Samsung Odyssey 3D (G90XF) Review: The Future of 3D Screens

3D effect is amazingly compelling. 2D to 3D conversion is interesting. Simple but beauteous design. High-quality IPS panel.

Not astir capable supported games. Lacking successful ports. DRM limitations.

There person always been 2 large issues with 3D displays: No 1 wants to deterioration 3D glasses, and determination has ne'er been capable contented to instrumentality vantage of the technology.

Samsung's caller Odyssey 3D show (G90XF) wants to lick these problems successful 1 fell swoop. It uses a lenticular lens and eye-tracking cameras to make a convincing 3D effect to bring PC games to life. It costs a hefty $2,000, a steep terms considering however bully (and affordable) gaming monitors are nowadays, but the Odyssey brings the 3D exertion to the PC successful a mode that feels similar the aboriginal we’ve ever dreamed of.

Seeing Is Believing

You can’t seizure oregon spot 3D with conscionable a camera, and that’s 1 of the biggest challenges successful describing the acquisition of utilizing the Samsung Odyssey 3D. You bash person to spot it with your ain eyes to judge it. While that tin beryllium existent of different important show technologies, whether it's resolution, refresh rate, oregon HDR, 3D is thing everyone volition privation to effort astatine slightest once.

If you’ve seen a movie successful 3D, you get the idea. Your eyes are tricked into reasoning the images are moving toward you successful 3 dimensions. Elements successful a game, specified arsenic a quality oregon adjacent a dialog window, outpouring disconnected the screen. The strategy uses the 3D cameras to not lone way your caput movement, but foretell it. That’s the concealed condiment successful providing a wider “sweet spot” for the 3D to enactment successful effect. The recommended region is betwixt 27 and 40 inches, which gives you tons of wiggle country to get comfortable. It’s imaginable to beryllium excessively adjacent oregon acold away, but I ne'er felt similar I had to enactment inactive oregon compromise my comfortableness to enactment successful view.

That’s a large measurement guardant from wherever this exertion was conscionable a fewer years ago, though determination are inactive limitations. You can’t person aggregate radical successful beforehand of the show astatine once, and determination are some solution and PC hardware requirements to beryllium alert of. You person to play the crippled astatine full-screen successful autochthonal resolution, and you’ll request astatine slightest an Nvidia RTX 3070 graphics card. That rules retired galore lesser-powered PCs, arsenic good arsenic AMD video cards. You besides request to person HDR turned disconnected to play games successful 3D.

The biggest limitation, though, is crippled support. A specified 12 titles are supported officially, and they aren't good known. There are a mates of fashionable games similar Palworld and Stray, but they besides see respective lesser-known kids' games similar The Smurfs: Dreams and SpongeBob SquarePants: The Cosmic Shake. Only The First Berserker: Khazan is labeled arsenic a “co-developed” title. Samsung has been airy connected details arsenic to what this certification indicates, but dissimilar the different 11, the developer had to beryllium progressive successful the 3D implementation successful immoderate sense. Samsung promises that determination volition beryllium 11 much of these “co-developed” releases by the extremity of the twelvemonth and arsenic galore arsenic 50 mostly compatible 3D games.

While that’s a bully on-ramp, Samsung is attempting to drawback up with the immense library of compatible titles successful Acer’s SpatialLabs ecosystem successful enactment of its Predator SpatialLabs View 27 and different 3D show products. Acer has been gathering that room for years, truthful there’s a large, notable disparity. On the different hand, the prime of what Samsung has achieved, specifically with the acquisition successful The First Berserker: Khazan, is simply a measurement up of thing I’ve seen. At the precise least, Samsung should beryllium selling this bundled with a escaped transcript of that game, fixed the highly constricted crippled selection.

A Silver Beauty

The Samsung Odyssey 3D isn’t the archetypal of its kind, but it’s the 1 that feels astir similar a morganatic product. It’s a gorgeous monitor, utilizing a metallic chassis akin to the ones connected other Odyssey monitors I’ve enjoyed. While it’s an experimental conception show for gamers, Samsung has done a fantastic occupation of making it look similar a modular screen. Yes, it has a wide basal and a ample apical bezel for its eye-tracking cameras, but different than that, you wouldn’t presume this is an early-adopter product. That’s dissimilar the aforementioned Acer Predator SpatialLabs View 27, which doesn’t look oregon consciousness astir arsenic high-end.

The setup is reasonably simple, though it requires a fewer things to get started. First off, you request the Reality Hub app launcher to really play games successful 3D. It's excessively atrocious it requires a abstracted app, but the bundle astatine slightest volition scan your crippled libraries and show immoderate supported games. Beyond that, you'll request to plug successful the attached USB-A cable, on with immoderate you're utilizing for the show itself. I hooked it up to a gaming laptop, and it worked fine.

You’ll find the ports connected the show astir the back, which connection the bare minimum, including 2 HDMI ports, DisplayPort, and 2 USB-A downstream ports. No headphone jack and nary USB-C. On the close of the larboard array, you’ll find the powerfulness button, which besides serves arsenic the controls for the OSD (on-screen display). The paper is fine, though I was annoyed by however galore clicks it took to get to brightness oregon measurement controls.

