How to set digital television brightness-contract as computer monitor

[young707]

We are using several digital television to use as computer monitors, model MTK5380 HD 1080p, setting 1920x1080, 60Hz, 32bits color. We have difficulty setting the correct brightness / contrast for computer use (such as web browsing and text editing).

System: Intel i7-2600K with build-in graphic processor. Intel motherboard DZ68DB with build in AVI and HDMI output. Using HDMI to connect to the digital television. Intel HD Graphic Process 3000 video BIOS 2111.0. Microsoft Windows 7 x64 Ultimate SP1. Monitor Software is Intel Graphic and Media Control setting brightness/contrast/color for RBG. No graphic cards.

So far, the result is very poor. Either too bright and hard to see text, or the color is washed out. Quite disappointing. Any advice?

 

[ubercake]

All sets are different. You're going to have to experiment.

Try contrast at 80 and brightness at 62.

 

[young707]

tried both making changes to the digital TV contrast & brightness control. Then, tried
the graphic card brightness and contrast control.

Brightness at 62 is fine. But Contrast at 80 wash out letters. Contrast at up to 44 with Brightnes at 58 can still read the lettering.

Same result. Poor lettering and quite hard to read documents. However, running Youtube shows great video, just like TV.

 

[ubercake]

Does your motherboard have a VGA (usually blue) or DVI (usually white) output on it?

I once had a video card (radeon 5850) that had terrible output through HDMI and perfect output through DVI. Video looked fine, but text was annoyingly fuzzy. It could be the same case with your motherboard's video.

If you have the VGA connector - I'm pretty sure there's one on the back of your TV set - try using that and compare.

 

[ubercake]

Also, you might try 'vivid' or one of the other picture modes.

 

[young707]

thank you, ubercake, your post has been helpful.
This digital TV has the following input: 4 HDMI, 2 component, 1 AV, 1 USB, 1 VGA, 1 RF antenna.

I now agree that HDMI is not the choice to use in computer display. But isn't HDMI and DVI inter-changeable? There are passive converter adapter to/from DVI and HDMI, correct?

Well, I tried the VGA port. I select VGA graphic instead of VGA video. The screen looks much better than HDMI. However, the white background is still much too bright. My setting brightness 32, contrast 70, seems to show the best on text readability.

 

[ubercake]

Glad to help.

HDMI and DVI carry the same digital video signal. The advantage of the HDMI cable is it can also carry the digital audio signal as well. Why the HDMI connection doesn't just work the same as the DVI cable when used with a computer and certain video solutions (integrated or discrete), I don't know. Could just be a lot of bad connectors on the device?

VGA goes through a D to A and A to D conversion, but is also capable of carrying HD signals beyond 1080p up to 2048x1526 @85Hz. So you at least get the same great HD quality if the cable is of decent quality.

 

[young707]

Best answer selected by young707.

 

[young707]

All our digital TV only has VGA and HDMI input. No DVI. Am I correct that most DTV are same?

All my digital monitors driven by both DVI and VGA, look exactly alike. No difference.

Using VGA to drive the digital TV looks much better than HDMI. Why? I am quite disappointed using HDMI to drive the digital TV. I think this has more to do with the digital settings. How can I compensate this?