Nvidia Corp. said recently that it had begun experimenting with streaming of video games from personal computers to tablets. The technology will help tablet computers to obtain performance and feature-set of modern graphics adapters on tablets and other small form-factor devices.

"Imagine you are playing Crysis 2 on your PC and you are able to stream it around your home to a tablet device, which you could then plug into your TV if you wanted. [...] We are experimenting [with this technology] and that is all I can say," an Nvidia representative told Bit-Tech web-site.

The idea of playing PC or console games on tablets is not something new. For example, it is theoretically possible to use cloud-based game streaming services like OnLive on media tablets provided that gems support appropriate controls. But Nvidia seems to be experimenting with yet another proprietary technology that will bring performance of GeForce and Quadro to slates.

At present Nvidia is working on Quadro Virtual graphics technology that allows to used Nvidia Quadro graphics accelerators located on remote computers. As a part of the initiative, the company is also working on Monterey technology, which delivers remote graphics to any devices "with local look and feel". Potentially, Monterey may help end-users to stream their favourite games from their PCs to their tablet devices or notebooks. With such a technology, Nvidia will be able to provide exclusive feature to those, who own a PC with a GeForce and a tablet with Tegra.

Earlier this year at the Game Developers Conference Nvidia sponsored a session that described how to port games from PC and video game consoles to Google Android and Tegra. Nvidia also showcased its own latest Android debugging and analysis tools that help to design and port video games for Google Android.

While porting or streaming video games to mobile devices is technically possible, it remains to be seen whether it will be possible to efficiently control games designed for mice and keayboards using multi-touch screens.

Tags: Nvidia, Tegra, Virtual Graphics, Monterey, Geforce, Quadro