It comes with a brace of 5-watt speakers, which are decent but not thing special. They person “directional sound,” giving dependable effects immoderate added immersion. However, successful my trial period, the audio was clearer and fuller with the 3D spatial speakers of the Acer monitor.

Quality Where It Counts

You'll bargain this show for its 3D capabilities, but successful reality, you’ll usage it successful modular 2D acold much often. That’s wherefore Samsung was astute to guarantee it didn't compromise connected the prime of the display. While I bash anticipation an OLED is introduced successful the future, the Odyssey 3D uses a high-quality 4K IPS sheet with a 165-Hz refresh rate to marque definite that gaming successful 2D is inactive an enjoyable experience.

Color sum is coagulated (100 percent sRGB, 83 percent AdobeRGB), and colour accuracy is excellent. I measured it astatine 0.83 with my colorimeter, comparable to OLED panels. In SDR, this is besides a brighter sheet than astir OLEDs, reaching 487 nits of max brightness. It won't beryllium astir arsenic awesome successful HDR, but arsenic it turns out, 3D games aren't supported successful HDR anyway. Suffice to say, it’s a coagulated 4K gaming show connected its own—if lone it weren’t for the exorbitant price.

But the constituent is 3D, and I tried retired a fig of the compatible games, including Palworld, GTA: San Andreas, Stray, and SpongeBob. Each crippled I tried utilizes the 3D effect good enough, though you’ll tally crossed immoderate cutscenes oregon in-game situations that don’t enactment well, specified arsenic the opening series of GTA: San Andreas. You tin dial backmost oregon pump up the 3D effect with elemental keyboard commands. These games tally connected the Unreal Engine 4 engine, allowing Samsung to o.k. them without requiring further developer work. Samsung hasn’t announced enactment for different crippled engines similar Unreal 5 oregon Unity.

The existent showcase of the exertion is The First Berserker: Khazan. Samsung worked straight with the developer for the 3D integration, and the effect is spectacular. The highly stylized enactment crippled shows conscionable however overmuch the 3D effect tin adhd to the immersion of the game. In the opening sequence, the snowfall doesn’t conscionable autumn astir the character—you’re close determination successful the flurry, soaking up the ambiance successful a mode that isn’t imaginable successful 2D. It’s little astir the enactment of the crippled abruptly jumping toward you—like you mightiness expect successful a 3D movie—and much astir being submerged into the world. That’s important due to the fact that successful a crippled that requires your attraction successful battles, you don’t privation the 3D elements to distract. After playing for 30 minutes, you’ll find yourself getting utilized to the other dimension. If you’re similar me, you won’t privation to spell back.

The 3D exertion isn’t explicitly exclusive to games. The show tin besides person 2D images and videos into 3D, which is amusive to experimentation with. There are respective restrictions, specified arsenic the request to beryllium successful afloat surface and DRM-protected content. That means you won’t beryllium watching afloat movies successful 3D anytime soon.

But watching clips of films oregon trailers connected YouTube shows conscionable however promising it could beryllium if Samsung tin get astir the DRM problem. So agelong arsenic they are afloat surface and with lone 1 different person, you tin adjacent usage it connected video calls, which I tried out. It’s beauteous incredible, emulating thing akin to a toned-down mentation of Google’s Project Starline.

The 3D conversion uses AI to make a extent representation to foretell wherever the layers of extent should be. As you whitethorn person guessed, it’s acold from a cleanable effect. You tin spot the AI slop fraying connected the edges, and the level of extent is obscurity adjacent arsenic lifelike arsenic it is successful games. It besides soaks up immoderate performance, causing the Razer Blade 16 I was utilizing to footwear its large fans on.

An Exciting Future

No 1 should unreserved retired and bargain the Samsung Odyssey 3D. It’s expensive, and the database of compatible titles is embarrassingly small. At $2,000, you’ll wage a batch for the privilege of investigating retired the tech. With however bully gaming monitors are nowadays, you’re paying good implicit $1,000 for the 3D here. Most radical should bargain an incredible OLED gaming monitor, which costs astir $800.

I can’t assistance but beryllium excited by it. For me, it was not dissimilar trying retired virtual reality for the archetypal time. 3D is not astir arsenic immersive, but not requiring a headset oregon glasses feels similar magic. While I’m not definite I’d privation to play each crippled successful 3D, there’s truthful overmuch little fatigue, making this a much applicable exertion implicit thing wearable. This show has made maine genuinely excited astir the aboriginal of 3D displays. While I hold for a aboriginal wherever the full Windows operating strategy tin beryllium navigated successful 3D—both successful games and not—the Samsung Odyssey 3D show feels similar a glimpse into the future.

It won’t beryllium the past of this technology, arsenic Samsung tells me. (Samsung hosted WIRED astatine a media lawsuit successful Seattle and paid for a information of our reporter’s question expenses. We received a reappraisal portion soon after.) If you’re lone marginally interested, you shouldn’t person to hold excessively agelong earlier we spot immoderate (hopefully) much affordable options connected the market.