Subject: The (almost)definitive post on TV-Out
Pre-Note: All prices listed are Canadian as that is where I live.
Some of you may or may not remember a short series of posts I made back in July regarding using your tv as a monitor. Well, I posted that I had made a decision about how I was going to do it and was asked to let you all know if it works or not. Well, here it is.
I'm sure of you have thought this. Why can't I have a 32" monitor? What about 50"?
Yes, with TV-Out video cards why not connect it to your TV. Get a projection display that will give you a 100"+ video display and most people would drop into a coma before they even see the 5 foot by 5 foot start button. So what stops people? Doesn't have to be projection, you can get it working with a simple 19" tv or 21" tv. Well, the short answer is, it sucks. The long answer will cost you about $1500 to find out that, yeah it works, but it's still not what ya want. So, I present to you my story on how to go about doing it the kinda wrong way.
It all started when I had to move back in with my mom.(eh, ya gotta do what ya gotta do) My computer naturally came with me. So, how do you get two computers into a small apartment that only has enough room(literally) for one monitor? You use the frikken tv that's how!
At the time we had a 19" ten year old tv that was failing, failing fast and there wasn't a whole lot anybody could do to fix it. The Voodoo3 3500 TV-out card I loaned her didn't work worth poop and even videos looked like someone had thrown up on the screen and started to finger paint with it.
So, there is only one way to fix a tv that is past its age. Upgrade! After A LOT of research into how tv's generally work and what kind of inputs and outputs you need and finding out that there is a difference between composite and component cables it was my suggestion to go with a 27" HD-Ready tv from Advent that we purchased at The Brick with a 5-year parts and labour warranty for $958.
Very nice tv, in fact, there is no other tv that is 27" in size that is better. Really, it's the only 27" tv that is HD-Ready. It also came with front composite A/V inputs, two more in the back, a composite A/V output in the back and two component inputs. Very nice setup.
So, after getting that setup and almost choking myself with the number of cables in the back, it.....sucked. The old tried & trusted voodoo, while a great card, simply didn't do it.
So, after even more research I discovered why: Since the beginning of man's first tentative steps into civilization(and the start of the tv advertisement) there have only been 525 scan lines on a screen. A lot like the resolution of a monitor except crappier, it didn't matter how big the tv was it always had the same number of scan lines. Which explains why big tvs looked like ass from up close.
High Definition(HD) or digital tvs didn't suffer from that. They could do any number of resolution that make almost no sense. 720x640, 1280x720, 1920x1080 and a couple of others I can't remember off the top of my head. These are actual resolutions, like you would see off of a monitor. The trick though is that they don't turn on unless you get a digital signal. How do you get a digital signal? Well this is where the importance of discerning the difference between composite and component come in. There are A LOT of people out there who do not realize that there is a difference, the facts are this:
A composite signal is Analog - or an RCA cable is analog(RCA cable and composite cable are the same)
A component signal is Digital.(there is no special name for the cables)
What did this boil down to? I got to buy more stuff. It was obvious I needed to get the digital signal from my computer and get it into the tv intact and non-degraded. Problem was, my video card(the voodoo) did not support this and the very few VGA to component adapters out there were simply too expensive.
So after several more days of almost constant research(I work overnight tech support and take maybe 10 calls or less in an 8 hour shift. I have a lot of time.) I found a posting in a forum about computer technology that directed me to ATI's online store and the picture of a VGA to component adapter that cost $49.99(only for use with ATI cards). My search was almost at an end. I decided to go with a Radeon 9600XT All-in-Wonder that cost $450(yes, I know it would have cost less if I kept looking, I was getting impatient and it cost me almost a hundred dollars. I learned my lesson.) Throw that into the computer and plug the adapter onto the VGA connector and BOOM!! Turned on the computer and got a blank screen with some squiggly lines every now and then. I missed the part that said I wouldn't be able to see the post. Computer turns on. The screen is clear! The lines are distinct! I can read what's on the picture from 10 feet away! Most of the time.
Yes, it worked to a degree. In order to have the screen fit on the tv I needed to use a really funky resolution of 1152x684 which doesn't really work that well when trying to play a game at 800x600(imagine one inch of the screen on every side cropped out) and it doesn't get better the higher the resolution. Then there is the fact that copyrighted DVDs will only play at certain resolutions. Imagine going to a theater and have the projectionist widen the picture until it falls off of the backdrop by an inch on each side.
If you leave out that you can't see your HUD when playing first person shooters and your missing half the face of an actor when he's at the edge of the picture and your forced to use a resolution that your forced to change if you want to watch a DVD. It works great.
Now the positive stuff:
The setup is pretty sweet, and the picture really is just fine. The main annoyances I have with it are really only minor and don't affect movie watch or game playing enough to make it impossible. Typing up a document in notepad or surfing the internet is just as fun as it always is(only it's about 10" inches more of fun), and the wireless keyboard and mouse that we also got for it make the thing really easy to use. Just make sure that you know what you’re getting into. It's going to be expensive and it may cause you a headache or two getting all the settings just right to accommodate as many things as possible. This is just why I needed it and how I went about getting it. There are probably easier setups out there, better setups that could give you a picture without having a funky resolution, I simply couldn't pay anymore than I did to get it to where it is. So good luck to anybody else that goes all the way like I did and if you find a better way of doing it, let me know?
