NVIDIA Quadro FX 1300/1400/3400/4400 Stereo Graphics Card for PCI-Express (PCI-X)

Vr Mapping

ON-LINE REFERENCE DOCUMENTATION

CARDINAL SYSTEMS, LLC

www.cardinalsystems.net

The NVIDIA Quadro FX 1400 – FX 5600 graphics cards offer PCI-Express (PCI-X) interface performance. At the present time these cards offer very good performance for 3D stereo roaming for VrTwo.

NOTE: The NVIDIA Quadro FX 1400 graphics card does not support stereo display in Windows 7.

NOTE: It is strongly recommended to use the PNY manufactured NVIDIA Quadro FX cards. There are several manufacturers that make the NVIDIA graphics cards and PNY has shown virtually no problems over the past several years. The PNY cards may be purchased from www.zipzoomfly.com or www.newegg.com.

NOTE: The monitor used for stereo viewing should be capable of refresh rates of 100 Hertz or better. This is not applicable when using the Planar stereo viewing systems..

Without the correct NVIDIA driver the Quadro FX may not be able to use two monitors from a single Quadro card. The overlay plane may not available when two monitors are configured and VrTwo needs this plane for interactive graphics. Please make sure that a recommended NVIDIA driver is configured.

It is possible to use a second graphics card to drive the second monitor or the VrTouchscreen. Since the Quadro uses the PCI-X slot, the second graphics card may be a standard PCI graphics card. As of September 2004 the ATI Radeon 7000, or equivalent, was a good graphics card for the second monitor. Windows XP handles dual monitors from two graphics cards well and is suggested as the operating system to run VrTwo. More information can be found at Multiple Monitor Configurations.

NOTE: There are two user interfaces from PNY that will different depending on the driver version being used. Interface 1 is used for the older versions and Interface 2 is used on the newer versions.

Start the Display Properties dialog by pressing the right mouse button anywhere on the desktop and selecting Properties then the Settings tab.

The screen resolution of 1280 x 1024 offers adequate screen space for stereo display and menus on a single screen. The Color quality of 32bit is suggested.

Pressing the Advanced then the Quadro FX button will display further properties in which OpenGL and monitor settings may be made.

The OpenGL Settings may be left at their default values. All the check boxes in “Performance and compatibility” are un-checked except for “Use unified back/depth buffer”. The Vertical sync setting should be set to “Off by default”.

The “Enable stereo in OpenGL” setting turns on stereo and “Enable overlay in OpenGL” allows the interactive display of lines in VrTwo. The Exported pixel types may be set to “Color indexed overlays (8 bpp).

Pressing the Advanced then the Quadro FX button will display further properties.

NOTE: Make sure the View option is set to “Advanced settings” or all options will not be displayed.

Select Vertical sync then un-check Application-controlled and choose Off on the slider. Duplicate the following settings. If a setting is not listed below it may remain at its default setting.

Setting	Value
Vertical sync	Off
Hardware acceleration	Single-display mode
Maximize texture memory	Off
Enable stereo	On
Stereo display mode	Use on-board DIN connector
Force stereo shuttering	Off
Enable overlay	On

If Use on-board DIN connector is not available as an option to “Stereo display mode” then check your driver version. Refer to Drivers on the Hardware Help page for a list of working drivers.

The Monitor tab allows the configuration of the Screen Refresh Rate. The Quadro maximum screen refresh rate is 100 Hertz.

Turning Off “Show Shadows Under Menus” and “Show Window Contents While Dragging”

The display of shadows under menus may cause display problems in the stereo window with some Windows XP configurations. To turn this feature off right mouse click on the desktop -> Appearance -> Effects -> uncheck Show shadows under menus.

The display of window contents will cause the stereo display software to repaint graphics multiple times when a window is being dragged over a graphics window and it is advisable to turn this feature off by un-checking it.

Following are the settings for the Quadro FX when using the Planar’s SD Stereo/3D Monitors.

On the side menu select “nView Display Settings” then select Clone for the “nView Display Mode”

On the side menu select “Performance and Quality Settings” then select “Use nView Clone mode” for the “Stereo display mode”.

To set the screen refresh rate to 75 Hertz select “Screen Resolutions & Refresh Rates” on the side menu. A new refresh rate may need to be created under “Custom resolutions and refresh rates” which can be done using the Add button.

The configuration of VrTwo for the Planar screens can be done from the Vr Configuration program under Configuration->XYZ Digitizer.

Set “VrTwo use overlay plane” to No. This setting has been tested with the NVIDIA Quadro FX 1400. When using NVIDIA graphics cards containing more memory the setting of Yes may work. Please test both settings for best results.

Following are the settings for the Quadro FX when using True3Di Stereo/3D Monitors. NOTE: After configuring the graphics card, make sure the True3Di is in stereo mode by pressing and holding the rightmost button on the front panel. The configuration may be done in stereo mode if the stereo viewing glasses are worn.

The graphics cable connection from the graphics card port nearest to the emitter socket is connected to the cable connection on the right side (view looking at the back of the monitor). The other graphics cable is connected from the graphics point farthest from the emitter socket to the cable connection of the left side of the True3Di Monitor.

On the side menu select “nView Display Settings” then select Clone for the “nView Display Mode”

On the side menu select “Performance and Quality Settings” then select “Use nView Clone mode” for the “Stereo display mode”.

NOTE: Make sure the View option is set to “Advanced settings” or all options will not be displayed.

Select Vertical sync then un-check Application-controlled and choose Off on the slider. Duplicate the following settings. If a setting is not listed below it may remain at its default setting.

Setting	Value
Vertical sync	Off
Hardware acceleration	Use nView Clone mode
Maximize texture memory	Off
Enable stereo	On
Force stereo shuttering	Off
Stereo display mode	Use nView Clone mode
Swap eyes	On
Enable overlay	On

The configuration of VrTwo for the True3Di screens can be done from the Vr Configuration program under Configuration->XYZ Digitizer.

Set “VrTwo use overlay plane” to No. This setting has been tested with the NVIDIA Quadro FX 1400. When using NVIDIA graphics cards containing more memory the setting of Yes is more desirable and may work. Please test both settings for best results.