Meant to be Seen

Hi! I'm working on a build where I'm considering using a pair of smaller screens, one for each eye, but there is so much information out there it becomes hard to figure anything out... so I'm hoping some people here with some experience on the subject can steer me in the right direction!

I'm looking for a smaller screen, between 2.25" - 3.0" diagonal. A 3" would work great if it was a 16:9 format, otherwise 2.25" - 2.5" would be ideal. I need to be able to at least use RGB, but I'd like to be able to connect DVI to it, and I would prefer 720 horizontal lines or more, if possible.

I'm open to other ideas, but I don't want to drone on about details in my first post, so if you want some info or have some suggestions let me know.

And, as a footnote, what are other options for splitting the screen?

Screens like this do not exist, at least not outside of prototype form. A lot of people have looked.

How about 480 lines? Is that more reasonable? 3.5" diagonal actually will work fine for me, after some further measurements. Will a pair of 3.5" screens at say 640x480 be decent? Or is everyone using higher resolution screens?

Yes, there are some 640x480 3.5" screens out there, but the borders are too large to mount them side by side in landscape orientation. They are relatively expensive, though.

Any reason to not just use a single screen? I started out along the same lines as what you want to do before I decided to use a single screen for the Rift.

Well, I want to be able to run it in 2D and just use it as a monitor, 3D is a secondary consideration. I'm using 5x loupe aspheric magnifiers for lenses, and I can't find a solution for running a "stereoscopic" output to a single screen that doesn't add "3D" to the equation. If I could, I imagine I could go with a 5.6" screen pretty easily.

What kind of field of view are you looking for?

I'm not sure I have a specific desired FOV. It doesn't have to stretch in to my peripheral vision. I'd love to build a set that *does* but I'll be using this specific build for doing some gaming where there is HUD information at the edges of the screen, so I don't want that warped or way out in peripheral vision. An example would be Mechwarrior Online.

I assume you have looked into units like the HMZ-T1 and the ST1080? It sounds like those might be better/more cost effective for what you are trying to do.