We tested a long list of games with the technology and were impressed for the most part. Our performance impressions coincide well with NVIDIA's list and ratings. The software provides an overlay that shows up as each game starts, showing recommended settings for best 3D performance. Games that benefited the most from the 3D treatment include Prince of Persia, Demigod and Left 4 Dead. It's pretty much a gamble when playing that aren't on NVIDIA's test list, but we found that Audiosurf works amazingly well and the recently released Champions Online benefits from it too, although we encountered some stability issues. At the same time Guild Wars saw a noticeable benefit, but the software doesn't seem to work with City of Heroes at all, despite the fact that the game once bore the NVIDIA approved logo. It might have something to do with the game switching sides to support ATI, but we'll never know for sure.

The good news is PC gamers don't have to make any big upgrade investments beyond purchasing the right video card. However, red/blue anaglyph technology comes with plenty of drawbacks and limitations. The most prominent drawback is that most games end up looking drained of color, as though a dull yellow filter were put on top of everything. Games that would otherwise be vibrant with color like Prince of Persia and Street Fighter IV look subdued when given the 3D treatment. One of the most frustrating downsides of is that, for obvious reasons, the color red doesn't show up very well. Blue also has a little trouble showing to a lesser degree, but the combination is extremely counterproductive when playing a game like Unreal Tournament III, where the teams are separated into Red vs Blue. We also noticed a significant shadow image around some characters and objects that the glasses didn't quite filter out, but that might not occur with different monitors.

A major issue that needs to be taken into consideration when enabling the 3D Vision Discover feature is that separating out the blue and red images in real-time takes a serious toll on the PC's performance. While running the Resident Evil 5 benchmark, performance went from an average of 44.6 fps to 19.5 fps when in 3D using the same graphics settings, which is more than a 50% drop. The easiest solution is to lower the game's resolution so that it performs acceptably. Or you can run out and get a more powerful video card.

It's more than a little gimmicky, and really serves more as a promotional preview for the full NVIDIA 3D Vision hardware package, but you certainly can't beat the price tag for the 3D Vision Discover. There's certainly nothing to lose by giving it a try, other than perhaps a little dignity of someone happens to walk in on you.