Let me start by making it totally clear that these Meta smart glasses are outstanding devices. I’m glad I bought them. I will own something like this for the rest of my life. That being said, I’ve had some hits and misses with connections lately. Details follow.
I tested a walk around my neighborhood with a professional sighted guide on the other end of a Messenger video call. Hits: My sighted guide was able to navigate me around a car that had blocked the sidewalk and also point out tactile cues on the sidewalk to help me find an easy-to-miss turn. The video and audio quality were excellent despite being on LTE. My sighted guide saw the value in this technology for the first time and how it could be used to provide support remotely. Misses: Establishing a call was problematic. After the Meta glasses dropped Bluetooth twice, I rebooted both the phone and the glasses, then finally got a stable call. Furthermore, there is no way to start a Messenger video call hands-free. I must start an audio call hand-free, then interact with my phone screen to enable video.
I did another test, this time using Be My Eyes, and in an area with solid 5G. The goal was to step out of a store, start a BME call, and have a volunteer serve as a guide while I walked two blocks to another store. I’ll start with the misses: Again, the Meta glasses dropped the Bluetooth connection, leaving me with an audio-only BME call. The first time, I couldn’t hear the volunteer at all, either through the glasses or my phone. The second time, we could talk, but there was no way to enable even my phone camera. I gave up and did the walk without assistance. Hits: Once I arrived at the second store and was no longer standing outside in the cold, I rebooted the phone and glasses and placed a successful BME call, just to verify it actually worked.
Summary: This is outstanding technology. Invaluable. But the connection system needs to be bullet-proof, because the current unreliability makes it unhelpful in critical situations. BME has the right approach with a hands-free way to start a video call, but there needs to be a better recovery mechanism in the event of Bluetooth issues (better than a reboot). Meta needs to implement the same hands-free video call initiation mechanism for Messenger.
Comments
Starting video call
I've only used video calling with WhatsApp, but it always starts an audio call then you can double tap the camera button to switch it to video. I'm guessing it's a privacy thing to avoid accidentally showing someone what you are looking at.
Maybe Messenger doesn't do this?
But I would agree, connection problems are my biggest gripe. I've never figured out if it was the glasses or bluetooth or my mobile signal. I vaguely remember someone on here suggesting turning airplane mode on and off which might be worth a try if you've not done that already.
I thought maybe AirPods
I thought maybe my AirPods might be involved, since the Meta glasses are complaining about Bluetooth. But my AirPods were stowed when these issues occured. That should be enough. I shouldn't have to stow my AirPods and reboot.
Yes, Messenger has the same mechanism to switch an audio call to video. So I can verbally initiate an audio call with the glasses, then pull my phone out and switch to video. But since I'm going to have to pull my phone out anyway, I may as well just interact with it to launch a video call from the outset.
No need for the phone for video
If you are in an audio call, just double tap the camera button on the glasses. No need to pull the phone out.
I thought I tried that
Thanks for the tip. I'll play with it some more.
Does the glasses have a screen reader on them as well.
Hi.
Since the glasses has touch control does it have a screen reader as well?
I had a look at the meta rayband smart glasses yesterday at a store.
How do you know as a blind person where the camera button is?
No
Hi Kushal. No, there’s no screen reader or need for one. There is a physical on / off switch on the left arm, and a physical camera button which is easy to feel on the top of the right arm. The side of the right arm is touch sensitive, but you only tap and swipe on it to carry out functions like play / pause, change volume etc, much like other Bluetooth earphones. It is not used for menus and there is no screen to read.
Settings are in the app on your phone.
Making video calls
To answer the question about video call s from your Meta smart glasses. There is a great Youtube video on how to setup and make video calls without the need to pull out your phone, from the "Blind Life". Here is the link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qzJize5ZI18
Bluetooth is the problem
Thanks. I've now mastered the art of starting a video call hands-free.
The main issue is Bluetooth connectivity. I described the problem in the main post body. Meta engineers must eliminate the failure, obviously, but both BME and Messenger developers should consider implementing a more graceful way to handle non-connecting Meta glasses.
Higher Fidelity
What we really need, and not just for smart glass usage, is something with a better bandwidth than Bluetooth technology, which is 30 year old technology, by the way.
I ruled out AirPods
I wanted to make sure my AirPods had nothing to do with my connection issues. So I did another test. After stowing my AirPods, I rebooted both my phone and Meta glasses. Then I went to sleep for the night. When I got up this morning, without touching the AirPods, I attempted a Be My Eyes call with the glasses. I experienced two types of failures.
One. I get connected to a volunteer, but seconds into the call, the glasses announce to me that there is some issue with Bluetooth (sorry I don't have the exact text of the error). The call reverts to audio only and there is no obvious way to turn on the iPhone camera.
Two. I ask the glasses to place a BME call, and it tells me it is doing so, but it doesn't. No BME ringtone, no error from the glasses. Just silence.
I attempted several times. Whether the Meta View and Be My Eyes apps are running or not doesn’t seem to affect the issue. The only way I was able to get a call to go through was to power off the glasses, reboot the phone, and power on the glasses again. After that, the Be My Eyes call connected and worked flawlessly.
Is this possibly a flaw with my glasses? I imagine I should start with Meta before I try to contact Be My Eyes, after all, I see a similar problem with video calls in Messenger.
Meta canned information
Apparently this issue is common enough that Meta has a canned support page. Sadly, the advice is unhelpful. My glasses are already close to my phone, and my other Bluetooth devices are already turned off. Disconnecting them (unpairing) isn't really reasonable, in my opinion.
Brian's 2 cent advice
Hey Paul, before going through the hassle of replacing your Meta's, try the following:
1. Go to settings, Bluetooth, and disable every device you currently have connected/saved to your iPhone except for your Meta smart glasses. By disable, I mean "forget this device".
2. Try to make a standard phone call with your Meta smart glasses.
3. Try to text somebody with your smart glasses.
4. Ask Meta AI a few random questions. Like what is the tallest mountain in the world? What is the deepest part of the Pacific Ocean? Just how rocky are those Rocky Mountains? 😛
5. If you use Facebook and/or Instagram, try taking a photo of something and using Meta smart glasses to upload to your social media page.
6. If you use WhatsApp and/or messenger, try contacting somebody via your smart glasses.
7. Finally, try saying, "hey Meta, Be My Eyes".
Pay attention to how well your smart glasses stay connected to your iPhone throughout each of these steps. If it is only messing up with Be My Eyes, then it is more of a Be My Eyes issue, then a meta-smart glasses issue. However, if connection is spotty throughout all of these steps, then it is Bluetooth related, and possibly a smart glasses issue or even an iPhone issue.
HTH
Update
Thanks, Brian. Per Meta's canned advice, I decided to contact their support. They responded quickly by email and advised a full factory reset. The instructions they provided in their email were vague. I found these alternate instructions helpful. But the bottom line is that you can't do a factory reset without enough eyesight to both see the blinking LED and discern its color. I employed my sighted spouse workaround. I'm glad I married a sighted techno nerd.
The factory reset took a while. I didn't time it, but I would guess maybe ten minutes. Afterward, you go through all the initial setup, just like when they were new. It's a good way to spend about an hour on a snowy Tuesday. I immediately made a Be My Eyes call to test. It worked! I looked out the front door, and the helpful volunteer gave me a good estimate on how much snow is in my driveway. I'll try other calls over the next few days and hope this has made the connection process more reliable.
Be My Rockies
Hey Paul,
Glad you got them working for you. Met a smart glasses, like any other technology, can be really really nice ... when they work as intended.
True story. ☺️
When these first came out, I…
When these first came out, I felt like they sounded more like a toy than a tool, but withh Be My Eyes, I'm more convinced by the day. Now, if I could just find a pair used to save a few bucks, that would be ideal.
Or you can do what I did, if you have vision insurance
And buy a pair of brand new for less than $70.
Hmmm, wonder if my United…
Hmmm, wonder if my United Medicare plan would cover them. I don't have any vision though, so don't think so.
UHC?
If you have what I think you have, then yes, yes it will. 😉
More info on my experience
Here is a link to my post on how I purchased Meta's for so little, using my Vision Insurance. Note that while I went to Lens Crafters, you can pretty much go anywhere vision insurance is accepted.
Good luck!
https://applevis.com/forum/assistive-technology/meta-smartglasses-vision-insurance
All of this has me thinking…
All of this has me thinking. I wonder how well a pair of these might work in a gym setting? Specifically for weight machines? In my gym, they are a bit odd. Some go by increments of 10, some by 15, and it just seems a bit random. A lot of time I don't know for sure how much I'm lifting, as I just go by the position the pin is in, move as needed, and find out from a sighted person later the exact weight, and there have been times when I was actually lifting more than I thought. While there are usually people around I can ask if I really wanna know that bad, being able to just ask meta would be pretty sweet. Also, things like total distance on the treadmill, to know if what my Apple Watch is saying is actually right. Any fellow gym rats around here who would be willing to test this for me?
