Smart glasses without a camera? Even Realities bets productivity beats recording everyone
Smart glasses without a camera? Even Realities bets productivity beats recording everyone
没有摄像头的智能眼镜？Even Realities 押注生产力胜过全方位录制
In the past few years, multiple tech executives have told us that glasses could be the next big interface for consumer hardware. And yet, today’s smart glasses rely a lot on phones, even if they have good hardware. Even Realities’ G2 smart glasses are in the same boat. They’re a premium-looking pair of glasses with a neon-style heads-up display you can see in any lighting — but their functionality relies heavily on their connectivity with the phone, which can be unreliable and frustrating. 过去几年里，多位科技高管曾告诉我们，眼镜可能成为消费硬件的下一个重要交互界面。然而，目前的智能眼镜即便拥有出色的硬件，依然高度依赖手机。Even Realities 的 G2 智能眼镜也不例外。这是一款外观高级的眼镜，配备了在任何光线下都能清晰可见的霓虹风格平视显示器（HUD），但其功能高度依赖与手机的连接，而这种连接有时并不稳定，令人沮丧。
Even Realities takes a different approach to smart glasses than players like Meta. Their devices have a monochrome heads-up display that shows text and information in green, giving it the look of a neon board. There are no cameras or speakers, and that is by design. The company wants to focus on productivity rather than recording, so the people around you don’t have to worry about being filmed. Even Realities 在智能眼镜上的策略与 Meta 等厂商不同。他们的设备采用单色平视显示器，以绿色显示文字和信息，看起来就像一块霓虹灯板。设备没有摄像头或扬声器，这是刻意为之。该公司希望专注于生产力而非录制，这样你周围的人就不必担心被拍摄。
The G2 is the second pair of smart glasses from Even Realities and an improvement over the G1 released a few years ago. The G2 has a brighter 1,200-nit display (vs. 1,000 nits on the G1), four mics (vs. two), and a 75% larger display area than its predecessor. The new display also has a better 60Hz refresh rate, compared with 20Hz on the G1. In the few months I’ve used the G2, the connectivity with the phone has improved tremendously. Early on, the glasses would disconnect from the app so frequently that I nearly gave up on them. But after a few app updates, that issue got better. The glasses are targeted at people who might be constantly in meetings, giving presentations, and traveling to countries where different languages are spoken. G2 是 Even Realities 推出的第二代智能眼镜，相比几年前发布的 G1 有所改进。G2 拥有更亮的 1200 尼特显示屏（G1 为 1000 尼特）、四个麦克风（G1 为两个），显示面积比前代产品增加了 75%。新显示屏的刷新率也提升至 60Hz，而 G1 仅为 20Hz。在我使用 G2 的几个月里，它与手机的连接稳定性有了巨大提升。起初，眼镜与应用程序断连非常频繁，我几乎想放弃它。但在几次应用更新后，这个问题得到了改善。这款眼镜的目标用户是那些经常开会、做演示以及前往使用不同语言国家旅行的人群。
Design
设计
The glasses, which come in two frame designs, are very light at 35 grams. The frame is made out of magnesium alloy, and the temples (the arms that go over your ears) are made out of titanium alloy. In terms of weight and fit, the glasses were comfortable to wear. Since I work from home most of the time, though, I didn’t feel much need to wear them all day. That said, the lenses have UV protection built in, so they’re still worth wearing outside just for eye protection — smart features or not. 这款眼镜有两种镜框设计，重量仅为 35 克，非常轻便。镜框采用镁合金材质，镜腿（架在耳朵上的部分）则采用钛合金材质。在重量和佩戴感方面，这款眼镜戴起来很舒适。不过，由于我大部分时间都在家办公，并没有觉得有全天佩戴的必要。话虽如此，镜片内置了防紫外线功能，所以即使不使用智能功能，仅作为护眼工具，在户外佩戴也是值得的。
The company claims that, based on typical usage, G2’s battery can last up to two days on a single charge. The glasses come with a protective case that can recharge them up to seven times before needing to be plugged in itself. I personally didn’t test the two-day claim, but the battery lasted me long enough to put them back into the case without running out of juice. That case is big — you can’t shove it in a pocket — but it’s solid, and the glasses fit in snugly. 该公司声称，在典型使用情况下，G2 单次充电可续航长达两天。眼镜附带一个保护盒，在自身需要充电前，可以为眼镜充电多达七次。我个人没有测试过两天的续航说法，但电池续航足以支撑我使用到放回盒子里，期间没有耗尽电量。保护盒体积较大，无法塞进兜里，但它非常坚固，眼镜放入其中也很贴合。
Features and operation
功能与操作
The glasses act as your companion for schedules, reminders, and access to notes. You can wake them up by tapping on the stem-based controls. If you double-tap on the control pad on the stem, you will see a dashboard with information like your upcoming meetings, stocks, and top news. The G2 can also show real-time phone notifications, but the pop-ups weren’t always reliable — and since my phone is usually within reach anyway, I didn’t find much use for the feature. 这款眼镜是你的日程、提醒和笔记助手。你可以通过轻敲镜腿上的触控区来唤醒它。双击镜腿上的触控板，你会看到一个仪表盘，显示即将召开的会议、股票和头条新闻等信息。G2 还可以显示实时手机通知，但弹窗并不总是可靠，而且由于我的手机通常就在手边，我并没有觉得这个功能有多大用处。
