Using 42" Plasma Or Lcd As Extra Pc Monitor

[chrgrims]

hi,

I just connected my 42" plasma to the pc with a vga cable. the plasma is 720p. the tv only wants to display 1024x768 and 800x600. the screen looks stretched horizontally and not good. i read this could be because of the pixels in the plasma, and cant be corrected. is this true? 

what are the specs to look for on a big panel for correct display on a pc?

[Benjie]

1280x720 wasn't a very popular resolution for plasmas, It's more likely to be 1024x768 or even 800x600 with rectangular pixels.

[Phil Conners]

If it's 16:9 and 720p high it should be 1280p wide to show the picture correctly. Try if you can force it to show 1280x720.

[astral]

I cannot try it out at present as I am on holiday.

I have a vga cable and will try with my Samsung 40" (1080) when I get home next week.

BTW my notebook is 16:9 (1680x1050 native) so should match the TV.

It seemed to work quite well on my old 32" Samsung.

[chrgrims]

yes, its a 16:9 720p samsung 42". 1280x720 doesnt work, it says mode not supported.

yes, it would be interesting to know if the 1080 displays the pc correctly. i have a full HD in the bedroom (samsung 6 series lcd), and probably will get something similar in the living room later.

[Phil Conners]

chrgrims, have a look in the user guide/manual - look for "native resolution". It should be around 1280x720, but I've had one that was something weird like 1350x750 - fortunately this was an option with my display card and with that it worked perfect.

[Benjie]

typically the displays tend to be 1366 x 768.

Can you go in through DVI or HDMI rather than VGA?

[Phil Conners]

^ Yep, that was it, 1366 x 768

[chrgrims]

It does display 1360x768, looks pretty good except for a horizontal strip on the bottom that just show digital nonsense info. My guess was that the correct is 1366, so with 1360 we get this strip. I then created a custom resolution 1366x768. This works fine, but still has the strip in the bottom. So i am not really sure what is wrong now.

Yes, i probably could use a HDMI cable, if for some reason that would solve the issue. I would need a 10 meter hdmi, the PC is far from the TV.

[astral]

See if you can borrow a short HDMI cable to test, before investing in the long one.

[samuijimmy]

I have just connected my TV with a HDMI cable from the computer & impressed with the picture. (15 ft cable... as a point of interest ranged from 500 baht to 1500 baht, in various stores... all looked the same!???) The resolution is different than the TV but quality is very good.

But my problem is I also want to get the full surround stereo, coming from the Computer to the stereo system (linked to the TV BTW ) There is another single RCA cable running to the stereo system .....But can only get the front speakers to work.

I have tried various configurations, & done the sound tests, but still only the front speakers work.

I see on the Computer speaker control panel that there is an Analog & digital outlet (The RCA wire is plugged to Analog outlet)

Question then! Do I need digital cables to run to a digital out let on the computer to the stereo system to get the full surround sound ? Is it necessary to get a pre -amp as well?

Running W7 ultimate in case that makes a difference, but not sure is there is a digital out let on the computer?!

Hope one of you techie people can advise! Thanks

[chrgrims]

does the soundcard on the pc have 5.1 outputs? if not, u will only be able to get stereo. RCA from stereo needs to be two cables. no need for a pre amp. just put them into the sound system.

if you have 5.1 soundcard, its a whole different story. let me know and i will try to take the next step when i know the setup more.

[samuijimmy]

"if you have 5.1 soundcard, its a whole different story. let me know and i will try to take the next step when i know the setup more. "

Well I think so! In the set up on the screen it has a sound test for various configurations... including 5-1

But cannot seem to get passed it only getting sound on front speakers...

My "limited" ability on such things tells me I need to run more than one RCA cable, or other cable from the computer to the receiver???

Any assistance would be greatly appreciated.

Running 64 bit, 8 megs ram if that helps...

PM me if you prefer.

Thanks!

[chrgrims]

so, your sound card has outputs for left right sub center and the back two speakers (6 outputs in total)? if so, are they rca? if they are rca, you need 6 rca cables. then you need to amplify all of them. the easiest way to do that is with a 5.1 amplifier.

if this doesnt make sense, take a picture of the back of the soundcard and put it here or PM me with it.

good luck!

[Spoonman]

What Graphics card is in your Pc ??

I had an issue with my PC when i swapped to an LED monitor, my then card did not have HDMI out so i purchased another, for the life of me I could not get a full screen display at native resolution, turns out my card by default (Via HDMI) thinks its plugged into a TV and has some weird auto scaling thing going on, Nvidea card BTW.

EDIT: Did not read the full thread, seems running over HDMI fixed the picture issue.

[astral]

I have just connected my PC using VGA.

The setting automatically went to 1024 x 768

and the proportions on the TV exactly match my 16:9 computer screen,

no stretching. I tried some higher settings but that is a far as it will go,

without loosing the edge of the image.

[chrgrims]

now the tv is displaying correctly for me, just a small line on the bottom that displays noise. its ok for now, i will not watch movies that way anyway. my graphics card only has one digital out, so if i want to connect the tv via hdmi i would need a new card. not worth it at the moment.

[Benjie]

Is the noise a line with white/black gaps at odd spaces?

[samuijimmy]

By some stoke of "genius"

I clicked a button & presto have full surround sound... If you asked what I clicked.... I don't know!

But at least I have what I spent hours/ days trying to achieve... by fiddling & diddling.... seems to me I disabled some thing, but not sure what!

Now, if only True vision would broadcast in stereo then would have the full benefit of tying in the speaker system to the TV!

Thanks for the offers of help though... Jim

[Benjie]

TrueVision is stereo isn't it?

[samuijimmy]

I think, I figured out my "stoke of genius" about getting surround sound to the stereo system from the TV.

It does not work with Windows Media Player, but does with VLC Player... ( I think a friend had downloaded it for some thing, but it seems to do the job of music & videos & TV programs in full stereo.) Just thought I would add that to the thread....

As for True Visions in Stereo, Benjie, I been told no surprised that it is not...