Of course, the other thing to consider is how out of place the glasses would look in a gym setting. lol But, since you can send audio to them via bluetooth, another advantage would be that I could continue to listen to whatever I am listening to, and still have my ears free and be able to navigate between machines. I have tried and can't pull it off that well with my AirPods Pro, even with transparency enabled.
I imagine ...
I imagine no one would even blink an eye at you, or anyone else, wearing sunglasses at a gym. Doubt it'd be the first time anyone has seen that before.
Regarding the weights, the AI may be able to read the LBS off of the free weights. Possibly.
I have a friend who has a couple of 3lbs and 5lbs free weights she uses in her home, and she claims her Metas can read the measurement off of those.
Who knows about gym weights, though.
I'd say just give it a try and see. 🙂
Yeah, I have a pair of 20s…
Yeah, I have a pair of 20s here at home, but at the gym I prefer just using the machines, so would be interesting to see if it would work. Will give it a shot if I'm able to get them any time soon.
Funny you should ask
What a coincidence. I just tried this yesterday. I use weight machines, and set the weight with a steel pin that I slide into a stack of 15 pound weights, and each hole is clearly labeled, 15, 30, 45, etc. But there's also a dial for 5 pound increments, which will read 0, 5, or 10. I tried asking, "Hey Meta, how many pounds is this machine set for?" It read the 0 off the dial and told me it was set for zero pounds, totally ignoring the pin position. I'll try again in the future. Maybe I need to be more explicit in my prompt. Like, "Hey Meta, read the numeric label next to the steel pin."
Wearing sunglasses and using a cane is really no big deal. The regulars say hi to me and usually introduce themselves. If I start caning around a machine that's occupied, the person tells me the machine is in use. I haven't sat on anyone's lap. Yet.
Bike machine
I failed to mention. The Meta glasses do a good job reading items off the display screen of the bike machine. "Hey Meta, read the elapsed time off this screen," works as expected.
Slightly related
The washers and dryers in my apartment buildings laundry room are all lcd displays. My Meta's do a wonderful job of relaying how much time is left when I use those. 😀
Thanks Brian and Paul. That…
Thanks Brian and Paul. That makes me think it might work very well on the treadmill, but the weights could be questionable.
I get around the gym pretty well by myself, and like you, Paul, haven't sat in anyone's lap. lol Would appreciate the continued testing.
How is the quality of the speakers for things like music? Good enough for just listening on the glasses, or do you still prefer airpods? If you do have the glasses on, but are also using airpods, does it mess up, or have issues switching between devices?
Re: Sound quality
While I cannot speak on AirPods, never owned a pair, the sound quality on the Metas is amazing. I want to say that the delay that we all experience when using Bluetooth audio devices seems to be a bit shorter on the Meta smart glasses, over typical Bluetooth earbuds, but my experiences revolve around third-party earbuds, and not Apple branded earbuds, so your mileage may vary.
Glasses + AirPods
I have found that they work well together. You might get redundant announcements, such as SIRI (through the AirPods) and Meta (through the glasses) both announcing an incoming text, but you can adjust Meta settings to avoid such situations.
The airPods sound quality is superior. They are, first and foremost, in-the-ear high quality Bluetooth earbuds designed by Apple. The glasses quality isn't poor, but they are over-the-ear speakers that let in ambient sound. I would say that they have the sound you would expect from such a design.
I'm with Brian. The glasses are amazing technology. You won't regret buying them. I plan to have tech like this for the rest of my life.
Back to Bluetooth
Again, Bluetooth instability.
I placed a Messenger audio call to a friend. All went well until I double-clicked the capture button to switch to video and enable the glasses camera. For a few seconds, he could see through my camera as expected. Then the Meta glasses gave me an error message and the camera cut out. The Messenger app call screen displayed a button for microphone and video, but the video button was dimmed, so I couldn't even switch to the phone's camera.
A few minutes after we ended the call, I tried a video call with my spouse. It worked flawlessly. So the problem seems to be random. I have Meta's toll-free support number, so I'll try giving them a call tomorrow. But I've already done a factory reset, so I don't know what else they might suggest.
