Acer held its annual global press conference in New York City on Tamil ArchivesThursday and once again vomited a boatload of new laptops, gaming laptops, all-in-one PCs, and even a new generic fitness-focused smartwatch.
They're all nice -- in many cases, thinner and faster than what came before -- but the biggest surprise product was the company's Holo 360, the world's first 360-degree/VR camera with built-in LTE.
SEE ALSO: You'll need to take out a loan to buy this huge gaming laptopAcer's global CEO Jason Chen was quite proud the Holo 360 doesn't require connection with a smartphone, and even boasted about its ability to make phone calls. I'm not sure why you'd want to make a phone call from a 360-degree camera, but, uh, OK.
Looking like some kind of point-and-shoot camera, but with two spherical lenses on top, the Holo 360 is also the first 360 camera to have a built-in screen -- so you can see what you're recording, because you know, the no phone connection thing. Acer says the camera runs on Android, but didn't provide further deets on which version.
Acer Holo 360 is a 360 cam with a screen. LTE, Wifi. No need to connect to a phone. Runs android. pic.twitter.com/2Gz130n7Zq
— Raymond Wong 📱💾📼 (@raywongy) April 27, 2017
Aside from also having built-in Wi-Fi and what looks like the ability to share media to services like Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, and Pinterest (still photos and videos are shareable to all of these platforms, but not all of the support 360-degree content), Acer's not really sharing much else.
The company didn't have the Holo 360 on show. We still have no idea what how big or small it is, how well it works, what resolution it records 360 video in, if it'll have live 360 streaming or not, how much it'll cost, or when it'll be available. Basically we know almost nothing.
The built-in LTE is intriguing, no doubt, but without trying it there's simply no way to know if it's comparable or superior to Samsung's second-generation Gear 360 camera, or any 360 consumer camera that's already available.
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Hands on with the Samsung Gear 360 (2017)
Topics Cameras
