Nvidia 3D Vision 2 Kit Review

IR emitter built into the bezel of a monitor

The new 120Hz monitors have also come a long way since a few years ago. You can now game in 1920 x 1080 with the GPU pumping out 60 frames per eye per second for a stutter-free experience. It’s not only gaming though, you can watch 3D movies as well provided you have the content and the right player. PowerDVD has had support for 3D Blu-rays for a while now and will work with the 3D Vision kit. If you have a 3D TV, you can simply connect your gaming rig to it and game in 3D using the 3DTV Play software. Remember that you’ll have to use the 3D glasses that came with your TV since Nvidia’s glasses won’t be compatible with it.

Performance
Setting it up was super easy since we had an Asus monitor with the emitter built into it, so it was just a matter of installing an Nvidia graphics card and the drivers. To truly experience 3D Vision at its best, we threw a GTX 590 onto our Sandy Bridge test bench along with 8GB of RAM and Windows 7 64-bit installed on an Intel 520 Series SSD. You’ll also need a dual-link DVI cable or HDMI for this to work . The emitter in the Asus VG278H is placed dead center above the bezel with the ability to tilt forward and backwards so you can get a proper line of sight depending on your seating position.

The Asus VG278H

Nvidia has added over 600 titles to the 3D Vision compatibility list including all the latest ones. When switched on, the image and surroundings darken a little but not as much as with the older kit. It’s like wearing a pair of lightly tinted shades. We fired up Dirt 3 which is certified as “Excellent” in the games compatibility list and rightfully so. The 3D effect is very good with good amount of depth and this applies to the menus as well. The slight flicker that was prevalent in the older glasses is almost non-existent. We noticed a slight issue with crosstalk in objects that were in the foreground but that was fixed by reducing the 3D depth in the control panel. The game ran smoothly thanks to the GTX 590 and we didn’t notice any ghosting or screen tearing. Batman: Arkham City looked even better if not the best out of the games we tried. The level of depth and overall picture was extremely sharp with no signs of crosstalk at all. This is because it’s heavily optimized for Nvidia cards as well as 3D. Unfortunately, you can’t escape the headaches and after just 15min of playing, we could feel a slight strain developing between our eyes.

The new rubberised finish feels nice

We also tried using the older glasses with the monitor but for some reason, they just refused to sync and kept flickering. As soon we plugged in the external emitter from the older 3D Vision kit, the drivers automatically shut off the one in the monitor and engaged the external one. With this, we were able to use the older as well as newer glasses without any issue.

Verdict and Price in India
You can pick up the Nvidia 3D Vision 2 kit for Rs. 12,500, which is more or less the same price as the older kit. If you want to buy an extra pair of 3D glasses, then that's another Rs.8,500 right there. However, this is not the only investment you’ll be making as you’ll have to cough up more cash for a 3D monitor as well, which is another Rs. 25,000 at least, so in total you’ll be spending close to Rs. 35,000 for the whole setup. You could choose an integrated solution like the Asus VG278H monitor, which comes with 3D glasses, but this will cost you close to Rs. 45,500.

Nvidia’s 3D Vision 2 is an incremental improvement over the earlier offering and is definitely a lot better than AMD’s HD3D. From what we’ve tested in the past, AMD’s solution is not quite up to the mark in terms of polish, primarily due to the fact that they still rely on a third party like TriDef for the drivers to render games in 3D. Nvidia’s solution therefore remains the best implementation of 3D for the PC platform till date, but it comes at a very steep price.