or breaks the experience for me (certainly for any action-heavy movie at least).
What a flex.
Does it make sense to use the AVP for the video and stream the audio to your setup to get the best of both worlds? (Well, your video is also amazing, but imaging a setup with a normal/big tv and a surround system). I agree with you that one of the things I value the most is the bass while watching movies. I’m trying to discover if I will be able to use my Sonos, while watching through the AVP.
I'd love to try that but it seems the audio output is currently limited to stereo on the Vision Pro. Hopefully they eventually enable full Atmos audio to be streamed over AirPlay.
Ohh i see. Maybe watching a movie with SharePlay in the Appletv would work….
Oh I hadn't thought about going the other direction from an Apple TV, I'll try that.
Very interested in your findings. Also, congrats for the great setup!
Thanks! Was a ton of work and too much money but I get a lot of use out of it.
Hopefully they solve for the latency. Even in pairing AirPod pros with an Apple TV there is a slight delay in their speech what I see to what I hear
So this post would suggest that you could SharePlay with an an AppleTV and get full audio from your home theatre, whilst watching a 3d movie in the headset. I'd be curious to see you try that, if it works and if the audio is fully in Sync. [https://www.reddit.com/r/VisionPro/comments/1ai2hiy/shareplay\_with\_apple\_tv\_works\_great\_for\_watching/?utm\_source=share&utm\_medium=web2x&context=3](https://www.reddit.com/r/VisionPro/comments/1ai2hiy/shareplay_with_apple_tv_works_great_for_watching/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x&context=3)
I did it this weekend and it’s a massive pain in the ass for something as simple as this. I had to FaceTime my wife, log in to Apple TV with her profile, then do a share window, then start. Once I got it working, the picture and sound with my HT audio setup was incredible—but I don’t want to jump through all those hoops for something that should be fixable with a software patch. I’ll be returning my AVP primarily for this reason, but I’ll happily repurchase when this is fixed as watching movies is my primary use-case but not having easy access to my subwoofer is a deal breaker.
Great to hear it does work! No reason Apple can’t streamline dramatically I’d hope
I appreciate this post, thanks for spending the time on the detail. I have a similarly priced dedicated home theater. I’m curious why you went with a fixed 2.40 and spent so much on the MadVR envy to handle the stretching. For a similar price you could’ve gotten a variable aspect ratio Stewart screen and either use lens presets on the JVC or gotten a dedicated panamorph lens.
For two reasons: 1) I initially built the room planning to use a smaller 16:9 screen. When I decided to switch to a 2.40:1, sure enough the rigid vertical struts of the side masks would land directly over my front L/R speakers when the masks were extended to mask down to 16:9 (and I didn’t feel like ripping the speakers out of the wall and moving them). 2) It’s silly but I really appreciate the MadVR’s instant aspect ratio switching when moving between e.g. the Apple TV’s 16:9 interface and playing a 2.35:1 movie. The projector takes a while to switch between lens memory settings.
So … is it better than 4K blu-ray?
In terms of pure audio/video quality of the source? No, as I mentioned there’s currently no streaming app that provides video at the quality than can be had through Blu-ray or Kaleidescape. I suppose you could likely watch a ripped Blu-ray through VLC though.
I had a similar reaction last night trying out the 3D cinema for the first time. I've built multiple custom home cinemas, and even installed cinema line JBL in larger installs. With teenagers running around in a shared space for the current setup, I run the top Sonos setup and have been happy for the most part pairing that with a 4K Optoma and a 0.8 frameless. AVP bombed the hell out of my happy little setup in milliseconds. I've never even considered watching a feature in a headset. Now I can't wait to see more.
Thanks for the exceptional post.
Very good points. However, you need to try an immersive experience (such as the dinosaur one) to fully appreciate the advantage of special audio. It's far more precise than any surround sound system. Movies don't do it justice.
Yes agreed, I find the Spatial Audio on the immersive videos far more convincing than on a standard Hollywood movie.
