Chameleoki
Limp Gawd
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If the performance had been there, I would have jumped all over that.
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NVIDIA 3D VISION SURROUND Experience @ [H]
- Thread starter FrgMstr
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If the performance had been there, I would have jumped all over that.
If you have a 1920x1200 screen and play a game, you have a resolution of 1920x1200 on that screen. If you have 3 screens with 1920x1200 resolution in a surround/Eyefinity setup, you still have 1920x1200 resolution on each screen. The differense is that you have now 3 times more content.
http://sites.amd.com/us/underground/products/eyefinity/Pages/eyefinity-experience.aspx
Going 1920x1200 to 2560x1600 as example gives you a higher resolution image of the same game content. This is the big difference. Eyefinity/Nvidia surround gives you more game content, not a higher resolution image of the same game content.
That would make sense if the image is just stretch out.. NO?
In that link you provided, the normal view is just normal but with eyefinity you're actually getting more picture hence pixel that the monitor is showing.
Tamlin_WSGF
2[H]4U
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No, its no stretching going on, but a larger field of view (FOV). You get 3X the game content with surround vs. single screen due to the larger aspect ratio.
Chameleoki
Limp Gawd
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Correct (that you see more). That is the advantage of 3-monitor gaming- you see more activity around you. It's more immersive.
Well I won't be using SoftTH anymore but it was fun albeit a little buggy.. My 30" will now go to my Hackintosh and my 3 2007FP will be my main gaming screens.
Chameleoki
Limp Gawd
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Nope. That should be easily doable.
LeninGHOLA
Vladimir Hayt
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It's all about Field Of View.
There is no reason it wouldn't work, though I am not sure if there are games that like the option for 4:3 support these days...
I couldn't get Soft TH to work on a damn thing other than the Serious Sam HD games, and even that was flickering like mad.
I too can't wait to see what the performance does in portrait. I have a 5970 and it usually is going to waste as 3x1 portrait mode as it is my preferred gaming mode and eyefinity does not function properly in 3x1 portrait mode with DX9 games (I.E. Borderlands)
Guess I need to play more DX10 games.
I have no issue with portrait in anything. Including blands.
I haven't read through all 6 pages, but I wanted to point out that 3 way SLI with 200 series cards DOES work with surround view (dunno about 3d surround). I have on my bench a system running 3 GTX 285's with 1 17" lcd hooked up to each, and it setup just fine. It's a clean build, so I'm waiting for a game to download to test, but I do have the extended desktop running, and the bezel management worked as well, so I'm assuming 3d apps also work.
Now this is the part that pisses me off with nVidia - it seems they go out of their way to irritate their customers. The little gem I quoted is a direct result of engineering decisions made by accountants.
With an ATi setup, I can Tri-Fire with an HD5970 and an HD5850; 3 GPUs with what is basically identical performance, all working together. Or, if the fancy takes me I can trade the HD5850 for an HD5870, wind the HD5970 back up to its proper clocks and and have a setup that is effectively HD5870 Tri-Fire with 2 cards instead of 3.
With nVidia, can I Tri-SLI with a GTX295 and a GTX275? Nope. So, if I want to do the Surround stuff and I have a GTX295 with only 2 DVI connectors, I have to go buy another GTX295 just to get the third DVI connector (and waste the fourth one, I presume).
This is a totally unnecessary situation.
I think the terminology being thrown around is misleading. Of course you get more pixels when you go to eyefinity. However the density of those pixels per square inch does not increase.
I think that jaggies at any resolution detract to the image quality for me. But I suppose the theory is that if the pixels are relatively smaller and finer, that you would notice the jaggies less. I don't think I buy that theory.
In any case the more pixels that are rendered, the more of a burden it is on the gpu to implement antialiasing features.
1920x1080 = 2.07m pixels
1920x1200 = 2.3m pixels
2560x1440 = 3.7m pixels
2560x1600 = 4.1m pixels
Now for NV Surround or Eyefinity multiply those pixels by 3. Now if you want to go NV 3D Surround. Double those pixels again.
So for the H review, they used 3x 1080p monitors.
In NV surround that is 6.2m pixels rendered and in NV 3d surround a whopping 12.4m pixels rendered per frame!
You can still do surround in 2D mode with this card though.. which is what eyefinity equivalent.
Incorrect, he needs a 3rd dual-link dvi port. And the only way for him to get it is to purchase an identical video card to put in SLI.
heatlesssun
Extremely [H]
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Just tried SC:Conviction, not sure what Kyle's problem was but setting up the resolution worked fine for me other than having to wait a bit because I had my game set to 16 AA and that don't work so good at 5760 x 1200.
6 times the power to run 3D surround vs a single monitor of the same size. Assuming linear relationships (which is optimistic), you'd need to be running at 180fps on a single monitor to support 30fps on a 3D surround setup. It's a small wonder why Nvidia isn't that conserned with someone wanting to running these without a SLI setup.
Actually, pedsaktix is correct. The GTX295 is an SLI setup by itself. Also, the need for three dual-link DVI connectors kinda leads me to think that they are producing three images per frame (red, green, blue) for the 3D stuff. I could be well off base though.
As far as Tri-SLI goes, my point still stands.
Chameleoki
Limp Gawd
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Man, that is nice and intelligent! nVidia did a good job with that.
Is there a confirmed source on how many images are produced per frame, for the 3D stuff? Is it two, or three? I'm thinking red, green and blue.
