There's no denying that NVIDIA made a splash when they announced that they would resume support for stereoscopic 3D gaming. After vanishing from the scene for two years, some thought that they might never return, much less with their own proprietary shutter glasses and a potentially lucrative partnership with ViewSonic -- a display manufacturer currently finalizing a LCD monitor that, running at 120Hz, they hope will finally enable stereoscopic gamers to trade in their chunky CRTs.

But NVIDIA's no longer the only game in town. In their absence from the stereo 3D market, a new competitor named IZ3D sprung up with their own stereoscopic LCD monitor, and as graphics giant NVIDIA enters the market today they find IZ3D a small, but developed incumbent. In this part two of a series on the current state and future viability of stereoscopic 3D technology for gaming, GameCyte speaks with IZ3D about the company's origins, their current 3D offering, and how they plan to deal with the sudden reappearance of NVIDIA.

During the day, Aaron Rapp works for IZ3D as its product marketing manager; at night he helps run the IZ3D-sponsored gaming community FearedGamers.net. Here, Mr. Rapp and I have just begun to discuss whether or not FearedGamers plays a role in the company's business.

GameCyte: Are they playing on IZ3D monitors?

Aaron Rapp: A few of them are playing on IZ3D monitors. It also helps in research -– we’re able to do research, run marketing ideas past them, see if it’s something they would like to see. We also send out review units and they can keep them for a couple weeks or so and give us feedback. So it does help us.

GameCyte: Have you gotten any feedback that’s actually helped in the development of the monitor?

AR: Oh yeah, absolutely. A lot of the feedback we get helps with the development of the monitor. Actually a lot of it is the development of the software behind the monitor; the monitor itself is hard to change right now, because it’s already in production, but we’ve already fixed all the problems anyway, so it’s not the hardware that needs fixing, it’s the software.

Between NVIDIA and IZ3D, NVIDIA is the only other software provider in terms of 3D drivers. IZ3D is the only independent company that does their own 3D drivers.

GameCyte: What about other stereoscopic solutions? Do the rest use NVIDIA, or do some of them also using IZ3D’s drivers?

AR: That’s an interesting question. A couple of years ago, that was the case. Actually, IZ3D at one point, we were using NVIDIA drivers, until NVIDIA stopped updating.

GameCyte: Can you tell me when that was, by any chance?

AR: It was either the middle or end of 2006, I think. They just stopped. Nobody heard anything from them, no updates, and for a lot of us – for a lot of companies that were trying to enter the 3D market… you can’t have a product without the software behind it. It put a lot of stress on companies including ourselves.

So, we put our own money in to help develop our own 3D software. And at this point our 3D software is, most places, better than NVIDIA’s. Now NVIDIA only supports their partners, and right now the only partner they have is Zalman. So unless you have a Zalman monitor, you can’t use the NVIDIA drivers.

GameCyte: They’ve actually just announced partnerships with Mitsubishi and ViewSonic, I believe.

AR: Right, but neither one of those companies has hardware actually out on the market yet. They’re not actually in production.

So people with shutterglasses or dual-projector 3D… or people who may have a Zalman monitor with an ATI card, they can’t do anything, because the only support for Zalman monitors is with NVIDIA cards. We’re in the beta phase of our driver version 1.09, which will support eight different outputs including interlaced, shutter glasses, dual projector… I think there are seven or eight different outputs.

GameCyte: Do you support anaglyph?

AR: Yes. Anaglyph is a free output that we support. The other ones take a license, and the price for these licenses hasn’t been released yet, but it’s small in comparison.

GameCyte: So you’re offering a separate software solution for other hardware providers, is that correct?

AR: Correct – we will be, once the driver is released.

GameCyte: What kind of time frame are we looking at for that? You said the drivers were in beta.

AR: I would say the next… two to three weeks.

GameCyte: Have you had interest from any particular hardware manufacturers?

AR: Yes… we have, but that’s about as much as I can say.

GameCyte: Can you tell me a little bit about the history of IZ3D?

AR: They go back to around the year 2000, where it started in an incubator-type company based out of Moscow, working to improve existing 3D technology. That company was Neurok.

After a certain point, Neurok started to see that there was a future in this technology, so they branched off and made their own company, called Neurok Optics. Neurok Optics had gone off and tested various existing technologies up to and including arcade-type dual projector solutions, but didn’t find anything that was really practical, especially when looking at the consumer. They came up with the current dual panel technology that you currently see in the IZ3D monitors, and that was where it really started to take off.

In April 2006, they released the 17-inch, the first widely available IZ3D monitor. It was priced at $1299, and what it was really used for was to validate whether there was a need in the market. We got a lot of good feedback, a lot of attention, but the problem was we were a little bit behind the curve in terms of size. 17-inch was small for gamers – gamers were already trying to get 19-, 22-, 26-inch…

GameCyte: Were consumers looking at CRTs at that time, or LCDs?

