Meta Quest 3 and Quest 3S headset owners will soongainaccesstothe full capabilities of Windows 11 in mixed reality, Microsoft announced at itsIgnite conferencethis week.Users will be ableto access a local Windows PC or Windows 365 Cloud PC in seconds, Microsoft said in ablog post, providing access to a private, high-quality, multiple-monitor workstation.Although its already possible to cast a PC desktop to a Quest device, the update should make the process simpler.Microsoft has been working with Meta to bring its apps to the mixed-reality headsets fora while.Last year,the companylaunched several Microsoft 365 appson Quest devices, with web versions of Word, Excel and PowerPoint,as well asMesh 3D environments in Microsoft Teams. At its Build conference in May, Microsoft also announced Windows volumetric apps in a developer previewthat promise to bring 3D content from Windows apps into mixed reality.Meta is the market leader, with Quest headsets accounting for 74% of global AR and VR headset shipments, according todata from Counterpoint Research.At the same time, Microsoft has rolled back its own virtual and mixed reality plans,recentlyannouncing it willdiscontinueits HoloLens 2 headset, with no sign of plans for new version in the works.The number of devices sold globallyfell in the second quarter of 2024, according to IDC analysts, down 28% year on year. However, IDC predicts the total number of devices sold will grow from 6.7 million units in 2024 to 22.9 million in 2028 as cheaper devices come to market.Using a Quest headset as a private, large or multi-monitor setup makes sense from a productivity persective, said Avi Greengart, founder of research firm Technsponential. Accesstoall of Windowsrather than just a browser and select Windows 365 appsaddsa lot of utility.Large virtual monitors are a key use case for investing in head-mounted displays, whether thats a mainstream headset like the Quest 3, a high-end spatial computing platform like the Apple Vision Pro, or a pair of display glasses from XREAL that plug into your phone or laptop, said Greengart.Severalhardware constrains limit the use of Quest devices for work tasks,includingdisplay resolution and field of view (the amount of the observable virtual world visible with the device), andthe discomfort ofwearing a headset for extended periods.Metas Quest 3 and 3S devices are more comfortable than Apples Vision Pro, but lack the high resolution of the more expensive device.Greengart added that somepeopleparticularly older usersmightstruggle to focus on small text at a headsets fixed distance focal length. Those that require vision correction lenses inside the headset can find the edges of the display distorted, he said.I love working in VR, but compared to a physical multi-monitor setup,it isnt quite as productive and it gives me a headache, said Greengart. That said, Ive been covering this space for years, and each iteration gets better.