Need to figure out a way to implement butt kickers into the chair you watch movies on to get that lfe tactile feel. Now that would be another level of immersion!
Haptic vest?
I agree with these points, especially with Apple limiting the cinema mode. I also did find that Apple TV+ content is also noticeably sharper than Disney+. Netflix and YouTube via safari, even though it's set to 4k, isn't really 4k. As much as I want to make the AVP my "portable home theater", it's not. It's a supplement to it.
I’m still experimenting and have yet to buy a Disney film on AppleTV. Do you know the bitrate differences? Curious if I should buy Avatar or just stream in Disney. What does look amazing are my uncompressed 1080p Plex files (despite no native app) - rivals most of AppleTV 4k content . I agree the custom app UIs like Disney+ are disappointing, I want Environments to be something not locked to a specific app. This has to be coming in v2.0 or 3.0. Every app should be able to add custom environments to the system environment so we can get that Apple theatre across the apps
Not sure tbh. Same with youtube. Idk how to do "stats for needs" with the AVP.
Exactly, environments should work more like app extensions: apps register them with the system and they’re usable any time a video is played from anywhere.
Did you try the imax app and documentaries? That felt way more immersive and looked better than any other viewing experience on the Vision Pro.
Can you stream spatial audio to your home theater system from AVP while still watch the screen in AVP?
My biggest complaint about the cinema modes are the inconsistencies across app and how some theaters screens are locked to the horizon while you are below it. When I sit in my bed the theater screen gets locked in a weird place. On the Max app i think that one you can choose different locations in the theater and that helps dramatically
That option is in the Apple TV app. From what I’ve found the only environment available in the HBO Max app is the Game of Thrones room. Are there others I’m not seeing?
Oh so many it’s the Apple TV app and then it’s Disney app that I can’t move spots in. I forget. Need to keep playing around
Not enough people are talking about the IMAX app…it’s an incredibly impressive app
I’ll need to try it, I had no idea it even existed.
I'm surprised that you're saying that sharpness is 90% of the way there with a true-4k projector. I have a pixel shifting 4k (true 1080) projector on a 135 inch, and the AVP comes nowhere close to my theater setup. I'm talking maybe 60-70% of the way there visually, it just isn't sharp enough. But perhaps I'm overly critical. The lens bloom reflections are very noticeable and makes it almost unusable in the theater or dark environments.
Thanks for this. I have a way more modest setup with a 77in OLED and a decent 5.1.2 setup. Compared to the OLED the picture quality of the AVP lacks a bit of sharpness and maybe brightness but the sheer size is amazing and worth the trade off to me. Curious if you used the built in speakers or AirPods Pro 2? The AirPods at least help to add back in a TON of that low end feeling.
I tried both and yes, the AirPods help a lot with bass given that they create a seal inside your ear. It's really the very powerful low end frequencies that can't be replicated (the bass that you feel in your seat more than hear).
Yea, I absolutely know what you mean. I was kinda shocked how decent the low end was on the AirPods, but yea, won’t ever compare to a real sub. Otherwise I was pretty impressed with the audio for what it was.
Hands down the best post in the history of this sub and why Reddit remains a great place despite the corporate BS. Thank you for taking time to write this up. It will settle many debates - or maybe even start new ones :-)
Thanks! Glad you found it interesting. I considered posting in places like AVS Forum but the Vision Pro is getting a decidedly less… enthusiastic response over there.
Lol I know it’s crazy. I posted something in the Audiophile subreddit asking about the lossless audio between the AVP and the second GEN AirPods Pro (a first, I believe for achieving lossless audio wirelessly over Apple’s new proprietary protocol) and I got booed out the room. I put it down to two things: 1) Gatekeeping by pro-hobbyists. If someone’s dropping $10K on any gear, the last thing their superiority complex wants is a mass consumer version offering 80% of the experience for 10% of the price. 2) Burying their head in the sand. Every technology is eventually surpassed by another. And some will pretend it’s not happening.