Bluetooth instability
I think it's asking bluetooth to do more heavy lifting than it was ever designed for. It was always intended for sound at most and otherwise just low bandwidth peripherals like keyboards and mice, I'm not sure how much bandwidth it presently has but I'm very surprised anyone even thought to use it for video.
Weights, redux
I tried a few different prompts to get the glasses to read the weight machine settings. I had the best luck with, "Read the number next to the hole with the steel pin in it," and I was holding the pin halfway in the hole when the glasses took the photo. One problem is that it's often hard for even a sighted person because of the angle, and if a sighted person can't see it, neither can Meta.
On a different topic, I had the Audible app open and was holding my cell phone up. So, basically, the only thing Meta would see would be my hand holding my phone, with Audible on the screen, and whatever was in the background, which just happened to be a cat on a bed. I asked Meta to look and describe. It said this was a person taking a photo of a cat on a bed. I dug deeper, of course. "Is there a cat on the phone screen?" Meta: "No." Me: "Is there text on the phone screen?" Meta: "Yes, but it's not clear and I can't read it." Me: "Would there happen to be an audio book player on the screen?" Meta: "No, there is no audiobook player on the screen."
The technology is good when it works, and it works a lot. But when it fails like this, it's quite amusing, and more than a little frustrating.
Thanks for the info. :)…
Thanks for the info. :) Sounds like it would not be quite as helpful in the gym, but still has enough practical uses to make them worth while.
Glasses in other languages?
Hi guys, I live in Mexico, don't know if those are abailable in Mexico yet, but if I could find someone to bring ones from the US, I need first of all to know if they only work in English, because it will be weird for me to give orders on English in front other people.
thanks.
Weird my comment was published twice
please disregard this message as I edited it to avoid the mistake.
Poor Bluetooth connection
Hello Paul!
First at all congratulations for the glasses.
internet connection
couple recommendations
Whenever you use the glasses and do not have Wi Fi connection should you turn off WiFi from your phone and only use cellular data
Factory reset only took about 1 minute the intire process
Fold the glasses, press 5 times the capture button , then press and hold for about 5 seconds the capture button and about 20 seconds later the glasses will boot up.
stable signal instead of Strong signal
try LTE when you go out and decide to use the glasses, 5G could be faster however isn't stable for most areas.
I glad you like the glasses ;(
Karina
Karina, you may find the description features don't work in your area. I know it works in the US, Canada and Australia for some reason but I don't recall if Mexico was on the list. Almost nowhere else in the world has this functionality yet.
Edit:
Just checked. US, Canada and Australia only. Not being in one of these countries myself I know it's frustrating but it is what it is.
descriptions in Mexico
I can confirm that I used "Look and Describe" and "Live AI" in Mazatlan over the Christmas period and it worked fine. This surprised me slightly as I too noted that Mexico wasn't on the list. No VPN or settings changes were used; just got off the plane and started using it via airport wi-fi and hotel wi-fi.
Re: Mexico
Did you have Look and Ask running before you went to Mexico? I think if you have the glasses setup in US or Canada, then go somewhere else the feature will work for a short while. I think it might be different if you unboxed the glasses in Mexico and used them for the first time there.
Not that I know about Mexico specifically, but I believe that is how it works elsewhere. (Which is why the VPN trick used to work for about a month in the UK)
Re: Mexico
@Mr Grieves, yes, I setup the glasses in Canada so that could very well be the case. I didn't know about the grace period.
Top Shelf and Mr. Grieves
Thanks for your comments, I agree with Mr. Grieves, also because the glasses were set up in canada. How ever, After my last post, I went to Meta's webpage and confirmed that although there are various contries where the glasses and all their functions work, Mexico isn't there yet. After that, I saw a video on youtube from a Spanish guy which told the AI function was recently added for Spain (and I can confirm Spain in deed was there in the Meta's webpage) and he was trying it in Spanish during the video, so well hope this devise comes soon to the third world.
Greetings.
at Karina
Regarding to the Spanish videos and more, sadly not true it all.
Its hard to understand until you have the glasses and try by yourself.
While it's true that Meta has expanded Languages including Spanish for many of the services, unfortunately the feature that interests to our visually impair community is only available for English United States, Canada and Australia.
In other words using the camera with AI is only available in English for the countries mention above, it doesn't support any other Language at this time.
in the rest of the countries support the most basic things like a voice assistant, very similar as Siri and Alexa.