AR: Ours was an LCD… gamers, about that time, were doing the transition. When they were doing the transition though, they wanted to go to a bigger size. We were kind of behind the curve… However, we were noticed by a company called Chi Mei Optoelectronics – a large LCD glass manufacturer – based out of Taiwan.

We formed a joint venture company in January 2007, and there we were able to lower the price for a 22-inch. When the 22-inch was released it started out at $999; we were already making improvements because we were using a larger manufacturer.

GameCyte: And at $999, were you making a reasonable profit?

AR: Oh yeah, yeah. The thing with our solution is we’re using double the hardware, so lowering the price becomes difficult when you’re using double of everything. Two LCD panels, a larger backlight, two boards instead of one, that type of thing. Luckily though, because they make those types of things in large quantities, the price was able to come down.

The first manufacturer we used is what they call a tier three manufacturer, kind of small…

GameCyte: And Chi Mei is a big name.

AR: Yeah, Chi Mei’s huge. Chi Mei does manufacturing for many different companies…

GameCyte: I was just going to ask you – I believe that one of NVIDIA’s partners for these monitors is also using Chi Mei.

AR: ViewSonic. ViewSonic, Westinghouse are the two that I’m currently aware of.

GameCyte: Do you have any notion of why they would help build a competitor when they already have a vested interest in IZ3D?

AR: They’re not really a competitor for Chi Mei. Chi Mei wants to make money off of panels, so if they can sell to both at one time, their panel business goes up. It’s not really whether one will fail and the other succeed; they think that if one succeeds, the other will succeed too. The market’s so small, and people want choice of some sort.

With us, they’re making a pretty good profit because we use double the tech.

GameCyte: Do you believe then that the new Mitsubishis and ViewSonics and so on will not cut into your profit?

AR: Well, honestly, in the end it’s going to help us. NVIDIA’s got a broader reach than we do, and that’s a fact that everyone’s aware of. It’s not something that scares us, it’s just something we’re aware of. We’re always pushing the idea of 3D, sometimes more than we’re pushing our product.

But if they sell the idea of 3D, then now everybody’s on a common playing field of “Okay, here’s the market, people are actually out there searching for this stuff,” and we believe we can win. Like we were speaking about earlier, shutter glasses are not a new technology. No matter how you look at it, they are an active 3D solution, and active 3D solutions by nature have always had a negative effect for long term [viewing].

Gamers – especially hardcore and enthusiast-type gamers – they play for long periods of time, and if you want to play in 3D for long periods of time, you can’t do that with an active 3D solution, no matter how you look at it. Your brain is going to figure it out some time, that something’s not completely right.

GameCyte: So you don’t think shutter glasses technology is the way to go.

AR: No, absolutely not. There’s a point where, with shutter glasses, at left you’ll see a blank spot, and nothing there, then the right and a blank spot, and so on and so forth. What your brain has to do is fill in that blank spot somehow, and after a while you get the fatigue, and the headaches.

We’re using one of the very few passive solutions, and we believe – for the gaming market at least – that passive is the way to go. Absolutely.

GameCyte: So you’re getting free marketing from NVIDIA for your own product, because gamers will try the other solution, say “No, this gives me headaches,” and go with IZ3D?

AR: Exactly, that’s our stance on it.

GameCyte: (chuckles) Are you worried at all about the advent of these new 120Hz monitors that can display 60Hz per eye in an alternate-frame sequencing mode?

AR: So you’re saying double the hertz of what past shutter glasses offered?

GameCyte: Yes, that’s basically what they’re saying right now. I’ve heard that shutter glasses solutions might have been running at 85Hz or so at some point, but now the ViewSonic/NVIDIA solution is promising 120.

AR: So now instead of getting half an hour before you’re tired, now you get 45 minutes.

GameCyte: (laughs)

AR: Really, that’s what it comes down to. You’re adding a certain amount of time before you start getting fatigued, but it’s not going to wipe it out completely, and it never will. Your brain’s too smart for that.

GameCyte: So tell me about this technology that IZ3D has, the passive technology that uses twice the hardware.

AR: We’re giving you the left view and the right view static at the same time. There’s no switching going on, there’s no moving going on, it’s left and right all the time. That way, when you look at it, it’s the exact same as if you were looking at something in real life. You’re seeing what you see all the time, and your eyes are separated.

That’s how all the passive 3D solutions work, you show left and right at the same time. Where we really excel is in giving you the best resolution. Usually with 3D what happens is you cut your resolution in half, so that you can put half the resolution on the left feed and half the resolution on the right feed.

GameCyte: I was just going to ask about that, because NVIDIA claims that the passive technology cuts your vertical resolution in half.

