[radup]

Hi,


I was wondering if the powerstrip timings need to be different based on what type of connection is used. Are there specific timings for DVI connections available anywhere - or are they supposed to be the same (as the ones Karnis posted).


I can't seem to get the DVI connection working properly between my Radeon 9700 and my plasma display.


Thanks,

Radu

 

[Spoonfed]

I read somewhere that some DVI devices only take 1:1 mapping on DVI (ie if the plasma is 1280 x 720 that is the PC res you have to feed it)


I could be wrong

 

[zen313]

To answer the troubleshooting question: Make sure you have the correct monitor selected as primary. If you have two monitors connected, you will have to go into Display Properties -> Settings -> Advanced -> Displays, and turn on the DVI output. Then you have to decide which one will be the primary, and which will be the secondary.


On Radeons, if you have two monitors connected, I've always found that the plasma always ends up displaying a virtual desktop.


If you have only the plasma connected, then make sure you are using the correct type of DVI cable (I think you need a DVI-I cable)... a google search will yield what the three different types are.


AFAIK, on my NEC plasma, Karnis' powerstrip timings do NOT work, they are specifically for the HDTV dongle. The DVI output is not set at one fixed freq with a plasma though, you can select a variety of frequencies as with any regular computer monitor. See you plasma user manual for a table that contains resolutions.


Hope this helps. If any of this is wrong, let me know, I'd love to improve my system... just put it all together about a month ago.

 

[radup]

Thanks for the answers.


I am not using two monitors at the same time - I get a stable image on my regular monitor and then switch the cable to the plasma display.


The plasma manual has no usefull info about DVI frequencies.



The native resolution for my plasma is EDTV 852X480.


I can set my video card to output either 848X480 or 856X480 - none work properly.


In general, should the powerstrip timings be different if a DVI connection is used?

 

[zen313]

What plasma display are you using? I would think that the plasma display would be able to display a broad range of freqs... at the least 640x480 and 800x600. Did you try lower resolutions? And did you reboot the computer with the plasma attached?


Is the plasma set to the correct input?


Hope these help...

 

[radup]

Thanks zen. I'm using the Panasonic 42PA20U. The plasma is set to the correct input. The only resolution I can display via DVI is 800X600 with virtual desktop.


I can't get any other resolutions to work (including 640X480).


I just got a VGA cable and will try the VGA input on the TV.


I'm curious - from a theoretical perspective - what kind os signal is being sent over DVI? Should the powerstrip timings that work for VGA work for DVI as well?

 

[radup]

Via the VGA input I can get all kinds of resolutions to work on the plasma.


Still no luck with the DVI to DVI link. Can you even change the frequencies on a DVI link?

 

[Karnis]

The beauty...and drawback...of DVI is that it sends very specific information to video card in regards to resolution and timing support.

FYI, there are two different sets of timings in the guide, one for VGA and the other for the ATI HDTV adapter.

 

[PBurton]

Karnis, please excuse my ignorance. I just got my HDTV three days ago. It is a Sony 51WS510, and it has a DVI input which I am trying to use. I read your timing guide as well as one on Digital Connection. Using the setups from Digital Connection, I was able to get maybe three of all of the ones listed to display anything.

Question 1: You said in your last reply to this thread "there are two different sets of timings in the guide, one for VGA and the other for the ATI HDTV adapter." Here is my ignorance... which timings do I use for the DVI port? I have a Radeon 9000 Pro. It has a DVI port on it, so I am not using the VGA port or any dongles or adapters.


Question 2a: Using Powerstrip and the DVI interface, none of the front porch settings do anything at all. In one of the resolutions that I can actually get to display, I've got some vertical overscan at the top and bottom, but the really annoying part is that I've got about 3 inches of underscan on the left side. Using MYHD to watch TV full screen is not a problem. It looks perfect, but watching a DVD using PowerDVD, WMP9, etc. I have that really bad underscan problem. My TV does not have a way for me to shift it over either. What can I do about this? One of the other resolutions in Powerstrip has slight overscan on all four sides, but that res. isn't as high.


