Facebook user Ramiro Cardenas claims he found a “Meta Quest Pro” VR headset in a hotel room and posted photos and a video of the item online (Thanks, Peter! via Reddit). The headset appears to be the same one seen in hacked installation videos From Smartphones, which Meta has been publicly teasing since late last year.
In the clip, we see Cardenas take the item out of its box to reveal a black headset and controller that appears to have been redesigned. While the front of the headgear includes three cameras, the controllers have a more robust design without the hollowed-out loop that stores the sensors.
The name “Meta Quest Pro” is stamped in the upper left corner of the box, while a picture of the virtual reality headgear and controllers can be seen on the right. Cardenas showed The Verge an up-close photo of the label on the box, which said, “Not for resale – engineering sample,” and said that the headphones had been taken by the guest who had slept in the room.
CEO Mark Zuckerberg has announced that the latest Meta VR headset would be unveiled on October 11 at the company’s Connect event, and the timing of the leak of images and video is spot on with that announcement. We anticipate learning more about Project Cambria/the “Quest Pro” and its other metaverse, augmented reality, and virtual reality initiatives.
‘Quest Pro’ pictures (and now a video) show Meta’s next VR headsethttps://t.co/Xrp8Zp6pSa pic.twitter.com/b5rQczfrOO
— The Verge (@verge) September 12, 2022
Cardenas originally shared the photographs in the comment section of a post on the Oculus Quest 2 Facebook group and reported many devices were left behind. The most notable example is the iPhone 4 prototype left in a bar in 2010. Still, other examples include the sale of the unannounced Pixel 7 on eBay and the apparent loss of a Pixel Watch prototype at a restaurant.
According to a Bloomberg article from July, developer Steve Moser discovered “Oculus Pro” references in Meta’s code, suggesting that this may be the last name Meta has chosen for the future device. The Verge’s request for comment from Meta went unanswered for some time.
Stay tuned for more such updates, Nog Magazine.