Is Nvidia 3d Vision really worth it, or a gimmick?

[MrK6]

Hey, I've been looking at getting the Asus VG236H with the Nvidia 3d vision kit, for $480 Canadian at my local Memory Express. For all you guys currently using 3d, is it really worth it? I've read all the reviews, and I also know that a review is never as useful as some unbiased opinions from fellow anandtechies.

Is it something that is really game changing, and you can't do without? Or do you use it for a month and put it away indefinately?

I've got a Core i7 950 at 4 ghz and a GTX 580, so I'm good to go for requirements.

I think it's a personal preference. I find it to be a gimmicky and ruin the immersion of games. To me, it looks like a bunch of cardboard cutouts stationed along the screen. Also, the dimmed brightness, crappy colors/lighting, and TN panel distract from the experience as well. Of note, I have excellent depth perception, and maybe that plays a part of it (get yours measured next time you're at your ophthalmologist :thumbsup: ).

Anywho, definitely go try it out at BestBuy or any event NVIDIA is at (PAX East is this weekend if you're in the northeast USA, I'm betting there will be displays set up there).

 

[SirPauly]

Everything is subjective but I would like to hear the testing involved with some of the subjective views. I always hear strong views but usually lacking data though which some may be from third parties.

 

[Arkadrel]

Everything is subjective but I would like to hear the testing involved with some of the subjective views. I always hear strong views but usually lacking data though which some may be from third parties.

I would recammend everyone read this:
http://www.mediacollege.com/3d/depth-perception/stereoblind.html

and take this test (if your one of the 12% that fail it, you cant enjoy 3D):
http://www.mediacollege.com/3d/depth-perception/test.html

Find out if your one of the people those brain cant understand 3D like this.

Then go to a the movie theatre, and see a 3D movie... check if you get tried eyes or headachs ect.

Then find a bestbuy or someplace where you can try a game in 3D.
Like Mrk6 said it might not be for everyone (there are "pro"s and "con"s to it).

Also note, AMD cards 6xxx series, can do bluray 3D movies too, but... you cant play 3D games with them as far as I know. So if you want to 3D game, you need a nvidia card.

 

[SirPauly]

Of course you can play games with 3d stereo with AMD cards.

 

[Arkadrel]

You can? I thought it was a nvidia only thingy? I know you can buy 3D glasses and a monitor that supports it, and if you have a 6xxx card, you can watch like 3D bluray movies.

Marketing I guess.. I didnt know that (amd marketing is kinda sucky).
I know nvidia sells a set of somekinde where you get like a bundle, and you have 3D.

 

[SirPauly]

3d vision is for nVidia but AMD's approach is to work with third parties for hardware and software. There are ways of enjoying gaming and 3d stereo on AMD hardware and a good place to start looking is at Iz3d and their forums, or MTBs3d.

 

[nanaki333]

has iz3d come out with a new display? the last 22" they had looked terrible. i checked out a demo they had setup at microcenter back when it came out and was unimpressed.

 

[Raduque]

The future is 3d IMHO. We allready have 3d TV's, monitors, 3d vision, 3d Nintendo DS, 3d movies are becomming common also. I think when prices come down it will become more mainsteam.

I hope all this 3d crap is both able to be turned off, and won't compromise normal viewing methods. 3D gives me a headache and it doesn't work for me anyway.

 

[Seero]

Just to get the fact straight. LZ3D used to have its own 3D gears, including monitors and selected set of video cards from both AMD and Nvidia. About 9 months ago it releases a S3D driver which supports other selected set of 3d monitors in the market. I believe all Dx11 video card can run S3D. So the reminding question is which monitor is supported.

Just to be clear, Some AMD video cards are supported by S3D, not the other way around, meaning that AMD is not responsible of fixing anything if any 3D related tech broke. Nvidia 3D vision also only support 8800 gt or better video cards but not any other video cards. If anything wrong with Nvidia's 3D vision, Nvidia, or the particular game is responsible of fixing the problem.