AR: Well, that’s because they don’t like us…

GameCyte: (laughs)

AR: or they don’t do their research. We’re using dual-channel -- we’re using both outputs on your videocard, so instead of 1680x1050 divided by two, we’re doing 1680x1050 times two. Which is why we require dual output –- we’re actually doubling the resolution.

GameCyte: At what expense, in terms of performance?

AR: Everybody’s going to get performance drops. For us, it varies anywhere from 10% to upwards of 50%, depending on the game and the rig you’re trying to play it on. If you’re trying to play Crysis on a four-year old computer, you’re already going to have problems, but when you try to put it on 3D then yeah, it’s not going to work.

But I guarantee you you’re going to get the same thing with other solutions, and even though they’re cutting the resolution in half, they still have to do the 3D conversion in the game. They have to get from 2D to 3D, and that’s happening with any solution. The difference with us is that we’re actually using the entire video card.

Most of the time you can use half the video card, but your video card was meant for dual targets, meant to render dual targets, and we’re using that.

GameCyte: Can you tell me about support for Windows XP and Vista? Are there any problems when using the system on either XP or Vista?

AR: No problems –- we’ve overcome all of those hurdles. XP, Vista, 64-bit, 32-bit, we have everything. We have support for ATI and NVIDIA.

GameCyte: Does IZ3D support SLI and/or CrossFire?

AR: Currently, SLI and Crossfire are not supported by us, and I’ll tell you why: because we need two outputs on the videocard. SLI and Crossfire, as it stands right now, have only one output open. Now, CrossFireX – quad-core, with two dual-core video cards put together in what they call the CrossFireX mode – does actually work, because ATI opened up one more port when they did that.

GameCyte: I wanted to ask, how does IZ3D interface with developers to insure support for the 3D technology? I realize that at a basic level, you don’t need to -- the technology just works, but…

AR: We’re in contact with a lot of developers – I can’t say who – but we do spend a lot of our time contacting developers to help provide 3D support. Like you said, we don’t require it –- as long as it’s DirectX, that’s all we’re worried about. However, there is code that can be inserted for their game to natively support 3D. So you could buy the game –- say you don’t have a 3D monitor –- and play it in anaglyph. Just turn it on, the game has it in its own options to play in anaglyph. Let’s say you have a Mitsubishi 3D screen. You could just tell the game that you’re running on a Mitsubishi monitor and play it in 3D. Same with IZ3D.

So we’re letting them know, “Hey, you could really support every 3D solution out there,” and that’s how the IZ3D team is pushing just for the idea of 3D, not only to make money on it.

We believe that 3D is the future. I mean, HD is okay, but we can only go up so much before you’re not going to be able to tell the difference. Hollywood believes that 3D is the next step, and they’re already taking it.

GameCyte: I was going to ask you about that next; have you spoken with James Cameron about Avatar?

AR: We haven’t spoken to him in person; we’ve been looking at events that he’s going to be at where we may talk to him about it. But we’ve spoken with different companies that work in the 3D Hollywood industry, and we’re looking for ways that we could get in there too. We don’t know if that’s the place to be, but we definitely keep tabs on what they’re doing.

GameCyte: Have you contacted, or been contacted by, any developers about building games from the ground up for the IZ3D monitor?

AR: We’ve contacted them… they liked the idea of it, but the big question for them would be the chicken or the egg. Do they want to put out a 3D game and hope that it will force people to go out and buy 3D solutions, or do we need to have a widespread community of people already using 3D solutions before they’ll make that game?

GameCyte: Can you tell me if you know of any such games currently in development, regardless?

AR: Not that I’m currently aware of… I don’t think so.

GameCyte: Game consoles. Have you talked to any of the console manufacturers about 3D support?

AR: We have, and we’ve gotten certain feedback that most would say is good. However, we’re developing the support ourselves with the idea that… we don’t need them to do it. It’s easier to do it that way. If we get their support later on, even better, but we go into things as if nobody is going to help us do it. We have to do it ourselves.

GameCyte: Then, are you developing something that might interface with game consoles?

AR: It’s in development, yes. There’s no date or anything set for that, we’ll just let people know we’re developing that capability.

GameCyte: The current consoles use HDMI and component cables primarily, although some of them have VGA options. Are you planning to integrate HDMI or component?

AR: Oh yeah. All of that stuff will be in line with the most widely used technology that’s out there. If everyone’s using HDMI on the consoles, then we’ll definitely be in touch with the industry as to the standard.

GameCyte: So are we looking at another 22” monitor down the road with HDMI and component input, then?

AR: Probably not. I would say the different input demand larger sizes. When we get into the TV sizes…

GameCyte: Any plans to go that route?

AR: We all have our roadmaps… it’s on the roadmap. There’s no date or price or anything yet.

