TV out quality

[Mr T]

Hi,

I am thinking of turning my existing PC into a HTPC. Its spec is
Athlon 64 3200+
MSI RS480 mobo
1Gb RAM
X600 pro
no TV card at present

As a test to see what Divx playback was like on my TV i connected the pc up using the svideo connection. The picture quality was really bad, much worse than my modded xbox playing the same divx's. It also would not display in 16:9 widescreen, in fact WinXP wouldn't even let me set my resolution to anything other than the standard 4:3 resolutions (640x480, 800x600 etc)

My TV is a panasonic tx32pl10 (a 32inch widescreen CRT) and has a great picture when playing DVD's etc from 'normal' consumer electronics devices.

Is TV out always this bad from a PC to a non HDTV? Its a bit of a show stopper as i cant watch TV with a picture that bad.

Mr T

[dottore]

it depends on the g-card. the matrox g400 has the best tv-out i've ever seen. the problem is, the card is old and therefore no gaming etc...

there are vga <-> rgb-scart connectors for nvidia and ati-cards, but you have to assemble it yourself and it could cause your computer or tv-set to be destroyed.

short: you can have a good tv-out, depends on the card.

[Remco]

I got a pretty good tv-out by soldering a VGA-to-SCART cable: http://ryoandr.free.fr/english.html

Using powerstrip you can make the VGA-port give 720x576 @ 25Hz

I had to extend it with a hsync/vsync to csync converter (http://www.tkk.fi/Misc/Electronics/circuits/syncbox.gif) but i think on an ATI-board this in not necessary

It is not really dificult making this cable; but you are risking both your TV and your HTPC.

[csy]

In order to get good s-video/composite video output on your video card, you need to configure it into "video mode".

Follow these steps:
1) install ATI driver 6.1 (this driver gives you the 720x576 or 720x480 options)
2) Launch the ATI CCC and select View: Advanced View
3) set refresh-rate to a multiple of your TV field rate (I use 100Hz for PAL TV) (this makes the 720x576 and 720x480 resolutions available to use) and apply. Note you may have to enable "list all posible modes" to see all the available refresh rates.
4) set resolution to 720x576 for PAL or 720x480 for NTSC (this also makes the "video mode" tick box visable for step 5) and apply.
5) Go into the TV properties tab and Adjustments sub-tab and enable "video mode" and apply.
6) exit CCC

Video mode overrides the scaling and directly maps the pixel rows to the TV scan lines as a one-for-one mapping, hence the significant inprovement in video quality on the TV. This however is a double-edged sword because while you have good video, you will now notice that the Windows desktop edges disappear off the TV screen - this is normal due to the overscaning that all TV's do (I lift the taskbar to double-height to compensate).

Other points:
This ATI driver also provides hardware adaptive vector/motion deinterlacing which is usually far better than your software "bob" deinterlacing, so configure your software players to use "weave" (no) deinterlacing and let your video card do this for a superior output.
I also recommend enabling DXVA on the video card to help reduce CPU load, via the CCC video tab, and all-settings sub-tab and enable "Windows Media video Acceleration". However please note this only kicks-in with single display, so you must disable you monitor display and only have your TV display for this to work.

Best of luck.

[Mr T]

Thanks for all the advice

How do all these off the shelf HTPC's like you can get from PC World handle the connection to the TV?

Mr T

[nemulate]

Deja vu? http://nolanparty.com/mediaportal.source...hp?t=12620 (ps sorry if not happy with this sub just thought it was funny! You can delete my post no worries!)

[-stattik-]

What kind of inputs do you have on your TV? VGA? DVI? Those would get a better picture than svideo and you should have an easier time with resolutions.

[nitrogen_widget]

I've used a radeon 7000 with the s-video to composit adaptor & the picture looked good to me.
I've also used a g-force 5200 with S-video & that looked good also.
Both of those card though would give me slight interference patters occasionally & that turned out to be the quality of the cables themselves.

I'm currently running a radeon 9550 with the component dongle to my 32" SDTV & the picture is just beutiful.
Well the desktop looks like crap because the card needs to be set at 720i for my TV but video looks amazing.

DVDs looked just as good as a set-top box with one exception. The color settings were a step off. Blacks were not true blacks & I had to futz with the settings as best I could.

adjusting the ATI driver's is just plain impossible at that resolution.
I have to attach a monitor & use the TV as monitor 2 so I can make adjustments on the TV.

Ok my complaining is done.

[nemulate]

What kind of inputs do you have on your TV? VGA? DVI? Those would get a better picture than svideo and you should have an easier time with resolutions.

Doubt wether a crt would have those!

[Torque]

Doubt wether a crt would have those!

My 36" Sony Wega CRT has DVI and it's what I am currently using. The picture is great.