Hololens price estimate

[onlysublime]

The $3000 is for a dev kit. The dev kit for Xbox 360 was $10000. Did the retail 360 cost $10000? Of course not. Now, it'll cost more at the beginning for an "Enterprise edition" because businesses have lots of money. But when it gets to consumer retail, it'll be much less.

Since the HoloLens is a full PC, I'm going to assume it's an Atom processor with 4 GB of RAM and 32 GB storage. It has multiple cameras including a camera with Kinect technology. I'm going to guess between $750 and $1000. Not bad when you consider the Surface 3 is $500-700. The Surface Pro 4 starts at $900. An iPhone 6S Plus with 64 GB is $950.

People will pay for something they really want. Look at iPhone. Look at MacBooks. Look at Surface Pro. Look at Surface Book. Look at hoverboards. People are paying $400-2000 for hoverboards that will sit in the closet in 6 months.

this is pure speculation and I have scoured the internet as I'm very very interested in the hololens and I have heard speculation that the hololens will start selling at $3000 which a few places has stated that price range, which makes sense to me since 1) how much it costs to buy a surface book or SP4 nowadays? and 2) the tech that went into this gadget and they had to invent their own 3d GPU rendering processor and 3) MS never ever sells anything cheap! (just look at how much the Lumia 950XL costs! LOL... so yeeeeeaaaa you better start saving now!

 

[grahamf]

The Oculus Rift retails for $600 and offloads processing power to a powerful gaming computer (which can't easily be obtained for under $1000).
It will be over $1,000 for certain, and I'm expecting between $1,500 and $3,000. Version 2 will be cheaper, however.

 

[jkmail]

I think that all of the people who are predicting an over $1000 have given up on an average / high end consumer.

Even though the surface is somewhat expensive it reflects a market for the more intensive user, they could have gone with a more adverage, main stream, product. Even though they stuck to the higher end user they kept the price a bit more realistic as opposed to Apple who price everything as if were a gift from the gods.

I don't believe MS is seeking to keep hololens an expensive, niche product for the rich.

At least I hope not, anyway.

 

[DavidinCT]

The Oculus Rift retails for $600 and offloads processing power to a powerful gaming computer (which can't easily be obtained for under $1000).
It will be over $1,000 for certain, and I'm expecting between $1,500 and $3,000. Version 2 will be cheaper, however.

But, the big problem here, is at $1000, it will not get mass consumer acceptance, as it will be too expensive for most people. This brings up another problem. If it's priced right, the devs will make more apps for it because more consumers will be willing to buy it and buy their software. If it stays, $1000-3000, not a lot of people will buy it, devs wont make as many apps as not a larger amount of people to sell their products to.

It really has to be priced right to for consumer acceptance. Just because you have $1500 burning a hole in your pocket does not mean everyone does.

It really is one of those catch 22 type things... or even like a Windows Phone type thing....You cant get the apps because you don't have the marketshare but, you cant get the marketshare because you don't have the apps...

Would love to see a very reasonable price for this and lots of software, as it could take gaming to the NEXT level but, it all depends on where Microsoft wants to go with these devices.

I personally would not buy it unless there is a VERY large amount of options for software. I hate to spend money on a "toy" (as it would be a entertainment device), and neat to play with for a while but, after 6 months it just sits on the shelf because there is no NEW software available for it.

 

[grahamf]

It doesn't need mass consumer acceptance. The tech is too early. This is not VR. Hell, it's not even AR, considering that things such as the Google Glass were marketed as such. This is something new, and never seen before. With LCDs I can just imagine my old CRT monitor but skinny. With Oculus Rift I can use a $20 Google Cardboard and get a general idea. But Hololens? You can describe it to me, but I as an individual cannot find a way to experience it until I actually have one on my head. We have to go back to computers like the Programma 101 to get such a major leap forward in how we use technology. And that computer was $3,200 at the time, and was sold to companies like Nasa. We grew up with Windows and got spooled by Apple so we expect to have access to the latest tech, but this is not the case.

The Hololens is not for you. It's successors are. Maybe in 5-10 years time we will have a $600 version that isn't complete ****e, but for now we have to wait.