So I have been looking into ways to charge my phone while using nreal (main use case being for long haul journeys like flights). I tried 2 different HDMI to USB-C adapters, which supposedly worked on the nreal lights, but having an issue on the nreal air.
Seems that the display is misaligned when going through these, as the top ~10% of the display appears at the bottom when in air cast/basic display mode. Works fine on the MR mode.
I also plugged the output of these dongles into a USB-C display, and that worked fine without issue, so presumably something up with how the glasses convert the display signal.
Is this something that could potentially be fixed by firmware update? Or does anyone else have a work around to support charging a phone (without wireless charging), and using the nreal air at the same time.
Hi developer. We are considering to provide a similar charging solution for customers. Please give us some more time. Once this kind of charging adaptor is released, we will update it on our website.
I’m having the exact same issue. Which adapters have you used? So far I’ve tried this cheapo model from Amazon, and ordered the Goovis Young HDMI to Type-C adapter as well, which should arrive on Monday.
I personally tried with the Groovis young adapter and had that issue… I know someone who tried a ugreen hdmi to usbc adapter with same output. I assume its something the headset is doing with the signal rarther than the adapters.
I’m fairly certain the adapter I have is practically the same as the Ugreen one, internally.
I’ve come to the same conclusion after testing the adapter with other Type-C monitors. The weird thing is that it clearly is showing more than 19201080 - my guess would be that the actual display in the glasses is 19201200, with some software magic truncating it to 1080p height, and since the displays are OLED, the black bars are invisible. But somehow the HDMI to USB-C signal conversion effs something up, and we get this weird banding result.
Which is a shame, because these glasses, in my opinion, work best with the phone connected wirelessly.
Thank you guys for discussing this issue. At present, our glass doesn’t support HDMI-Type C connection, so you may get issues when using this kind of connection. Please do not use it. We will also consider to provide power-saving solution for you in near future.
Please introduce HDMI support then. The Air (and Light) glasses are amazing hardware-wise, but incredibly limited by software. I’d even recommend going as far as officially providing support to open-source HMD projects (e.g. OpenHMD), making the glasses usable with any regular PC.
Hi developer. Thank you for your suggestion, we will try to improve our products. By the way, you can insert Air to regular PC which support DP. And Air will work as expanded screen.
Yes, that works. However my goal was to use a generic Miracast dongle and a power bank to allow my phone to be a standalone controller on the go, not tied to the glasses via cable.
I too have had this exact issue using the UGreen adapter - I was considering taking a chance on the Goovis adapter to see if that worked but glad I read this thread first!
For those who just want to view a HDMI source in AirCast mode, there is a workaround but it requires additional hardware.
I’ve got my source passing through a HDMI capture device, which is in turn connected to the USB-3 port of a Chromebook. I can then connect the NReal Air to the USB-C of the Chromebook and view the HDMI source in full screen mode via the standard camera app.
Not exactly an ideal solution, but it does work pretty well.
The core issue, as discovered after several debugging sessions, is caused by the HDMI adapters.
HDMI signal (and DP signal too) have a few timing-related settings that are usually transmitted through the EDID information block (this is negotiated between the sink (display) and source upon connection).
These timings are used to “blank” certain parts of the screen (e.g. most TVs and monitors you’ll use in your life are not the perfect 1920x1080 resolution as it might be advertised, but they have a few extra rows/columns of pixels that are covered - this blanking is used to constrict the content to the actually visible part). In our case, the Air glasses use a display with a native resolution of 1920x1200 (or comparable, I’m not sure about the exact specifics yet).
So in default connection mode, the Air tells the source device, via the EDID timing informations, to send a signal that is 1920x1200, but the actual content should only be 1920x1080 (thereby blanking out the last 120 lines).
However, when an HDMI adapter is used, this blanking information gets overridden by the adapter, and because of this, the image distortion happens. This is absolutely a fault on the HDMI adapter’s side, as it should NOT be overriding the EDID information coming from the display.
Now, if you absolutely need an HDMI adapter, I’d recommend going for the GoFanco adapter - I’ve verified that this one will NOT have any blanking issues or distortion.
This was working with the Steam Deck (And likely any other HDMI compatible option) with all powered HDMI to USB-C devices/docks that I had on hand as of “air_07.1.01.192_20221022.bin” With the implementation of the most recent (12/5/22) it has now been broken again so I recommend holding onto a copy of the above firmware update. I re-flashed and all is well.
Yes, PLEASE introduce HDMI to USB-C support because this is a much more supported means in a business setting as not all business computers have USB-C out ports.
similar issues here. I received the glasses last week. All was looking good. I was prompted, when plugged in to my Mac in Crome to update Firmware, which I did.
air_07.1.01.192_20221022
But now I have the issue with the image being pushed down by 10% and the top being a repetition of the bottom.
See image attached. Please release a firmware to fix this problem.
BTW, I am not using the HDMI adapter, but used it once to connect to my iPhone.
Mine have been working fine with the air_07.1.01.192_20221022.bin firmware on PC, Steam Deck, and Android. I was reading that some phones force a downgrade with the App, but have no personal experience. Additionally Mac is supposed to have additional features that are not available on PC. Did you use the site Nreal Air - Activation and firmware update and follow each step?
Best of luck getting it working soon! I love my Nreal Air’s and use them almost daily.
Hi, just like what @Dancing_J mentioned, the firmware of your Air glass should be the older one (older than 192_20221022), or the upgrading of your glass failed.