Question 2b: I spent hours each of the last few days searching for correct resolutions and timings that would show any picture at all, and the search feature of this site is not the best that I have seen. Could you tell me which timings I should be trying? My TV is a 51" 16x9, so I would like to run a pretty high res. 1920x1080i or something even remotely close would be great.


Question 2c: Since MYHD displays HDTV full screen perfectly, I thought that I would try using MYHD to watch movies, but when I change my input in MYHD to DVD, I have a problem. The DVD plays fine in a window, but when I try to switch to fullscreen, my screen goes black and I get no video or sound. Keep in mind that HDTV works perfectly in MYHD windowed and fullscreen. I am running MYHD 120 with DVI daughter card. MYHD driver 1.61 and ATI Radeon 9000 Pro with catalyst 3.7


Hopefully a couple minutes of you time can save me days or weeks of frustration. Thank you in advance

 

[Karnis]

Sorry, I don't have a DVI display device. Make sure you have the latest version of Powerstrip to try to adjust screen position, see if that works for you.

I believe you must use a macrovision removing program to get fullscreen DVD playback at high resolutions thru MyHD.

 

[scotthal]

My experience (tho' it might've been operator error), is that the ATI drivers won't drive the DVI port atall, unless your selected resolution matches one that the monitor reported at powerup. In the case of my pt-l300u, these didn't match those in the manual. Entech has a nice little utility on their download page - moninfo.exe - that will give you a list of what should work.

 

[elambo]

moninfo.exe would be very useful to me, but I couldn't find Entech's download page.


Does anyone have a link to this page?

 

[radup]

Powerstrip & catalyst do control what's being sent out on the DVI out on my AIW 9700. If I use a DVI to VGA convertor and use the VGA input on my display then I can adjust all settings. I even got a nice pixel perfect resolution.


On the other hand If I use the a DVI to DVI cable and the DVI input on my display things are ugly. The only stable image I can get is 800X600 with 16 colors. Aything else does not work at all.


I'm wondering - are the DVI signal specs public? What exactly should the card output? The dispay specs (I have a 42' Panasonic PA20U) say the supported DVI inputs are and I quote


525 (480) / 60p HF 31.47 VF 59.94

1125 (1080) 60i HF 33.75 VF 59.94


I tried outputing something with these frequencies but no luck. Does anybody know how may horizontal pixels are needed? Is this a DVI standard or does it vary from display to dispaly?


Radu


(moninfo is on http://www.entechtaiwan.com/files/moninfo.exe, but it didn't help me much)

 

[llamameat]

I have dvi and transcoder hooked up simultaneously, and I have to say that transcoder beats dvi hands down (at least on my system). Yes, the DVI output looks much more 'solid' than the transcoder, but it appears to be displaying only half the vertical lines in 1920x1080i!!! I can A-B between the transcoder and the DVI.....text appears fuzzy and unreadable on dvi (it looks like geforce with it's interlaced problems).


Is there any way to fix this? Has anyone else noticed this? I'm not even using powerstrip on the DVI, so the timings are pretty much perfect.

 

[zen313]

Hmm... now I'm wondering if I should use the VGA input on my NEC plasma instead of the DVI input... On the DVI input, the max res is 1360x786 or something like that, but on the VGA it can go much higher. I guess I'll play around with the VGA port..

 

[llamameat]

hmm, after a few days switching back and forth between dvi and transcoder, I think i'll use the dvi for dvds. But for TS streams, I'm definitely going to continue to use the transcoder. Much of the detail of HDTV streams is being lost on DVI (not so much with dvd). Originally, I thought that DVI was only showing half-vertical-resolution, but it seems to be a scaling issue instead. I have no proof of this, but the way text looks is almost exactly how it looks when things get up-converted/down-converted, even though I'm using identical timings with both the dvi and transcoder.


It doesn't make sense though because my tv's native resolution is 1920x1080i, and the tv doesn seem to do any scaling when the image comes from the transcoder. So I'm thinking the problem is with the hardware/drivers for radeon. Somehow it's unnessecarily scaling with my setup (catalyst 3.7 radeon9800 pro)