Long-pressing the temple control opens a menu with several functions: a notifications tray, Translate, Conversate, Teleprompt, a to-do list, and Navigate. Translate lets you set a target language and converse with anyone. At the recent Global Connect Show (GCS) in China, I wore the glasses while talking to company reps doing demos, and the translation was good enough for me to follow along when someone spoke Chinese. I also tried it with other journalists speaking various languages, including French and Spanish. (The downside of this feature is that the other person doesn’t know what you’re saying in your language unless they’re also using the app.) 长按镜腿触控区会打开一个包含多项功能的菜单：通知中心、翻译（Translate）、对话（Conversate）、提词器（Teleprompt）、待办事项和导航（Navigate）。“翻译”功能允许你设置目标语言并与任何人交流。在最近于中国举办的全球连接大会（GCS）上，我戴着眼镜与进行演示的公司代表交谈，翻译效果足以让我听懂对方说的中文。我也尝试过与其他说法语和西班牙语的记者交流。（该功能的缺点是，除非对方也在使用该应用程序，否则他们不知道你在用你的语言说什么。）
Navigate is a cool feature that shows turn-by-turn directions on the heads-up display. The catch: it doesn’t work with Google or Apple Maps. Instead, you have to set your route through the Even Realities app. I tried it a few times walking to cafes near my house. The directions showed up well on the display, but the app kept getting the addresses wrong, so I can’t rely on it for places I don’t already know how to get to. Still, I could see cyclists or motorbike riders finding it useful once the company fixes the accuracy issues. “导航”是一个很酷的功能，可以在平视显示器上显示逐向导航。问题在于：它不支持谷歌地图或苹果地图。相反，你必须通过 Even Realities 的应用程序设置路线。我曾几次尝试用它步行去家附近的咖啡馆。导航信息在显示屏上显示得很好，但应用程序总是搞错地址，所以我无法在去往陌生地点时依赖它。不过，一旦公司解决了准确性问题，我认为骑行者或摩托车手会觉得它很有用。
Conversate, at first, just showed a live transcript of the conversation on the glasses, which felt pointless since you can just as easily record a meeting with an app or an external notetaker. Later, the company added a “prep notes” feature that surfaces more context: you can manually add notes or documents ahead of a meeting and let the AI reference them during the conversation, or let it listen in real time and pop up short explainer bubbles for concepts as they come up. For instance, during a briefing about energy, it showed me a bubble for “Green Hydrogen,” and tapping it brought up a definition right in front of my eyes. That was genuinely useful — though I wouldn’t want a transcript or explainer bubbles for every conversation I have. “对话”功能起初只是在眼镜上显示实时对话转录，这感觉毫无意义，因为你完全可以用应用程序或外部录音笔轻松录制会议。后来，该公司增加了“准备笔记”功能，可以提供更多背景信息：你可以在会前手动添加笔记或文档，让 AI 在对话中参考，或者让它实时监听，并在出现概念时弹出简短的解释气泡。例如，在一次关于能源的简报中，它为我弹出了一个“绿氢”气泡，点击它就能在我眼前显示定义。这确实很有用，尽管我并不希望在每次对话中都看到转录或解释气泡。
At the center of all this is the built-in assistant, Even AI. As with any voice assistant, you say a wake word to activate it and ask questions or add items to your to-do list. It often misunderstood my to-do list requests, and for general questions, the answers were often long paragraphs that streamed across the screen with no way to interrupt or skip ahead. Another issue: despite having four mics, Even AI often failed to activate, or misheard me, when I was outside. The ambient noise in India could have played a part, but I’d still expect a modern gadget to have better noise handling. The G2’s screen was legible in most conditions, but in a bright room I had to adjust the brightness manually through the app. Even if the company hasn’t built an automatic-brightness sensor yet, I’d like to see a manual brightness control built into the glasses themselves, rather than requiring it. 这一切的核心是内置助手 Even AI。和任何语音助手一样，你说出唤醒词即可激活它，并询问问题或添加待办事项。它经常误解我的待办事项请求；对于一般性问题，答案往往是长篇大论，在屏幕上滚动显示，且无法中断或跳过。另一个问题是：尽管有四个麦克风，但当我在户外时，Even AI 经常无法激活或听错我的话。印度的环境噪音可能是一个原因，但我仍期望现代设备能有更好的降噪处理。G2 的屏幕在大多数情况下清晰可见，但在明亮的房间里，我必须通过应用程序手动调节亮度。即使公司尚未内置自动亮度传感器，我也希望看到眼镜本身能提供手动亮度调节，而不是必须依赖手机应用。