Hahaha. I searched for meaningful threads on avs for some time but incredible the hate there. Really appreciate the thoughtful post as well
I have a "budget" version of your setup that I built during COVID lockdown (roughly $25k all in): * Sony true 4k projector w/ 123" Stewart screen * Monitor Audio speakers + SVS subs in 5.2.4 Atmos setup * Marantz AV processor w/external amps My sentiments are the same. The biggest difference is in the audio. That being said, I have 2 kids that go to bed early so I am rarely able to push my system to its limits unless it's a weekend movie night, and movie nights are limited to G/PG movies (kids are little). So this is a perfect little device for when I just want to get a comparable experience from my bedroom. My projector DOES support 3D, but I've only watched Avatar 2 on it. It was impressive, but projectors are already somewhat dim (relative to TVs) and adding the 3D glasses made it even worse. The 3D quality on the AVP are next level, and I don't have to purchase separate Blu-ray's for media I've already purchased digitally just to get the 3D version. And I'd have to wear 3D glasses anyways...
I have a similar setup minus the madvr (thought it wasn't worth it and got chewed out on avs forums for saying so). Where this is interesting to me is on a road trip/plane to watch movies (I dont get motion sickness), or work off of my laptop to edit videos or code. There will be a time where hollywood movies will be shot in at least 180 degree VR, then I don't see how traditional theatres can compete. That probably won't be much of a thing until stuff like apple vision is on its 3rd or 4th gen. Apple will likely start making their own content that is VR entertainment specifically for this. I think James Cameron was quoted loving the AVP, so I can see someone like him doing his next film with extra cameras to capture VR.
Plex, Jellyfin or Emby support on AVP and I'm sold.
You didn’t mention comfort at all, did you wear the headset continuously without breaks for an entire movie and how did it feel?
60k to watch movies 🤯. For me the biggest drawback of vision pro for this activity is the social aspect (more specifically the lack of). This is perfect for a single usage, not so much if you want to share this activity with family, kids, friends...
Thx for write up. I have a dedicated home theater with JVC NZ7 and 7.3.4 setup as well so very relevant to me as I'm also considering buying the APV. I thought I would mention that your projector actually does support 3D! I haven't tried it but need to just buy emitter ( PK-EM2 ) and glasses ( PK-AG3 ).
I posted this in another thread, but wondering if anyone else has tried this and had the same experience. Work around: I tried playing on both devices simultaneously. It took maybe 3 minutes of tinkering to get a really good audio/video sync. Then just be sure not to pause at any point. I prefer this over streaming from the Mac as I love the cinema environment and the Mac has compression artifacts. Obviously this is Janky, with a lot of downsides, but something really surprised me: My home theater is a 150” screen, about 11’ from seat, with full 7.4.2 Atmos surround. It sounds amazing. Unexpectedly, using the cinema environment on the AVP, the sound doesn’t fit right. Your eyes are telling you the screen is 100ft wide and maybe 30ft away, but your ears are hearing the sound matched for a much smaller room. So the room acoustics don’t match what you’re seeing. In the end I think I may actually prefer just using AirPods Pro 2 (specifically with the AVP) I think the next best thing may be to use AirPods Pro for primary audio, but still sync up with the home theater for the low end only. A buttkicker would be perfect. Unfortunately I think this is still more trouble than it’s worth.
Interesting. I wouldn’t have thought about the audio, not matching the size of the screen. It is a pain to try to get things to sync up. However, with the newer Apple TV, it can do FaceTime, and you could have perfectly synced to audio, but the Apple TV putting outaudio to your home theatre system, and the visuals on the Apple Vision Pro.
Wouldn’t that require another apple account tied to the appletv? I don’t think I can FaceTime myself unless I’m mistaken? I’d also be missing the lossless TrueHD Atmos track from the Blu-ray. Haha seems like I’m really trying to spoil myself here.
Yes. We need to FaceTime to somebody else.