Microsoft Hololens: Australian pricing and availability
Microsoft has announced a price and prerelease date for the developer edition of its Hololens augmented reality device. If you’re keen, you had better start saving up.
While players such as Oculus and HTC are gearing up for the release of their virtual reality (VR) headsets, Microsoft is still at the stage where it needs to get developers on board for its own play in the VR/AR space, Hololens.
What hasn’t been known up until now was how much the Hololens product would cost, or when it will be available. Microsoft has answered that question, but if you want a Hololens, you’re going to need to put aside a fair amount of cash to do so.
Microsoft has opened up pre-orders for the Microsoft Hololens product in the US and Canada, with devices set to ship on 30 March 2016. Unlike other VR/AR products such as the Oculus Rift or HTC Vive, the Hololens is a fully self-contained device running on an Intel processor, Microsoft's own Holographic Processing Unit, 64GB of storage and 2GB of RAM. Expected running battery life is likely to only be between 2-3 hours of use.
If you’re still keen, however, it will cost you. USD$3,000 to be precise, and that’s if you can jump through the hoops of getting an invite to purchase as part of Microsoft’s developer program; this isn’t an open sale to anyone keen enough to part with their cash. (Because it's a developer sale, the price is also inevitably going to remain is US dollars).
Microsoft hasn’t announced when consumer Hololens devices will go on sale at this point in time, although it can be assumed that the release version will have a much lower price point.