Pre-Note: All prices listed are Canadian as that is where I live.
Some of you may or may not remember a short series of posts I made back in July regarding using your tv as a monitor. Well, I posted that I had made a decision about how I was going to do it and was asked to let you all know if it works or not. Well, here it is.
I'm sure of you have thought this. Why can't I have a 32" monitor? What about 50"?
Yes, with TV-Out video cards why not connect it to your TV. Get a projection display that will give you a 100"+ video display and most people would drop into a coma before they even see the 5 foot by 5 foot start button. So what stops people? Doesn't have to be projection, you can get it working with a simple 19" tv or 21" tv. Well, the short answer is, it sucks. The long answer will cost you about $1500 to find out that, yeah it works, but it's still not what ya want. So, I present to you my story on how to go about doing it the kinda wrong way.
It all started when I had to move back in with my mom.(eh, ya gotta do what ya gotta do) My computer naturally came with me. So, how do you get two computers into a small apartment that only has enough room(literally) for one monitor? You use the frikken tv that's how!
At the time we had a 19" ten year old tv that was failing, failing fast and there wasn't a whole lot anybody could do to fix it. The Voodoo3 3500 TV-out card I loaned her didn't work worth poop and even videos looked like someone had thrown up on the screen and started to finger paint with it.
So, there is only one way to fix a tv that is past its age. Upgrade! After A LOT of research into how tv's generally work and what kind of inputs and outputs you need and finding out that there is a difference between composite and component cables it was my suggestion to go with a 27" HD-Ready tv from Advent that we purchased at The Brick with a 5-year parts and labour warranty for $958.
Very nice tv, in fact, there is no other tv that is 27" in size that is better. Really, it's the only 27" tv that is HD-Ready. It also came with front composite A/V inputs, two more in the back, a composite A/V output in the back and two component inputs. Very nice setup.
So, after getting that setup and almost choking myself with the number of cables in the back, it.....sucked. The old tried & trusted voodoo, while a great card, simply didn't do it.
So, after even more research I discovered why: Since the beginning of man's first tentative steps into civilization(and the start of the tv advertisement) there have only been 525 scan lines on a screen. A lot like the resolution of a monitor except crappier, it didn't matter how big the tv was it always had the same number of scan lines. Which explains why big tvs looked like ass from up close.
High Definition(HD) or digital tvs didn't suffer from that. They could do any number of resolution that make almost no sense. 720x640, 1280x720, 1920x1080 and a couple of others I can't remember off the top of my head. These are actual resolutions, like you would see off of a monitor. The trick though is that they don't turn on unless you get a digital signal. How do you get a digital signal? Well this is where the importance of discerning the difference between composite and component come in. There are A LOT of people out there who do not realize that there is a difference, the facts are this:
A composite signal is Analog - or an RCA cable is analog(RCA cable and composite cable are the same)
A component signal is Digital.(there is no special name for the cables)
What did this boil down to? I got to buy more stuff. It was obvious I needed to get the digital signal from my computer and get it into the tv intact and non-degraded. Problem was, my video card(the voodoo) did not support this and the very few VGA to component adapters out there were simply too expensive.
So after several more days of almost constant research(I work overnight tech support and take maybe 10 calls or less in an 8 hour shift. I have a lot of time.) I found a posting in a forum about computer technology that directed me to ATI's online store and the picture of a VGA to component adapter that cost $49.99(only for use with ATI cards). My search was almost at an end. I decided to go with a Radeon 9600XT All-in-Wonder that cost $450(yes, I know it would have cost less if I kept looking, I was getting impatient and it cost me almost a hundred dollars. I learned my lesson.) Throw that into the computer and plug the adapter onto the VGA connector and BOOM!! Turned on the computer and got a blank screen with some squiggly lines every now and then. I missed the part that said I wouldn't be able to see the post. Computer turns on. The screen is clear! The lines are distinct! I can read what's on the picture from 10 feet away! Most of the time.
Yes, it worked to a degree. In order to have the screen fit on the tv I needed to use a really funky resolution of 1152x684 which doesn't really work that well when trying to play a game at 800x600(imagine one inch of the screen on every side cropped out) and it doesn't get better the higher the resolution. Then there is the fact that copyrighted DVDs will only play at certain resolutions. Imagine going to a theater and have the projectionist widen the picture until it falls off of the backdrop by an inch on each side.
If you leave out that you can't see your HUD when playing first person shooters and your missing half the face of an actor when he's at the edge of the picture and your forced to use a resolution that your forced to change if you want to watch a DVD. It works great.
Now the positive stuff:
The setup is pretty sweet, and the picture really is just fine. The main annoyances I have with it are really only minor and don't affect movie watch or game playing enough to make it impossible. Typing up a document in notepad or surfing the internet is just as fun as it always is(only it's about 10" inches more of fun), and the wireless keyboard and mouse that we also got for it make the thing really easy to use. Just make sure that you know what you’re getting into. It's going to be expensive and it may cause you a headache or two getting all the settings just right to accommodate as many things as possible. This is just why I needed it and how I went about getting it. There are probably easier setups out there, better setups that could give you a picture without having a funky resolution, I simply couldn't pay anymore than I did to get it to where it is. So good luck to anybody else that goes all the way like I did and if you find a better way of doing it, let me know?
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