Now having said that, LZ3D has been doing a good job on its driver.

 

[anishannayya]

Gimmick, you'll try it once or twice, but then you will get tired of the reduced framerate, refresh rate, and the downgrade to 1080i (dependent on the 3D tech). Then you will get dizzy/barf. Lastly, you have to wear/charge those stupid glasses.

 

[Seero]

Gimmick, you'll try it once or twice, but then you will get tired of the reduced framerate, refresh rate, and the downgrade to 1080i (dependent on the 3D tech). Then you will get dizzy/barf. Lastly, you have to wear/charge those stupid glasses.

I have 460 SLI, most games runs at 120FPS with everything set to max. OP has 580. I don't think video card and $$ is an issue. Worst case, one more 580.

The reason why i take them off is because I am used to see games in 2D. In 3D, everything is far more intense as my brain needs to process information in 3D, not 2D. The most obvious thing that never happened before is to have my eyes coordinated to track the cursor. My eyes don't need to refocus to see objects in distances 2D. In 3D, the UI is usually aligned to the surface of the monitor, and everything else is inside the the monitor. It is hard to explain, but all 3D user knows.

 

[SirPauly]

Gimmick, you'll try it once or twice, but then you will get tired of the reduced framerate, refresh rate, and the downgrade to 1080i (dependent on the 3D tech). Then you will get dizzy/barf. Lastly, you have to wear/charge those stupid glasses.

I take it you didn't like it, hehe!

 

[videopho]

3d PC gaming rocks!
Especially on a 73" screen.

 

[artvscommerce]

I just tried Crysis 2 in 3d and it was pretty awesome. I had to play with the depth a bit to get it right, but so far this game has been my favorite for 3d. Also since the 3d support is built into the engine, it doesnt cut the frame rate down too much like many have been complaining about. I imagine many new games will be like this as well.

 

[Dribble]

Batman in 3D is amazing and runs fine on my GTX 570.

imo 3D is still a mixed bag:
-online games you'll turn 3D off. Shooters are just more responsive in 2D, even old games like ut2004 where fps is never an issue it's harder to hit stuff in 3D. Might be the monitor effectively drops from 120hz to 60hz, but I suspect drivers aren't quite right either as it seemed to lag at times.

-games that aren't designed for 3D generally can be played but the irritating stuff (like a hud that's in your face) are off-putting enough that it's nicer to play in 2D.

-offline games that are designed for 3D are generally best in 3D.

 

[SirPauly]

There's is a lot of work to do in my mind but has great potential, imho!

 

[Destiny]

I was at CES 2011 Las Vegas at the Nvidia Booth playing on a Nvidia set up of SLI GTX 580 with 3 Monitors playing Mafia 2 in 3D = I literally had an orgasm...

So no it is not a gimmick...

 

[SirPauly]

You mean it didn't look like cardboard cut-outs stationed across the screen?

 

[ShadowOfMyself]

I dont like the way it is done right now... Watched a couple movies and it gets really uncomfortable, no headaches or anything but I feel like Im twisting my eyes all the time

Plus just like SirPauly pointed above, 3D looks too much like cardboard cuts in different distances, its kinda funny... Theres no real depth perception, you just know object A is in front or behind object B, no idea about the distance

Its cool though, Ill give you that... in Tron there was a scene that had me closing my eyes because it really felt like it came out of the screen, that was pretty awesome

Still, its one of those technologies where I feel in 50 years people will be looking back and saying "LOL, remember when people used this and that to achieve 3D? That was so lame"

 

[chelhxi]

So, I went ahead and bought the Asus vg236h kit. So far I'm pretty impressed, the monitor itself is great, the 3d vision is a bit of a mixed bag. I found starcraft 2 unplayable with it on, and Left 4 dead 2 is cool but disorientating. Then I loaded up Metro 2033.... Holy crap is that amazing! You really feel like you're in the game like nothing I've seen before. It seems like certain games are gonna be excellent that are designed with 3d in mind from the beginning.
I'm liking it, but I feel like my eyes have to adjust or something. I'm going a little crosseyed right now.

