Not Feeling the Spacial Computing Love

First off, I promise I'm not trying to dump on the AVP. It's an amazing device that I've been waiting years for, and does some things incredibly well. I just am feeling a lot of disparity between how Apple positions the AVP and the reality of what I've experienced.

I've had my AVP for a week, and while I generally have really enjoyed it, I keep running into dissonance when trying to actually be productive on the device. I've been thinking a lot about what the challenges are, and I'm increasingly conceding that Apple really missed the mark on what I was hoping they would deliver to in the "Spacial Computing Revolution." I'd value you all's thoughts on how you're handling these issues, and what you all's thoughts are on how where you realistically see this device positioned in a productive workflow.

I'll mention that I've had issues with tracking, passthrough quality, and especially glare, but these all seem to be areas where current technology is the limiting factor, and will get better with time. The issues I'm more concerned with are the things that were actively implemented in strange ways that I feel makes the "Spacial Computing" tagline from Apple seem somewhat disingenuous, and make the device feel like it's solely for consumption--which is fine, but is nowhere near the revolution I was hoping for.

And before all of the "it was just released!!!" comments, I know that. The thing is that this is Apple we're talking about, and on a product that was years and years in the making. Apple does not cut corners, or launch before they are ready. For a company who's main appeal is having things that 'just work,' I'm not ready to excuse every issues as an "it will come." Plus most of these features exist happily on products with the same architecture so solutions exist and seem to have been actively left out.

Issues: Cannot Create or add pictures to albums in photos. This is probably the dumbest limitation to me. What in the world good is 1Tb of pictures to me if I can't meaningfully organize, sort, or collaborate with them?

Simple device interoperability. There is no handoff, you can't share clipboards*, can't accept phone calls. This made setting the device up a PITA, and instead of feeling like the AVP replaced any devices, makes it feel orphaned and unwieldy.

Settings: I can't count the number of times that I've wanted to make an adjustment to an app or experience to get parity with my iPad/iPhone/Mac, and the settings just don't exist. The customization and granularity sucks, and this weaknes is super apparent in such an immersive environment. And can someone please explain to me why tf there is no dark mode?

Windows: There are no fixed view windows, there are no presets, there is no garuntee where apps are going to end up when you re-center your view after any length of use. I would have thought that Apple had gained plenty of knowledge from Stage Manager to launch with SOMETHING to make standardizing workflows or at least some form of work spaces more elegant.

No inputs, and tyranical peripheral control: I've never once complained about Apple removing ports, because I generally could see the logic and elegance in what they were going for. But, a $4k 'computer' that has NO inputs other than cloud loading just isn't compatible with the reality of creation or productive computing. I don't want to go through three other lengthy steps to get my photos from my camera, or to open a spreadsheet a Windows-using coworker has on a thumbdrive. If you're staging this as a computer, but it requires another computer to be in any way competent...it's not a computer. Even more than that, it's a 'computer' that will only work with the newest gens of Apple keyboards and trackpads... I get having to buy apple pencils for iPads, but why in the world do I have to spend $300+ to get primary input capabilities on a $4k 'computer'? I can't even listen to my Airpods Max on my AVP, I feel like I'm losing my mind.

File management and file transfer: Similar to above. I get the limitations of the UI, and I understand that the filesystem has to be managed very deliberately on a device that could be hard shutdown by removing the battery at any time, but you can do almost nothing meaningful with files... even less than the iPad, which is already limited.

Overly Curated App Store: I get that there aren't many bespoke apps yet, and that's fine, but the app store as is is miserable to use. I don't want to see the 12 apps you recommend again and again, at least list out the iPad apps that are compatible as they are presented on the iPad so I can more efficiently look for solutions without having to 'search' and pray something relevant pops up.

Audio and casting support: This is the biggest complaint to me, and where I really struggle to get Apple's "Spacial Computing" argument. Apple has repeatedly said that this is not a VR device, and it's obvious that they want users to be able to interact with the world.....but they can't. I can't airplay the podcast I'm listening to so my wife can listen with me. I can't cast music to the kitchen for the family to enjoy while I cook, I can't transfer audio on my zoom calls to my office setup that I would like to be part of my "Spacial Computing World". I feel like a digital island.

TL;DR, Apple has always had a lot of control over user's experiences, and I think that has historically been great. The problem on a mixed reality device like the AVP is that these limitations don't just affect an app or a UI, they affect your entire interaction with the world and literally define what you can and can't do. The device encourages users to incorporate the world into their computing space, then seems to put handcuffs on whenever you try. Unless you buy a completely secondary computer to mirror the screen on the AVP.......which, while awesome, completely misses the point for me.

It seems like Apple has left its users to decide what the AVP is actually 'for,' but then tells them they can't do that.

I'm honestly not trying to crap on the device, I've been waiting for it for literal years, I just feel like I was promised a computing revolution, and have been delivered a movie theatre and roped-off environment that lets me see but not meaningfully interact with anything on my device that I care about, and now I have one week left to divine if Apple is going to address any of these issues, or if they just misrepresented what their vision for the device is.

What are the thoughts of the rest of you who are trying to actually use the device for productivity?

Edit: Since the V1 issue keeps coming up--things like FOV, blur, imperfect eye tracking/click registration? THOSE are v1 issues, those are technical limits that are being met and frontiers being expanded, which is very different than missing implementations of existing features.

I have no problem showing grace where due, but I see no reason to make excuses for one of the most valuable companies in the world failing to meet expectations in areas they should be excelling.

Edit 2*: Looks like the shared clipboard may be an opt-in on AVP? Found this documentation, it was disabled by default on my headset, but the shared clipboard is working now.