> Is it mostly an entertainment thing or do you actually do work with it?

Both. I just got a steam deck and my current plan is to sell my MacBook and just use Steam Deck and some AR glasses as my set up for everything. I can use the desktop mode of Steam Deck along with Distrobox and Podman for dev work and then I can play games, watch Netflix etc using the game mode. The other alternative I was thinking of was getting a Samsung Galaxy and using Dex with some glasses and then using a linux cloud machine for maximum portability but I'm leaning more towards the Steam Deck at the minute because it's a lot of fun and being able to play/code locally regardless of internet signal is a major plus.

> Hows the pixel density? Does a virtual monitor look as good as a real 2k screen?

It's only 1080p so if you're used to a MacBook screen or a 4k monitor it's not going to be anywhere near as clear. That being said, the ergonomics are sooooo much better that, in my opinion, it is worth the screen clarity sacrifice. No matter what monitor set up I had going on, (chair, monitor height, position etc) I would always end up hunching. With the glasses you get none of that. You can fix the screen in the air if you use the Nebula app but I prefer to just have it move with me (which is the default) so you literally have zero shoulder/back pain throughout the day as the screen just moves with you. As for the lack of clarity, I just stick the zoom level to 110% and everything is fine.

The Xreal does have a few other flaws:

- brightness levels are pretty low, so daytime use can sometimes be a pain. you'll definitely want to use light mode during the day and then will probably switch to dark mode at night.

- there's a faint halo ring on the periphery. doesn't interfere with the screen at all and I can ignore it but it's still annoying when you notice it.

- You can get a painful pinching on the sides of your head when you wear it for a while. Oddly, you can completely eliminate this by wearing a thin polyester running headband underneath. Why this works I don't know, we're literally talking a very thin bit of material here and it completely stops it, it's very odd.

- They don't have an accessory available that allows you to charge your device and use the glasses at the same time, you have to purchase either the Nubia Red Magic Gaming Dock or the Viture dock.

Like I said, I am willing to put up with all of these issues because the hunching has got to the point where I think I'm getting the beginnings of kyphosis and I'm going to have to do some work in the gym correcting it.

Personally, I think I'm going to be selling the XReal and purchasing a competitor, the Viture glasses, as they look to be a superior product. Reviews I've seen say they eliminate all the above pain points (far higher brightness, no halo, no pinching, accessory available for passthrough device charging - I've actually already bought this and it works a dream with the Xreal) as well as offering diopter adjustment and the really cool ability to just magnetically snap prescription lenses on to them rather than having to faff about like you do with the Xreal. I don't need these yet but could see it happening in the future as I get older so would be nice to have the easier option if need be. They just seem to have thought about the whole setup a bit better than Xreal have including a cool Android neckband accessory, magnetic power cable etc. There's also Rokid, but the styling puts me off. Links to all here so you can do your own comparison:

https://www.viture.com

https://xreal.com

https://global.rokid.com/

It's a really exciting time at the minute, I don't think it'll be long until we get someone releasing 4k glasses in this space at which point they will be the clearly superior option to monitors.