Project Glass Google, i concorrenti avanzano

Il prototipo Mobile Eye-Trek di Olympus

E già l'occasione è di quelle ghiotte. Diciamoci la verità.Google ha il suo proselitismo interplanetario, ma questo non vuol dire che sia stata l'unica ad investire nel campo della realtà aumenta.C'è dietro l'angolo Olympus con il suo progetto MEG4.0, che realizza protitipi da ben 20 anni e , prevedono, un entrata in produzione per quest'anno: chi la spunterà?

Watch out, Google. Here comes Olympus with the MEG4.0 and don’t dismiss this as a Google Glass knockoff. Olympus has been researching and developing wearable displays for more than 20 years. The MEG4.0 concept, and with that, its eventual production counterpart, has been a long time coming and could be a serious competitor in the space.

Olympus made it clear in today’s announcement that the 30g MEG4.0 is both a prototype and a working name. The stem-like system sits on one side of the glasses and connects to a tablet or phone through Bluetooth. A 320 x 240 virtual screen floats above the wearer’s eye line. The MEG4.0 is designed for all-day use and should last eight hours on a charge, although Olympus states the glasses are designed for bursts of use, 15-seconds at a time.

Google isn’t the only player in the augmented reality game. In fact several companies have toyed with the concept for the last few years including Olympus. The company introduced a working set of AR glasses back in 2008. Called the Mobile Eye-Trek (shown above) the glasses were designed to be worn on a daily basis, feeding information like email to the wearer on a screen placed 50cm in front of the eyes, making it appear as a 3.8-inch screen.

While the Mobile Eye-Track never hit the retail market, Olympus indicated at the time that the prototype would lead to a production version by 2012.

However, much like Google, Olympus is not revealing the user interface yet. If the MEG4.0 is to be a success, the interface, and more importantly, the depth of the information available needs to be as mature as Google Glass. Price and availability was not announced.

techcrunch.com