For the other guys that have the nvidia kit, does the wheel on the ir receiver turn freely all the time? Mine keeps binding a little bit when I adjust the depth, it annoys me. Every turn or so it encounters some resistance.

 

[Seero]

...
For the other guys that have the nvidia kit, does the wheel on the ir receiver turn freely all the time? Mine keeps binding a little bit when I adjust the depth, it annoys me. Every turn or so it encounters some resistance.

Don't understand your problem with the scroll, but i personally don't use it as you can use hotkey for depths.

 

[SirPauly]

I dont like the way it is done right now... Watched a couple movies and it gets really uncomfortable, no headaches or anything but I feel like Im twisting my eyes all the time

Plus just like SirPauly pointed above, 3D looks too much like cardboard cuts in different distances, its kinda funny... Theres no real depth perception, you just know object A is in front or behind object B, no idea about the distance

Its cool though, Ill give you that... in Tron there was a scene that had me closing my eyes because it really felt like it came out of the screen, that was pretty awesome

Still, its one of those technologies where I feel in 50 years people will be looking back and saying "LOL, remember when people used this and that to achieve 3D? That was so lame"

Imho,

I was being sarcastic, hehe! IQ is subjective and tastes differ but, for me, the only way it looks like cardboard cut-outs is when the models don't have a lot of polygons and sort of flat to begin with. Morrowind would be a nice example of this to some degree.

You don't think you can't feel distance? I was playing Just Cause 2 and was having a hoot of a time with the grappling hook and decided to do some SkyScraper climbing. As I was getting higher and higher was starting to feel uneasy and what did I do? Looked down! I had a real sense of acrophobia, it looked so real and hard to express in words. Nothing cardboard cutout there.

Another title I like to play is World of WarCraft and brings me into Azeroth and Azeroth comes out of my screen. I like to have my Paladin model out of screen and when fighting I like the enemy to be in screen but when lunging or swinging -- out of screen. One of the cool aspects of 3d stereo is atmosphere and WoW is littered with it, where every particle, leaf, grass blade, tree branch, stone, anything can be easily distinguished and much more real.

It's not all roses and there is frustration but the most frustration is this: When there is content that shines, well, it really shines and the sad part is one may desire everything to shine. So, one may have one of their favorite titles and all excited to try it with stereo3d and it may not shine.

Another thing with PC displays, is CrossTalk -- hopefully as software and hardware mature this can be curbed more and more.

 

[Rebel_L]

I have only watched 3d movies, never tested a gaming setup, but I have found that it seems difficult to focus on details while watching a 3d movie. It always seems to me that edges have bit of distortion or shimmer if I focus on them. Im not sure if thats the glasses in a 3d movie not having good polarization filters and I get a bit of the other eyes frame or it comes from something else. Have any of you with gaming setups seen an effect like this in the movies and has it gone away for you in the gaming setup with the shutters?

As far as the 3d effects go I have always been quite excited by the falling snow effect, most of the rest though still is just happening in front of me and I have never had depth perception problems with standard three dimensional drawings and such so for me it just dosnt add anything other than making it more difficult to focus on details.

 

[chelhxi]

I tried out a couple more games - Batman AA and Resident Evil 5. Batman is just as amazing as Metro, I played with the lights off and the sense of depth was perfect.

I'm having troubles getting RE5 to work though. When I turn on 3d vision, there is a ghost image of everything, it looks somewhat 3d but there is a blurred "afterimage" of everything that is not syncing up. It is also running slower than it should, and at one point gave me a BSOD. Anyone else have problems with this? I'm using the newest Nvidia drivers

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

Some games just don't work well with 3d. I think more games in the future that are made with 3d in mind will be much better. You should try BC2 it looks great in 3d as well. Haven't tried RE5.