« Keep data safe | Main | Vista begins to Wow »
Have 3D monitors arrived?
I spent an hour or so this morning with some guys from Zalman who were showing off their latest 3D monitor. It uses polarisation rather than adding red and green, although special glasses are required.
With a couple of caveats, I was quite impressed. It took a little while to adjust (both ways, I had to be more cautious than usual coming down the stairs afterwards). The adjustment is not just mental but physical.
The vertical viewing range is a bare 12 degrees because of the nature of polarization. It blocks light so move too far off centre and things start to look weird. There are some diagrams on the Trimon product page that help to explain how it works. The horizontal viewing angle is a respectable 180 degrees so it's not all bad.
Stereoscopic videos looked amazing. I resisted the temptation to try and touch the dragon fish in the coral reef or scream as the steam train thundered towards me. But only just.
My feeling about games were a little more mixed. The drivers on the first demo computer were good but the game didn't really shine. The effect was more subtle than I was expecting and I tending not to notice when paying attention to aiming. Playing Painkiller Overdose looked better but the computer had older drivers so the 2D element of the current weapon looked a little odd. Apart from that it was very impressive. I don't know if it would give me an edge in multiplayer but it improves the experience.
They've left us with a monitor so I'm going to give World of Warcraft and GuildWars a go at some point. They told me how good WoW looks so it should be a treat, especially as the slightly slower pace (most of the time) means I should enjoy the 3D effect more.
As much as I like this technology, I've got some reservations about its long term prospects. At the moment, only Nvidia drivers have the required code. Thankfully games don't need to be rewritten, otherwise I probably wouldn't expect any future at all. But as drivers become available I can see this becoming more popular. At £430 for the 22 inch widescreen and £380 for the standard aspect 19 inch, it's not overly expensive either. Two special glasses will be included in the box and there are plans to sell extras as accessories.
Posted by Tim Smith on November 22, 2007 | Permalink
TrackBack
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.typepad.com/t/trackback/24766/23584158
Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Have 3D monitors arrived?:
