NVIDIA Display Settings Unavailable: How to Fix the Problem? NVidia Surround or gradual steps towards it NVIDIA Control Panel: NVIDIA display settings are not available. What is the reason

Introduction
In the age of Full HD and fashionable 3D... Combining a pair of monitors for someone is simply necessary, the reasons are different, both ordinary ones, related, for example, to the type of human activity, and fantastic ones, linking six monitors into one common resolution for a pleasant time transmission in the virtual world. The companies Nvidia and AMD are doing their best to promote this technology to the masses, such terms appear - Surround and Eyefinity. I would like to give you a short excursion, namely, what a multi-monitor system is, how it works on different operating systems, and what to do with the SLi mode.

Technical features of monitor connection modes Windows environment XP
It was possible to combine two monitors through one video card before, during the reign of Windows XP. To take a specific example, when using cards from NVidia, it was necessary to install the appropriate video drivers with support for the nView function and to have two monitors, without stipulating the presence of screens with similar technical parameters.
The settings are quite simple, not requiring special attention to what is happening. We will have access to four options for monitor operation modes.

Many people, like me, are interested in the modes: Dual View and Span, which is actually why this is done.
Span- displays are combined into one virtual screen, the desktop is expanded to cover both monitors, that is, technical resolutions are added up. As a result, for two 19-inch monitors we get a total of 2560x1024 pixels.


We are left with a double impression, it seems like it’s becoming more pleasant to play, but unfortunately it’s not more comfortable, the displays just share the silhouette or sight of the weapon with us, this applies to games from the 1st and 3rd person.


And without a doubt, this option will appeal to fans of strategies and various simulators of sports games.


At the same time, the question arises: if we have an SLi tandem, will we be able to launch the Span mode to give power to such high resolution. I will answer, this is not possible to do using NVidia drivers in Windows XP, the harness will be inactive.

Dual View- own multi-display mode. Each monitor has its own resolution.

Technical features of monitor connection modes in Windows 7
Although we all get this opportunity, this requires switching to Microsoft Windows Vista\7 32-bit or 64-bit, have graphics NVIDIA processor GeForce 8 series or higher.
Multiscreen SLi mode


Allowing the use of two monitors on one GeForce video card in SLI mode. But there is one thing, it requires games that support multi-screen technology, such as World in Conflict, Supreme Commander Forged Alliance and Flight Simulator X, again they fool the younger brother, in fact we get five games, and even then they are mainly tactical RPGs and strategies. Actually, the second monitor serves as a huge map of battlefields/locations. There is no doubt that this is a great feature for fans of online battles in the games listed above, but nothing more.
Dual View- repeats the mode that was available to us in Windows XP.

NVidia Surround (2D) mode
So I come to the most interesting part, the launch of three displays with one common resolution. This case is only possible on Microsoft Windows 7 32-bit and 64-bit and the presence of two or more video cards starting from the GTX 2xx series level.
Building the system is quite simple, you need to have at least two adapters from the recommended list, as well as a motherboard supporting SLi technology (but here I note that this is not so important, you can install modified NVidia drivers, so-called SLi Patch)

One of the main problems is the selection of monitors; they must have the same resolution, refresh rate and synchronization polarity.

Test bench, assembly feature



* Motherboard : MSI 790X-G45 (BIOS Version 2.5)

* CPU : AMD Phenom II X2 555 (unlocked to Phenom II x4 B55)

* Video cards: NVidia GTS450 MSI SLI 1Gb

* RAM: Corsair CM2X1024-6400C4

* SSD: Corsair Force F60

* HDD: WD 320Gb

* power unit: FSP Everest 600W 85Plus
Overclocking
The processor clock frequency is 3600 MHz, the system bus frequency is 225 MHz (225x17.5), the memory controller frequency is 2025 MHz (225x9), the DDR2 frequency is 900 MHz (225x4.00), the core voltage is 1.42. V, DDR2 supply voltage - 1.8 V.



Video cards operate at frequencies: 920\1840\4100.
The three displays are: two monitors from Acer V193 and LG 1953S.


Idle assembly, connect monitors to DVI connectors on video cards and proceed to setting up the NVidia software.


After starting the system, you need to go to the Nvidia control panel, where another menu should open.


Next, the system checks the compatibility of the connected monitors; if everything is in order, it will be prompted to configure the displays.
The setting allows you to select the orientation and identify the windows.


There are also so-called correction frames that allow you to adjust each display width independently.


After a minute of adjustments, I got this picture, with a resolution of 3840x1024 pixels.


Now I would like to test games with Nvidia SLi support.

Test applications
FPS measurements were taken MSI program Afterburner 2.1.0, only average values ​​were displayed in the graphs.

* Crysis - Dx10; settings - High, AAx-off;

* Gta 4 - Dx9; settings - Normal, AAx-off;

* Lost Planet - Dx10; settings - High, AA8x;

* Mafia 2 - Dx9; settings - High, AA4x;

* Metro 2033 - Dx9; settings - Normal, AA4x;

Test results, game features


To be honest, it was not customary at first to see such a big picture, much less to play, but it gives me pleasure.


Especially in 3rd person games, two side monitors add perspective and viewing angle,


It’s as if you’re in the game, the effect of presence is guaranteed.


If we talk about fps, the GTS450 performed very well; personally, I don’t find fault with the quality of graphics, and I think building a 3x1 system is not a bad opportunity.


As you can see, the average fps is 30-40 fps. at medium/high settings, whether it’s bad or worthy is not for me to decide, but again this is only the SLi mode, with single mode it’s much worse.

Alternative options
Go to the “red” side, the implementation of the term AMD Eyefinity looks more modest, not requiring two video cards. All you have to do is buy video accelerators of the series - HD54xx\HD64xx and higher. Of course, Eyefinity technology also has its pitfalls (related to adapters and connection connectors), but still, building a 3x1 system requires much lower costs, but that’s not the point here.
Matrox Triplehead 2Go - allows you to combine three monitors through one analog interface. Definitely, first of all, this is a huge plus, now it doesn’t matter which video card we like, using the SLi\Crossfire modes will add extra fps without any problems.
But, of course, there are no downsides. Using analog interfaces can cause image distortion, especially when the signal is split across three monitors.
The maximum resolution supported by the device is 3840x1024, when three monitors have a resolution of 1280x1024.

Conclusion

I tried to dwell on the more commonly used types of connecting two or more monitors, show visual effects in the form of visual photographs and explain the problem associated with the use of an SLi tandem. I hope you enjoyed this excursion.

Behind the scenes
NVidia GTS450 MSI SLI

Hi all! Today is a very interesting article about fine tuning graphics cards for high performance computer games. Friends, agree that after installing the video card driver, you once opened the “Nvidia Control Panel” and saw unfamiliar words there: DSR, shaders, CUDA, clock pulse, SSAA, FXAA, and so on, and decided not to go there anymore. But nevertheless, it is possible and even necessary to understand all this, because performance directly depends on these settings. There is a misconception that everything in this sophisticated panel is configured correctly by default, unfortunately this is far from the case and experiments show that correct setting rewarded with a significant increaseframe rate.So get ready, we will understand streaming optimization, anisotropic filtering and triple buffering. In the end, you will not regret it and you will be rewarded in the formincreasing FPS in games.

Setting up an Nvidia graphics card for gaming

The pace of development of game production is gaining more and more momentum every day, as is the exchange rate of the main currency in Russia, and therefore the relevance of optimizing the operation of hardware, software and operating system has risen sharply. It is not always possible to keep your steel stallion in good shape through constant financial injections, so today we will talk about increasing the performance of a video card due to its detailed settings. In my articles, I have repeatedly written about the importance of installing a video driver, so , I think you can skip it. I'm sure you all know perfectly well how to do this, and all of you have already had it installed for a long time.

So, in order to get to the video driver management menu, click right click mouse anywhere on the desktop and select “Nvidia Control Panel” from the menu that opens.

Then, in the window that opens, go to the “Manage 3D parameters” tab.

Here we will configure various parameters that affect the display of 3D images in games. It is not difficult to understand that in order to get maximum performance from the video card you will have to significantly reduce the image quality, so be prepared for this.

So, the first point " CUDA - GPUs" Here is a list of video processors from which you can select and it will be used by CUDA applications. CUDA (Compute Unified Device Architecture) is a parallel computing architecture used by all modern GPUs to increase computing performance.

Next point " DSR - Smoothness“We skip it because it is part of the “DSR - Degree” item settings, and it, in turn, needs to be disabled and now I will explain why.

DSR (Dynamic Super Resolution)– a technology that allows you to calculate images in games at a higher resolution, and then scale the resulting result to the resolution of your monitor. In order for you to understand why this technology was even invented and why we don’t need it to get maximum performance, I’ll try to give an example. Surely you have often noticed in games that small details such as grass and foliage very often flicker or ripple when moving. This is due to the fact that the lower the resolution, the smaller the number of sample points for display small parts. DSR technology can correct this by increasing the number of points (the higher the resolution, the greater the number of sampling points). I hope this will be clear. In conditions of maximum performance, this technology is not interesting to us as it consumes quite a lot of system resources. Well, with DSR technology disabled, adjusting the smoothness, which I wrote about just above, becomes impossible. In general, we turn it off and move on.

Next comes anisotropic filtering. Anisotropic filtering - algorithm computer graphics, created to improve the quality of textures that are tilted relative to the camera. That is, when using this technology, textures in games become clearer. If we compare antisotropic filtering with its predecessors, namely bilinear and trilinear filtering, then anisotropic filtering is the most voracious in terms of video card memory consumption. This item has only one setting - selecting a filter coefficient. It is not difficult to guess that this function must be disabled.

Next point - vertical sync pulse. This is synchronizing the image with the monitor's refresh rate. If you enable this option, you can achieve the smoothest possible gameplay (image tearing is eliminated when the camera turns sharply), however, frame drops often occur below the monitor’s refresh rate. To get the maximum number of frames per second, it is better to disable this option.

Pre-trained personnel virtual reality . The function for virtual reality glasses is not interesting to us, since VR is still far from everyday use by ordinary gamers. We leave it at the default - use the 3D application setting.

Background lighting shading. Makes scenes appear more realistic by softening the ambient light intensity of surfaces that are obscured by nearby objects. The function does not work in all games and is very resource intensive. Therefore, we take her to the digital mother.

Shader caching. When this function is enabled CPU saves shaders compiled for the GPU to disk. If this shader is needed again, the GPU will take it directly from disk, without forcing the CPU to recompile this shader. It's not hard to guess that if you disable this option, performance will drop.

Maximum number of pre-prepared frames. The number of frames that the CPU can prepare before they are processed by the GPU. The higher the value, the better.

Multi-frame anti-aliasing (MFAA). One of the anti-aliasing technologies used to eliminate “jaggedness” at the edges of images. Any anti-aliasing technology (SSAA, FXAA) is very demanding on the GPU (the only question is the degree of gluttony). Turn it off.

Stream optimization. By enabling this feature, an application can use multiple CPUs at once. If the old application does not work correctly, try setting the “Auto” mode or disabling this function altogether.

Power management mode. There are two options available - adaptive mode and maximum performance mode. During adaptive mode, power consumption depends directly on the GPU load. This mode is mainly needed to reduce power consumption. During maximum performance mode, as you might guess, the highest possible level of performance and power consumption is maintained, regardless of the GPU load. Let's put the second one.

Anti-aliasing – FXAA, Anti-aliasing – gamma correction, Anti-aliasing – parameters, Anti-aliasing – transparency, Anti-aliasing – mode. I already wrote about smoothing a little higher. Turn everything off.

Triple buffering. A type of double buffering; an image output method that avoids or reduces artifacts (image distortion). If we talk in simple words, then increases productivity. BUT! This thing only works in conjunction with vertical sync, which, as you remember, we disabled before. Therefore, we also disable this parameter; it is useless for us.

Sometimes, when trying to access display settings on computers with NVIDIA graphics adapters installed, the user may receive a message stating that NVIDIA display settings are not available. It's impossible to change anything at all. What to do in such a situation, read the material below.

NVIDIA Control Panel: NVIDIA Display settings are not available. What is the reason?

Most experts cite problems with video card drivers as the reason for this situation. It is not surprising, since it is precisely this control software that provides communication graphics adapter With computer monitor or laptop screen.

But why NVIDIA display settings are not available in each specific case can sometimes be quite difficult to determine, despite the known root cause. Drivers may be out of date, missing, or even corrupted. Depending on this, you can apply several effective solutions that will help eliminate the problem. The methods are quite simple, but in some cases it is necessary to take into account the specifics of the situation.

What should I do if my NVIDIA display settings are unavailable?

Let's start with the simplest. If a similar message appeared at one “wonderful” moment when the system started, but everything worked before, perhaps this is somehow connected with failures in the OS itself. There is nothing easier than activating system recovery to the state when the problem did not exist.

The same applies to the situation when a notification appears that NVIDIA display settings are not available in Windows 10 or any other OS version after installing updates. It is quite possible that some of them were installed incorrectly or themselves cause problems with the operating system. In this case, in the programs and components section, you need to remove recently installed updates, sorting them by installation date. But you need to remove them one by one, rebooting the system and trying to access the settings. When a failed update is found, you should set manual search, and then exclude the failed package from the list, having first remembered or written down its number.

Another completely banal reason is associated with situations when two video cards are installed on the computer (discrete and integrated). You can correct the situation in the “Task Manager”, where the built-in adapter is disabled if it is used in this moment, or the NVIDIA card is activated.

Exactly the same actions for cases where the “Device Manager” settings have no effect can be performed in BIOS settings, where NVIDIA is selected from the list of installed video cards.

Reinstalling and updating drivers

But, suppose that all the above methods did not work, and the system again displays a message that the NVIDIA display settings are unavailable. In such a situation, manual user intervention will be required.

To avoid going too far, try updating the adapter drivers in the same Device Manager. If this doesn't work, remove the drivers or even the video card itself. It is possible that the drivers will be installed automatically upon reboot. As a last resort you can use installation disk with adapter drivers, if available. But the biggest problem is that drivers are not always removed this way, and the message that NVIDIA display settings are not available appears again and again.

Removing old drivers

In this case, you will need to independently remove all drivers and related software, using the programs and components section located in the “Control Panel”.

Also for complete cleaning system from unnecessary drivers, you can use the Display Driver Uninstaller utility (but it is intended only for drivers and does not remove additional programs).

After this, you should reboot the system and install all components again. To install the drivers most latest versions It is best to use automated utilities like Driver Booster, which will update the control software for absolutely all devices on the computer.

Specialized drivers

Another option to fix the problem of NVIDIA display settings being unavailable applies to non-standard laptop models.

First, call the “Run” menu and enter the command msinfo32, then find the exact name of the laptop model. Then contact official resource manufacturer, search for drivers by model name and download the appropriate driver, then install it yourself.

Note: if the installer is presented as an EXE file, use normal run as administrator. If this INF file, through RMB, select the “Install” line. If the system reports that the driver cannot be installed this way, go to Device Manager, select driver update, and specify the path to the saved INF file.

Some manufacturers offer users an online laptop check, after which they will be given a list of problems, as well as tips on how to fix them. And you don’t have to download the graphics adapter driver, but install it directly from the manufacturer’s website.

Afterword

That's all that can be said about eliminating the problem described above. Which product should I use? The question is rhetorical. In principle, you can immediately install an automated driver update program. If the problem is not with the drivers, but with additional software, you will have to get rid of it and then install it again by downloading the latest version from the NVIDIA website. However, those who have skills in working with drivers can perform all the steps manually.

Introduction

I've been writing about new technologies for over twelve years. When I first started, I was delivered postal service sample sound card was reason enough to do it for a week. Remember Rage Fury MAXX? I couldn't sleep for two days after I received the sample.

As time goes on, the latest and greatest technology seems more commonplace. That's not a bad thing - I still like technology. But they no longer cause such delight as before.

With all that said, when I took the three 120Hz Acer GD235HZ displays out of the box, I was literally shocked. And the feelings only intensified when an Nvidia representative delivered to my office a new stylish Digital Storm machine based on an overclocked Core i7-960 processor, two GeForce video cards GTX 480 and SilverStone Raven RV02 cases. And the purpose of this build was to demonstrate 3D Vision Surround. Expectations were very high.

To be honest, the last time I experienced such feelings was three months ago, when AMD showed us connecting six monitors to a pair of Radeon HD 5870 Eyefinity 6 Edition video cards. While I had a lot of fun playing at 5760x2160 resolution with smooth frame rates, it was a little frustrating to see a thick and ugly bezel in the center of my favorite games. These monitors then took up residence in the corner of our Tom's Hardware lab as we eagerly awaited the arrival of Samsung displays With thin frame, which were shown almost a year ago.

Three displays, in our opinion, are the most optimal way to play on multiple monitors. And if you're worried about the wide screen space of three 1920x1080 monitors, you can always rotate them to portrait mode, which gives 3240x1920. But for the purposes of this review, we decided to stick with the 5760x1080 resolution...

Or less. Why not reduce the resolution below the "native" level of each monitor? Still, we have before us a technology that is capable of increasing the number of pixels so intensively that even a pair of GeForce GTX 480s in SLI will not always cope. In any case, meet 3D Vision Surround - a feature that Nvidia announced along with the release of video cards based on the GF100, but the appearance of which was somewhat delayed. According to company representatives, support was not yet ready. And today is just the right time for an announcement.

Good way to spend money

Eyefinity 6 is an AMD technology that will cost you a lot of money. Still, a pair of video cards for $500 and six monitors will require a substantial budget.

The same can be said about Nvidia 3D Vision Surround - the technology will not be cheap. The Acer GD235HZ displays are one of the cheapest 24" 120Hz monitors out there, and you'll have to shell out $400 each. You can use low-end graphics cards like the GeForce GTX 260 to support the technology, but if you want decent performance, then You can't do without a pair of GeForce GTX 480s for $500, and you'll also need to purchase the 3D Vision kit, which sells for $199 (and additional glasses will cost another $149).

If you are reading this article, then we can assume that you are willing to spend $2500 on video cards, monitors and glasses, and at the same time you already have a computer that can handle such a configuration. Or you are interested in this technology, taking into account the purchase of the following hardware configuration.

3D Vision Surround in detail

The "surround" principle is relatively new for Nvidia. In the past, SLI technology was limited to a single display, meaning you could install up to four GPUs in a PC, but all that power was used to output images to only one monitor.

Then AMD released its Radeon HD 5800 line, which managed to greatly advance Nvidia's position. For work applications, Eyefinity made it possible to expand the desktop space to three monitors from one video card. For fans of 3D games wide screen Eyefinity technology was the answer to years of waiting. Even the reference Radeon HD 5870 graphics card allowed comfortable gaming on three monitors - and the situation improved significantly after AMD supported CrossFire in Eyefinity mode.

The Nvidia GF100 GPU uses two display pipelines, so the graphics card itself is limited to two outputs. You can use three-monitor configurations when installing two SLI graphics cards, since they provide a total of four outputs.

Of course, you can install three regular 60Hz LCD monitors like the Dell U2410, which will give you 2D Surround mode. Or you can use 120Hz 3D Vision compatible monitors, which will give you support for 3D Vision Surround - the next evolutionary step in 3D Vision technology, which we first tested more than a year ago.

Rendering two maps on three displays

Nvidia supports Alternate Frame Rendering (AFR), in which video cards can display images on one display or three.

In Surround 2D mode, the internal distribution of work does not change: GPU 1 is responsible for rendering odd frames, and GPU 2 is responsible for rendering even frames. The difference, of course, is that one frame on three LCD monitors is much larger - 5760x1080 pixels, for example, instead of 1920x1080. Nvidia is reluctant to share details about the engine, which displays images on displays connected to two video cards, but, again, the bus is used for communication PCI Express and an SLI bridge.

Of course, turning on stereoscopic output literally doubles the workload, since each frame must be rendered and output twice (for each eye). In this case, the first GPU outputs odd frames for the left and right eyes, and the second GPU outputs even frames for the left and right eyes. According to Nvidia, this way each GPU is always fully loaded.

3D Vision Surround technology also ignores your v-sync settings, rendering the game at a 120Hz frame rate so each eye gets 60 frames per second. As a result, the most high frequency The frames you get in 3D mode is 60 fps. Nvidia's AFR technology adds some processing overhead, so as you'll see in our tests, frame rates are no higher than 52 fps. But you can play quite comfortably.

System assembly: 3D Vision Surround and Surround 2D

Displays

To build a 3D Vision Surround configuration, your components must meet certain requirements, the first of which is compatible displays. Since Nvidia only lists eight desktop displays (five 1920x1080 and three 1680x1050 models), it's likely that you don't have the right model, let alone three displays.

Desktop displays 1920x1080:

• Acer GD245HQ
• Acer GD235HZ
• Alienware OptX AW2310
• Asus VG236
• LG W2363D

Desktop displays 1680x1050:

• Samsung SyncMaster 2233RZ
• ViewSonic FuHzion VX2265wm
• ViewSonic FuHzion VX2268wm

Projectors:

• Acer X1130P
• Acer X1261
• Acer H5360
• Lightspeed Design DepthQ HD 3D Projector
• ViewSonic PJD6220-3D
• ViewSonic PJD6210-3D
• ViewSonic PJD5351
• ViewSonic PJD5111
• ViewSonic PJD6381
• ViewSonic PJD6211
• ViewSonic PJD6221
• ViewSonic PJD6241
• ViewSonic PJD5112
• ViewSonic PJD6251
• ViewSonic PJD6531w

In addition to LCD monitors that support Nvidia's proprietary technology, you can use 120Hz 3D Vision projectors (and they can even be used in portrait mode, unlike polarized systems). There are twice as many projectors as monitors in the list above, with 11 models coming from ViewSonic. If you have a large enough room and don't want to deal with display bezels, then a projector-based configuration makes perfect sense.

DLP TVs that were supported at the original launch of 3D Vision are synchronized on the display side and cannot be used in a multi-monitor configuration. However, this does not cause problems. Really, who needs three DLP TVs next to each other?

GPU and physical connections

In the first driver to introduce 3D Vision Surround technology, Nvidia supports the GeForce GTX 400 line (480, 470 and 465) and 200 line (295, 285, 280, 275 and 260). But it’s not easy to understand the configuration and connectors used, so be careful when connecting video cards to displays.

The 2-way SLI configuration is the simplest (and, fortunately, the most common). You can use any two video cards from the 400 or 200 series to enable Surround or 3D Vision Surround mode. In Surround mode, you can use any three analog or digital connectors. In 3D Vision Surround mode you'll have to use three dual-link DVI outputs - HDMI is not supported.

If you want to build a 3-way configuration (and who wouldn't want one?), then you will have to use 400-series video cards. GeForce GTX 200 video cards are not supported in this driver version. The requirements for connecting monitors are similar. You can use any three digital/analog connectors for Surround mode, as well as three dual-link DVI outputs for 3D Vision Surround.

GeForce GTX 295 is a special case. There are two versions of the video card - one with two DVI outputs and one HDMI, and the second with only two DVI outputs.

If your version is equipped with DVI/HDMI outputs, then you can use one 295 or a pair in Quad-SLI mode for Surround (2D) mode. As for one card, you can even get 3D Vision Surround mode, but only on projectors (LCD monitors are not supported). If there are two video cards installed, then you can use three DVI outputs from two cards for 3D Vision Surround mode on 120-Hz monitors.

The dual DVI version of the GTX 295, as you might expect, does not support Surround or 3D Vision Surround modes. It simply doesn't have enough outlets. If you install two video cards in Quad-SLI mode, you will be able to play Surround or 3D Vision Surround.

Concerning motherboards, then you will need an SLI-compatible platform.

2D support

You'll have to pay a hefty price for 120Hz displays in addition to the $200 3D Vision kit (plus $149 for additional glasses kits), so 3D Vision Surround is expensive. If you like to play on multiple monitors, but the 2D mode without glasses is enough, then Nvidia feature Surround allows you to do just that.

In Surround 2D mode, the 120 Hz requirement is removed. You can use any three monitors, up to three 30" LCD 2560x1600 displays. This function Not as flexible as Eyefinity - you'll need two graphics cards with four outputs. But if you are going to build a system for gaming in high widescreen resolution, you still need an SLI or CrossFire configuration.

Surround mode supports more varied output formats. While 3D Vision Surround requires three monitors in landscape mode, Surround 2D allows you to use three monitors in landscape or portrait orientation, or connect four monitors altogether - the fourth will be connected to the last available DVI port, while it will be separated from the main group of displays.

We've done multiple monitor configurations before, and it should be noted that the stand is very important for an accurate installation. Three 24" monitors take up a lot of space if placed next to each other on a desk, and if space is tight, one monitor will hang off the end of the desktop. Nvidia sent us an Ergotech three-LCD monitor stand, which we were able to Set up in 15 minutes.

If you have enough money to spend on displays, video cards and glasses, then you should not forget about a stand that will allow you to avoid cluttering monitors on your desktop.

3D Vision Surround in action

Our review is, of course, subjective, since my feelings may not coincide with yours. Yes, we'll provide objective performance data that you'll be introduced to shortly. But 3D Vision Surround should still be judged by the experience you get from the new technology.

Fortunately, last year we already spent a lot of time playing games with 3D Vision support. And today the compatibility situation is much better - significantly more games already support 3D Vision. But there are still games, even new ones, that don’t run so well in stereoscopic 3D.

I liked most of the games I played in 3D. You will lose some light in wireless active shutter glasses (as you can see below), and this is quite noticeable in dark games like S.T.A.L.K.E.R. and Left 4 Dead. Games with brightly lit scenes look great. For example, we really liked Far Cry 2 and Just Cause 2.

The glasses themselves are comfortable enough to be worn for a long time - our opinion has not changed since last year. Of course, children of primary school age with small heads will not be so comfortable. But teenagers who played our 3D Vision Surround system never complained.

It should be noted that Acer displays cannot be called the best option, in our opinion. The clarity in 2D was not very good, and to get a perfect 3D picture you need to look at the displays at a certain angle, and not even at the middle. Your gaze should be directed towards the top frame. It seems to us that other displays will provide a much clearer picture. We liked the 23" Alienware OptX AW2310 much more, for example, and they cost only $50 more than Acer monitors.

Battlefield: Bad Company 2

Battlefield: Bad Company 2 looks absolutely phenomenal. This game belongs to the 3D Vision Ready category, which perfectly extends to the Surround mode. To measure performance, we used the World War II opening sequence. In 3D, the first thing you'll notice is probably the waves crashing against the boat. Surround mode gives you a wide field of view on both sides of the boat. The good news is that you can enjoy the game with all the effects enabled, so this is the best combination of DirectX 11 and 3D Vision Surround.

DiRT 2

DiRT 2 is another popular game that has been in our test suite for some time. In fact, DiRT 2 does not work with 3D Vision. So we didn't test this game, but we still ran it to see why Nvidia doesn't recommend running it in 3D. The spectacle, frankly speaking, is terrible. The company's observations that shadows aren't rendered properly and lighting is all over the place are entirely valid. In addition, problems affect dust and smoke, the depth of which is completely chaotic. And after about three minutes, watching the game becomes simply unbearable. So Nvidia's claims can indeed be trusted - the game does not work in stereoscopic 3D.

Far Cry 2

Far Cry 2 was released before 3D Vision was announced. But at the same time it received the “Excellent” category from Nvidia. However, some compromises will have to be made. Setting the "Post FX" option to "low" means turning off DirectX 10 and reverting to DirectX 9. Setting shader effects to "Medium" and turning off the "Bloom" option does not affect the quality so much. When you play in stereoscopic 3D (the sensations from the visual component of the game are completely different), you don’t pay attention to it. The game is so bright and colorful that you will quickly forget that some of the light is lost through the shutter glasses - and you will enjoy the new sensations of 3D Vision Surround.

Crysis

You can call us conservative, but we continue to test Crysis among other games. Unfortunately, the utility we use to measure performance does not support widescreen resolutions, so we had to abandon frame rate tests. The game runs fine, too, although Nvidia lists Crysis as "Good," citing a few compromises you'll have to make, as well as a few lingering artifacts that will likely force you to play Crysis in 2D Surround rather than stereoscopic 3D Vision Surround. .

