Nvidia 7950 GTX go, which driver?

[jonesy89]

Hi,

I have a eMagin Z800 3DVisor and I am wanting to attach it to a Dell XPS laptop with an NVidia 7950 GTX geforce go. The latest drivers that I downloaded from the Nvidia site only have stereoscopic options for anaglyph style rendering.

Any help would be appreciated.

Cheers,


Steve

[farshizzo]

The eMagin uses frame sequential stereo, which means you need a graphics card that supports quad buffering, like an nVidia Quadro. nVidia seems to have discontinued their older stereo drivers that support frame sequential stereo.

[jonesy89]

Thanks for the reply,

So there is no way of using older drivers for this card? I have to purchase an nVidia Quadro or similar that allows frame sequential stereo? If so the application I am researching requires the use of the eMagin with a laptop, any ideas if this card is available in a latop?


Thanks for your help!

[farshizzo]

You can try installing the legacy stereo drivers available at http://www.nvidia.com/object/3d_stereo.html#drivers. nVidia makes mobile versions of the Quadro card, so you should be able to find a laptop that supports quad buffering.

[jonesy89]

I tried using the legacy driver for XP from the website, but the 91.31 driver that HAS to match the stereoscopic drivers of the same version are not available for the geforce GO 7950 GTX.

Is it just me or does having to dig about looking for drivers that are 2 1/2 years old and are not very compatible with a lot of hardware, suggest this eMagin I have been sold by worldviz is pretty much a discontinued piece of kit?

I'm getting close to sending the product back as it is not fit for purpose.

[farshizzo]

Our sales team should have known that the eMagin would not be compatible with your hardware, sorry about that. I'll talk to them and make sure they understand which hardware supports it.

I wouldn't consider the eMagin discontinued. It works, you just need a card that supports quad buffering. If it's not working with your hardware then contact the person that sold it to you and they should be able to work something out.

[mspusch]

Hi,

First of all, I assume that you work with Windows XP, NOT Vista.

Like Farshizzo said, please contact the sales team at sales@worldviz.com about this -- we have sold many eMagin units, so it's hard for us to tell who you are.

As pointed out in the discussion, the eMagin is a 'frame sequential' device, and the only way nVidia supports frame sequential stereo (or also called active stereo) reliably is with one of their quadro cards.

Active stereo with 'consumer cards' like the GeForce series has been supported only 'on and off', i.e. with some cards/drivers there were reliable combinations, with others not.
nVidia does not seem to have a high interest in giving professional active stereo support with their consumer hardware, as this is a way for them to charge significantly more for their 'quadro' technology for 'professional' use.

Worldviz has had good success using SPECIFIC hardware for active stereo,
so for example did the GeForce 6800 series and also the 7800 series cards in laptops work well for active stereo.

I honestly don't remember if or if not the 7950 series cards worked with the consumer stereo drivers -- one think which I do remember is that the nVidia stereo driver required a certain version of the nVidia main driver, or later, i.e. there is a reasonable chance that you can use a newer driver for you computer with that stereo driver and get it working.

but I agree with you, as you point out in your post, this all ends up to be frustrating 'try and error' and might not work in the end.

there are only three options --

A) you figure out a solution with try and error for your laptop. there is a risk that this might not work.

B) you buy hardware that works with 'active stereo', i.e.
- either an nVidia quadro card, ideally for a desktop computer, as the Laptop cards are always somewhat restricted -- make sure to run it under Windows XP ideally
- you can buy an nVidia 7xxx graphics card for a desktop which we know works with the eMagin HMD-- Worldviz has a bunch of those cards still in stock, as this is the cheapest way to get a desktop system going with an eMagin computer

C) you can return you eMagin HMD to Worldviz. please contact support@worldviz.com about this.

The eMagin z800 HMDs are widely used in the VR world, and probably one of the best low cost options for HMDs on the market. other options are http://www.vuzix.com/home/index.html and other low cost offerings like:
http://www.relaxview.eu and others.
most of those lower cost offerings have a smaller field of view or no integrated orientation tracker (the eMagin has integrated orientation tracking), which makes it less suited to immersive Virtual Reality.

Hope that helps.

Sorry for your inconvenience with the eMagin product/ your nVidia stereo drivers.