Meta Quest Pro Teardown Has Some Big Surprises | digital trends

Best known for disassembling smartphones, iFixit’s YouTube channel turned its focus to the new Meta Quest Pro VR headset, which came up with some interesting surprises.

This is a fairly complicated and compact device – with multiple inward and outward-facing cameras, advanced optics, integrated displays, and various sensors – that’s held on your head with a single, circular strap. Meta hasn’t released full specs for the Quest Pro’s components, so a teardown might be the best way to find out what you’re really getting with this $1,500 productivity headset.

The Meta Quest Pro has a 20.58 Wh (5,348 mAh) battery, which is 44% more capacity than the Quest 2’s 14.3 Wh battery. The battery is easier to access here because it’s placed at the back, away from the other electronics, iFixit noted. However, the challenge might be ordering a replacement, as curved batteries are uncommon.

There are mysterious ribbon cables attached to the battery that can potentially detect battery swelling. These could be capacitive sensors, iFixit speculated, but didn’t elaborate on why the battery might have this technology. Capacitive sensors are used in touchpads, but can also detect pressure, proximity, and liquids. Perhaps this helps the Quest Pro guide the user to the best fit, or provides a system shutdown in the event of contact with water. We reached out to Meta for clarification.

It was already known that the forehead and buttock pads could be easily released by pulling and snapped back in place with a little pressure. There are inward-facing infrared cameras that track eye and face movements, and headband-mounted stereo speakers that deliver surprisingly clear sound with good volume.

The front panel is glossy enough to look like glass, but it’s actually plastic so care should be taken to avoid scratching it. With the cover off there is an apparent empty rectangle that may have been intended for a depth sensor that was reportedly broken off just before manufacture began. Andrew Bosworth, Meta’s Chief Technology Officer, commented in an AMA prior to the launch of the Quest Pro that a depth sensor is unnecessary in modern VR headsets as this capability can easily be handled in software.

Dug deeper into the core of the Quest Pro’s visor, two near-silent fans sit directly in front of the two mini-LED displays. These critical components generate quite a bit of heat to provide enough brightness to meet the higher light requirements of pancake lenses. The lenses themselves are made of high-index plastic.

The iFixit team also delved into the mysteries of Quest Pro’s included touch controllers and discovered that the thumbsticks use potentiometer technology similar to that of the Nintendo Switch. Surprisingly, the thumbpad is actually a button that can sense depth and provide grip strength detection, which Meta has yet to detail. Each touch controller has its own processor and tracking cameras powered by large 10.85Wh batteries. Another detail uncovered is that the stylus sensor isn’t the component responsible for detecting the draw pressure, which Meta describes as a feature of the Quest Pro.

The iFixit team rated Meta Quest Pro’s teardown as one of the hardest it’s ever done. Despite this, iFixit praised Meta for using Phillips screws, a common tool, but stated that this is not a quick or easy device to fix.

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