Even though the CoD game is relatively new, it also received a "Good" rating. Moreover, to launch the game you will have to use the Widescreen Fixer utility. Otherwise, the field of view will be stretched and distorted (let's be honest, this also applies to AMD Eyefinity technology). The only change to the Call of Duty game itself is turning off the Depth of Field option - everything else looks harsh.

This is another 3D Vision Ready game, but the feeling in Just Cause 2 can be described in one word: amazing. I demonstrated this game to guests who wanted to know what was so special about 3D Vision Surround. It's bright enough that you won't notice the loss of light through shutter glasses, and guests even sometimes reflexively duck to avoid their heads being hit by a palm tree. "It's nice to receive such a gift for New Year", said one of my friends. “How much?” he asked. I named the price. “It’s not harmful to dream.”

Aliens Vs. Predator

Nvidia seems to be having problems with games that the company had no control over during their development. Aliens vs. Predator can no longer be called a new product, but the game is declared as unsupported in latest version drivers, it is really impossible to play. And the problem here, it seems to us, lies in the fact that the game was developed jointly with AMD. We were able to get performance results in the demo video - and the playback actually looked great in 3D Vision Surround mode. But as soon as we started playing the game itself, the hand with the weapon was displayed completely incorrectly, and we were unable to play.

3D Vision Surround tests

In our article we will present fewer tests than in other GPU reviews. And this is due to compatibility problems with 3D Vision Surround. We usually run tests on 3D Mark Vantage, Crysis, Aliens vs. Predator and DiRT 2. But since they were displayed completely incorrectly, we would never launch these games in 3D. It's a small consolation that you can at least play them in Surround 2D.

To show what 3D Vision Surround technology is capable of (and to show how quietly a pair of GeForce GTX 480 can work in SLI - we just confirmed this in additional tests of GeForce GTX 480), Nvidia sent us a wonderful computer built by Digital Storm. Processor Core The i7-960 was overclocked to 3.8 GHz, which gave us remarkable potential to unleash the graphics performance of video cards. The Raven RV02 based case (Digital Storm did a little modding) is well suited for a high-end graphics setup as it throws hot air upward.

Keep in mind that the Eyefinity 6 benchmark results we've included in this article don't apply to a six-display array. We used a pair of Radeon HD 5870 2GB graphics cards to connect the same three displays as in the Nvidia Surround (2D) configuration, so the comparison is quite adequate.

Hardware configuration

Tests and settings

Test results

It is logical to assume that 3D Vision Surround technology doubles the load compared to Surround (2D) mode. This is quite noticeable in Far Cry 2, where we see a correlation of almost 2:1 for two configurations at 4800x900 and 5760x1080 - both resolutions are quite comfortable in stereoscopic 3D mode. The only downside is that you'll have to use DirectX 9 mode to meet Nvidia's recommended settings.

Of course, AMD Eyefinity technology is unable to render games in stereoscopic 3D, so it makes sense to compare a pair of 2GB Eyefinity 6 graphics cards in CrossFire mode with Nvidia 2D mode at the same settings. The cards are slightly slower in Nvidia Surround mode, which is to be expected given the superior performance of the GTX 480.

Usually S.T.A.L.K.E.R. seriously loads the graphics subsystem, the game is capable of “bringing to its knees” the most powerful GPUs. But if you enable static lighting and switch from the DirectX 11 code path to 10.1, the load on the GPU is significantly reduced. Also, remember that we will never get more than 60fps in 3D Vision Surround mode. Since Surround (2D) mode is more than three times faster, we can assume that Stereoscopic 3D mode is adding extra load - we didn't reach the 60 fps performance threshold. In any case, having played in a resolution of 5760x1080, we can call the game comfortable and attractive, despite disabling some graphics features.

Here again we see performance that falls short of the upper limit of 3D Vision Surround technology. But this is not so important - it is quite possible to play at a resolution of 5760x1080. We tested the game without anti-aliasing, but graphics performance enough to enable 2xAA anti-aliasing (in fact, Nvidia does not recommend turning on the mode stronger than 2xAA).

Battlefield: Bad Company 2 is more demanding than Call of Duty, so Nvidia recommends running it at 4800x900 instead of 5760x1080. Given the performance results, it's hard to argue with that. Either way, the game is certified 3D Vision Ready, so you can enjoy it without any compromise on visual quality.

Two Eyefinity 6 graphics cards running a trio of monitors lag behind a pair of GTX 480s in SLI at the same maximum settings, which is what we expected.

Like Battlefield, Just Cause 2 is certified 3D Vision Ready, meaning you can play without compromise. This is another demanding DirectX 11 game, meaning you'll likely have to reduce the native resolution of 5760x1080 to 4800x900 to keep the frame rate at an acceptable level. But setting the resolution down does make sense - instead of disabling some features, Just Cause comes with all the graphics functions enabled - just like in 2D mode - but you get all the benefits of stereoscopic 3D. If in the future all games look like Just Cause 2 in stereoscopic 3D, then we'll definitely give Nvidia an Editors' Choice award.