It's convoluted, but I seriously doubt that it was a conspiracy in the accounting department. First of all, Nvidia got blindsided by Eyefinity, so the chances that someone schemed to develop a GTX 295 that was suboptimal for Surround gaming way back when is basically nil. That's just the way things worked out.
Second, your ATI comparisons ring a little hollow when you realize that you can't do Eyefinity on older ATI cards, period. Meanwhile, you can do Surround on the GTX 2 series cards - 260, 275, 280, 285. The GTX 295 is probably the least prevalent card out of the entire lineup.
He doesn't need to purchase another card if his 295 has 3 inputs. (2 pcb gtx 295)
Check out this link..
http://www.nvidia.com/object/3dv-system-requirements-surround-technology.html
Well Nvidia Surround didn't even exist when the 295 was top of the line, I don't understand how you can get mad that an unexpected bonus that wasn't an advertised part of the product you bought doesn't work without another card.
In fact unless you are using 3 22" or smaller screens, a 295 is underpowered . The question I have though, is since Quad SLI is not supported, what does that mean for the 295 in SLI?
I don't know what you mean by a second monitor, but yes, you can hook up a fourth monitor for non-gaming purposes.
There is a better mode than anaglyph red-blue mode.. stereoscopic mode is much more immersive than that.
BTW the flat background is probably just an artifact of things in the background literally being at some fixed depth (i.e. using imposters or some background image instead of geometry). That's a game issue more than a 3D issue I think, since 3d technologies separate the left and right eye images based on depth.
No no, you miss my point. Eyefinity came out with the release of the HD5870 and its siblings, if memory serves. The GTX295 was out long before that, and the other GTX cards before that.
With the release of the GTX295, it should have been child's play to add a GTX275 and have a 2-card Tri-SLi setup, regardless of Surround or 3D or TwinView whatever, and I bet you if there is ever released a dual-Fermi card, nVidia will pull the same stunt: no 2-card Tri-SLi.
That's because it's nothing new. IZ3D has been touted by AMD since they realized they were lacking a 3D strategy. The problem is the implementation is not as robust or performant as having 3D logic built into the driver, working efficiently within the existing framework.
Instead, IZ3D is just another software layer on top of the driver, trying it's best to handle things. It's also restricting your display choice to IZ3Ds specific monitors which can look fuzzy. Granted 3D Vision ready monitors are few and far between, but I believe 3 manufacturers are making them now so you can take your pick based on features/quality of the image.
Lastly it's not stereoscopic shutter based... it's purely polarized, meaning the 3D effect is not as strong.
The problem is memory. Meaning as cards come out from NVIDIA with more memory, you'll be free to crank up whatever you want as high as you want.
Now THAT is a pertinent question.
heatlesssun
Extremely [H]
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Been playing a little more and learning a few things. For one, it's a good idea not to have you game set at 16AA when you start up a game at 5760x1200. Getting Splinter Cell: Conviction set didn't pose any problems for me other than getting past the lag caused having 16xAA set, dropped it to 2xAA and it run smoothly but the left and right monitors had distorted resolutions, wonder if that was caused by setting bezel management.
Crysis runs like a dream.
Trying to get Dirt 2 running now.
Crysis runs like a dream.
Trying to get Dirt 2 running now.
Eyefinity/Nvidia surround gives you more game content, not a higher resolution image of the same game content.
1920x1200 will give you the same field of view space regardless of whether you're in Surround/Eyefinity or not. A well behaved game will determine it's FoV based on the aspect ratio, not resolution.
Big asterisk here.. this is totally dependent on the game supporting altering the field of view..
If it doesn't you'll get the same old pretty picture all stretched out to fill all 3 displays pixels, or a zoomed in (actually a *loss* of content) view to fill all pixels.
Some games by their nature will never support expanded FoV because developers see this as giving an unfair advantage to gamers with more money to spend on these setups. For example.. Starcraft 2 will never support Surround/Eyefinity with expanded FoV (for competitive parity reasons).
Which is why portrait mode is important for some games, as it gets you closer to a 16:10/16:9 ratio (a little wider really).
But really, many games out are there are persistently vert- (Unreal Engine 3 games) when there is no reason, competitive or otherwise, for them to not be hor+
2 per frame, 1 frame per eye.
LeninGHOLA
Vladimir Hayt
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If they expect everyone to run 3D, maybe you're right. For those who just want 3 displays, it's a bit of overkill for anything besides the 3-4 games that really push our GPU's.
The size of the memory on a card only affects a single frame, so it's only one third of the equation: the power of the GPU to do the calculations, the bandwidth to shove the data into the framebuffer and the size of the framebuffer needed to hold a single frame for display.
It's no stunt.. it's how SLI has *always worked*. I don't know why this bothers you now
By definition you can only SLI products with identical device IDs. This actually saves you from yourself btw.. why would you intentionally introduce microstutter by guaranteeing that alternating frames will always take longer to render on one gpu than another? I guess you want more frames per second, but you don't mind when you get an uneven framerate, leading to it feeling like a slower framerate?
Since you have 2 device IDs that are the same, and 1 device ID that is not, you can't SLI the 3 boards together. Simple as that.
Trust me, you don't need to try to correct me of all people on this forum
The bottom line is that 3D Vision increases memory amounts by a lot because for each application-submitted frame, the driver has to make 2 frames from a left and right eye perspective. This means up to twice the memory.
Combine this with Surround taking 3 times the amount of memory (the same price you pay with Eyefinity btw).. you've bloated memory usage substantially in one generation of technology.