GameCyte: Speaking of price, we know what your price is like, but being a joint venture with Chi Mei, do you have any insight into what the price of your competitors’ monitor might be like with relation to your own? I’m not asking for figures, but would you estimate that it would be cheaper, or more expensive to get one of these ViewSonic monitors?

AR: Now, we don’t have anything in terms of price – we can only estimate, and speculate what it might be. Now, these are going to be 120Hz monitors, right? So already, the price is going to go up because they have to use different hardware. And then, the glasses – if we look at past shutter glasses, you’re looking at oh, $150-$200 for the shutter glasses alone.

GameCyte: I saw some not that long ago for as cheap as $70 or so, but these are supposed to be quality glasses.

AR: Right, these are supposed to be quality… those dropped price because they had no other choice.

(both chuckle)

AR: NVIDIA’s going to be in a different situation. They’re going to be like “This is a new thing, this is not like what they had before,” so they’re going to sell them at a premium price – I’m assuming. Again, I don’t work for NVIDIA, but that’s what I’d do.

And I think where they’re going to run into a problem there is with solutions like ours, you could have ten people watching the same thing if you wanted to. You don’t have to keep passing the glasses around for every person to take a look.

GameCyte: How much do your polarized glasses run?

AR: 10 bucks. You get three of them with your monitor, and can order more from the website. That’s where I think there’s a big selling point for us; if you want more than one person to watch, play, do whatever you do in 3D, then our solution is the way to go.

GameCyte: Since you’ve been on the market for a couple of years, can you tell me what your success has been like?

AR: Can’t give you numbers, but I can say that it’s definitely a success. We’re moving into the retail market, in-store retail, with plans to be in places like Fry’s and Best Buy, possibly Staples, because we believe that this is definitely a see-it-to-believe-it product.

GameCyte: How soon would you expect – is this a matter of weeks? Months?

AR: By the end of the year, I’m hoping – to be at least in Fry’s, maybe in Best Buy.

GameCyte: I’ve heard that stereo 3D can improve distance perception in games – are there any talks, or have there been any efforts to put it the technology into competition, gaming leagues and the like?

AR: No, and I think it has to do with the hit on performance. Even with games like Counter-Strike, for example, where the performance requirement is very small, for those tournament players we’ve found that even the very small can grow exponentially to, “Oh, it’s much bigger than that.” They’re all about the FPS, and we’re not really all about the FPS. We’re really more about the visual effects of a game.

GameCyte: In your list of supported games, Crysis and Crysis alone is listed as ATI-only. Why is that? Crysis is something of a benchmark these days...

AR: Good question. I wish we knew. There’s something about the dual-target rendering that NVIDIA doesn’t do very well in their cards. Something in the card itself, where when it tries to render the left and right, in only that game, performance goes down to 5 FPS. It’s horrible, and we really can’t figure out why it’s doing that. On the ATI card? 10% loss in performance. You can still play it on NVIDIA, but it isn’t going to be fun. So for support purposes, we put ATI-only.

GameCyte: I wanted to ask about ghosting. Does your monitor have any trouble with ghosting?

AR: (in a resigned tone) Yeah, and it comes with the technology. That’s not to say that we’re not improving it though. I know we have three guys that do nothing in life except figure out how to fix it.

GameCyte: (chuckles)

AR: I would say that if we had one flaw, I agree that it’s ghosting. The ghosting can be minimized to a certain level, but we can’t completely get rid of it… We’re one step away from being an absolutely perfect product, and that’s the ghosting.

GameCyte: One last hardware question – are there any plans for headtracking? I don’t know if you’ve seen the Johnny Chung Lee video…

AR: Oh yes. (snickers) That would be very difficult – the game would have to be changed physically for that to work. What you saw him use was a program that supported headtracking… that game would have had to have known there were lines behind those targets, otherwise they would have just been flat. It’s a good idea…

GameCyte: Other than ghosting, what other obstacles does IZ3D have to success?

AR: I would say the general idea of 3D and its history. I think because certain 3D solutions were not perfected in the past, it gave everybody that “Oh well yeah, I’ve seen that before, it stinks,” or “it hurts” impression. Back in the 50’s, 3D movies were great for a while, but they died. Mid-90’s, you get the shutter glasses, and again you get the “Oh, well it hurts my head,” and then that quickly died. How we see it is, we have to take people’s focus off the past. This is not the past, this is the future. We’ve redone it, we’ve redone it right, we’ve done it for gamers and this is not what you’ve seen before. This is something entirely new.

We’re trying to do what they did back in the day going from black and white to color – to us, it seems like a no-brainer, but to some, it’s probably the same as back then. “Why do I need a color? I’ve got this black and white right here, and it looks perfectly fine to me!”

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Feel like you're missing the big picture? You can find part one of the series -- an interview with NVIDIA's Andrew Fear -- right here. And stay tuned, next week, we'll have industry experts tell us about the stereo 3D market for part three.

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