Those 3D glasses may soon be a thing of the past, at least when watching three dimensional content or games at home. At Computex 2014, ASUS showed off a prototype 28-inch monitor that displays truly stunning, glasses-free 3D while rendering 2D content at a full 4K resolution.
From smartphones like the LG Optimus that offered mediocre image quality to laptops like the Toshiba Qosmio F755, which had to track a single viewer's eyes with the webcam, most attempts at glasses-free 3D have been huge disappointments.
MORE: What is 4K TV?
However, we had a chance to watch a loop of movie and game clips on the unnamed monitor and were blown away by the quality of the 3D images. An ASUS rep told us that the monitor supports 28 viewing angles and, indeed, we were still able to see the 3D effects clearly as we walked around the monitor's circumference.
In a clip from "Star Trek," each of the characters appeared to be at different depth levels within the screen. We also felt like we could reach out and scratch Scotty's chin, because the image seemed to pop out a bit in addition to appearing as if it receded further into the screen. An ASUS representative told us that all the video clips in the loop were made with the Dolby 3D process for added quality.
Users don't have to just sit passively and watch movies in 3D. In a clip from a video game, a soldier appeared to be floating above the background as he walked as he walked around a battlefield.
Though every clip we saw on the monitor was in 3D, an ASUS rep said that the screen outputs at 4K resolution for any content that is not three dimensional. 3D mode is limited to 1080p but most 3D content appears at that resolution or lower.
ASUS said that it does not have any immediate plans to release the monitor. However, the quality of the output in the demo was so impressive, it's hard to believe this technology won't appear in a future product, if not a very similar 28-inch monitor.