Of course, Nvidia's 2D Surround profile isn't as exciting as 3D Vision Surround, but it's a good alternative if games don't run properly in stereoscopic 3D. In S.T.A.L.K.E.R., for example, we won't have to use static lighting. We can upgrade to a full DirectX 11 level lighting model and enable SSAO for maximum quality pictures in 2D mode. And, of course, we cannot enable a similar mode with AMD Radeon HD 5870 2GB Eyefinity 6 Edition video cards.

Performance was pretty close, but the GeForce SLI cards came out on top at 4800x900 and 5760x1080 resolutions.

In 3D Vision Surround mode, Nvidia recommends running Far Cry 2 with settings that reduce picture quality compared to the maximum settings (which look great in this game). Running the game in 2D mode allowed us to return some of the settings (we activated Bloom, set Post FX to High, and were also able to use the DirectX 10 code path).

Here, again, the SLI configuration outperformed AMD video cards in CrossFire mode. However, both systems provided impressive performance.

We were unable to run DiRT2 correctly in stereoscopic 3D, so Surround was the only mode the game could run on three monitors using a pair of GeForce GTX 480s. Performance was quite decent compared to a pair of AMD Radeon HD 5870 2GB in CrossFire with maximum settings .

To run Call of Duty in stereoscopic 3D, you need to make some changes. In 2D mode we were able to leave the Depth of Field option active and also enable 4xAA. As a result, we got very similar performance Nvidia video cards and AMD. However, Nvidia came out ahead again.

Conclusion

Let's start with where 3D Vision Surround technology shows its best side. 3D Vision Ready games felt truly amazing, much like going from a 2D VGA card to a 3D GPU. If new technology did not have such a serious price barrier to its implementation, many readers would probably have signed up in line near computer stores. Battlefield: Bad Company 2 and Just Cause 2, in our opinion, are best examples of what 3D Vision Surround technology is capable of. They are simply breathtaking. However, it is very difficult to describe the transition from pseudo-3D on a two-dimensional screen to stereoscopic 3D. You just need to try it yourself. So try to find a rich gamer with a similar configuration and ask him to give it a try.

Of course, the previous paragraph may seem like the work of an impressionable schoolboy. And to be honest, the technology does have its drawbacks - the most annoying of which is the fact that not all games are as well optimized for stereoscopic 3D as Battlefield and Just Cause. In fact, in the 3D Vision Ready category, at the time of publication, there were six ready-made games listed on Nvidia's website (the rest are either in demo state or have not yet been released). The remaining games exhibit various problems that have yet to be resolved. In particular, we had to turn off some graphics enhancement options. Or, for example, you had to endure visual artifacts that cannot be eliminated.

Additionally, 3D Vision Surround is quite an expensive proposition. You will have to buy three monitors, several pairs of glasses, a pair of GeForce GTX 480 video cards, and also a stand if you do everything right. That is, you will have to spend more than $2500, and we didn’t even count the rest of the computer (which, by the way, should also be powerful). So price is one of the main slowing factors. However, we should not forget that this is still an image technology from Nvidia, very similar to AMD Eyefinity 6 Edition video cards.

If you are not limited on funds, then 3D Vision Surround will work great in some games. In others, you can use the Surround (2D) mode. As we have already seen in the case of AMD Eyefinity, this technology can also be called very interesting. It's a shame that AMD doesn't have anything to offer in terms of stereoscopic 3D. We were promised results at the time of the release of 3D Vision for one monitor, but since then we have not received anything.

After all, the conclusion we reached in January 2009 about 3D Vision, will be true in this case as well.

GeForce 3D Vision glasses reminded us of 64-bit computing, multi-core CPUs and hardware support for transformation and lighting (T&L). This is a product that is built on technology that has the potential to change many things - in this case, games. However, we should not forget about the disadvantages. The “ticket price” for this attraction is quite high, you will have to turn off some quality enhancement settings, and the graphics subsystem must be quite powerful.

Let's not forget nVidia's "The Way It"s Meant To Be Played (TWIMTBP) program. The TWIMTBP program gives the GPU manufacturer enough influence over game developers to ensure that their new products are not only fully compatible with GeForce 3D Vision, but also contained additional features - such as the appearance of objects outside the plane of the 120-Hz screen. GeForce 3D Vision glasses cannot be truly successful without widespread support from game developers, and nVidia is actively working on this today. Well, for now this is the moment It hasn't arrived yet, so let's expect prices for new monitors and glasses to drop a little. The technology is great - but in an era of crisis there is still somewhere to spend $600.

Let's hope Nvidia still has significant influence over developers to significantly increase the list of "3D Vision Ready" games. These are the games that will promote 3D Vision Surround technology to the masses. If you get to try a properly optimized game in stereoscopic 3D, you won't want to go back to 2D.