Nvidia 3D Vision kit for three-dimensional gaming

If you have a fancy new 3D-capable television or projector (see the sidebar) there's been only way so far to get your computer to display actual 3D pictures or video, which is through Nvidia's 3D Vision kit.

It consists of a small pyramid-shaped transmitter box and a pair of 3D glasses. These aren't the flimsy type you get in the cinema, though. Instead these are the ‘active shutter' type which decide how to display images based on a signal from the transmitter box.

There are also two USB cables, one of which connects the transmitter to the computer and the other is used to charge the glasses when their internal battery runs out. In our experience the battery lasted for a few hours' viewing at a time.

Various programs and drivers must be installed from the Nvidia website to make the kit work, and installation was a tricky process. The software installed fine but when we went through the checks to enable 3D, it refused to accept that our test display, a Viewsonic PJD6211 projector, was compatible. Eventually, after uninstalling and reinstalling the software, it worked, and we had a 3D image.

The instructions were confusing, referring to bits of equipment that we didn't have, and asking us to connect cables that didn't exist. In the end, connecting a standard VGA cable from the graphics card to the projector worked fine, but your setup might require other connections.

Note that the kit doesn't render everything on the computer in 3D: only certain games are equipped for it, but firing up any of these gave us a very impressive 3D image without any further tweaking required. There are also 3D videos and pictures available, many of which are listed on the 3D Vision Live website.

You will also need a compatible Nvidia graphics card and of course a compatible display. The package includes one pair of 3D glasses; additional pairs cost around £80.

The kit is quite old now – it was released in 2006 – but it's only now that it's becoming worthwhile, as it gets cheaper and more 3D displays become available. Nvidia 3D Vision isn't perfect, but it does a good job of making 3D work for games.