Many of the unique demo units and prototypes seen at the annual CES show don't make it onto store shelves in the near term, if at all (for example, Lenovo's convertible U1 tablet/laptop). Then there's the Toshiba Qosmio F755, which we saw as a 15-inch glasses-free 3D prototype at CES in January, and which is now officially for sale in a single fixed-configuration model.
Toshiba Qosmio F755-3D290 Glasses-Free 3D laptop
The Good
The Bad
The Bottom Line
That's a pretty quick turnaround, although the glasses-free 3D market is starting to pick up with help from Nintendo's 3DS handheld gaming system and similar stereoscopic gadgets from Sony and others. Like the CES prototype, the final version of the $1,699 Qosmio F755 has a 15.6-inch display that uses special eye-tracking software to track the viewer's head movements via the built-in Webcam and adjust the stereoscopic image accordingly. But keep in mind that the screen's native resolution is 1080p, but for 3D content, it drops to 720p (actually 1,366x768 pixels).
As with a 3D TV, it'll take a few moments to orient your eyes, especially if you're not used to watching 3D content. But we found the eye-tracking feature allowed for a reasonable amount of freedom of movement, and the 3D effect worked from an off-axis side view. However, again because of the tracking feature, it works best for one viewer at a time.
Other drawbacks are that the 3D display doesn't work for video games or streaming-video content yet, only 3D Blu-ray and 3D video files you're able to download and play in Toshiba's custom media player application. Both Toshiba and Nvidia have told us updates for expanded compatibility are in the works, but there are no firm details or time frame right now, which is a shame, as 3D gaming would be a killer app.
Stereoscopic screen aside, the rest of the system is typical of Toshiba's Qosmio line of consistently excellent multimedia and gaming laptops. Components include an Intel Core i7 CPU, discrete Nvidia graphics, and even a rare Blu-ray-burning drive.