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High Resolution DVI Support for Plasma Displays?
spongman asks: "I'm trying to find the best way to connect a computer to a 50" (or larger) plasma display. The display I'm currently looking at is the NEC 50MP2 because its native resolution (1366x768) is high enough to meet my needs and it can display a 16:9 image with square pixels without scaling, but I'm open to suggestions for similarly-capable displays.
I also want to use a DVI connection between the computer and the display to reduce interference and noise.
The problem I'm having is that I can't work out which video cards support this resolution (or something near it) over a DVI connection. The only card I've found that seems to support this is the PixelPerfect from Imagine Graphics in the UK, but it's based on somewhat old technology (Kyro2) and I'd like a few more choices if possible.
Does anyone have experience getting their video card connected to a plasma display over DVI at native resolution?"
That is the only combination I know that will use all of an HDTV's resolution. And it has to be and 8500. The lower end versions wont cut it.
A 50" CRT? I don't believe such a thing is even made, and if it were the weight would be monstrous, not to mention that it'd be huge not only diagonally, but depthwise, consuming a huge portion of the room.
Plasma screens, on the other hand, can be made 3.8" deep, and the power consumption (and hence heat dissipation) of plasma (& LCD) screens is dramatically lowered. Most LCDs and Plasma offer much better contrast than CRTs, and the only real critique of them is ghosting in some lower cost models, but that's mostly a complaint of yesteryear.
I had a similar problem when I originally got my SGI 1600sw flat panel LCD a few years back. It ran at 1600x1024 native, and to accomodate this unstandard (at the time) resolution, you were forced into using one of their "pre-approved" graphics cards. At the time they were fairly decent, but eventually they got old, without being able to upgrade, since the default connection was OpenLDI digital (not DVI), you had to buy an adapter (Usually out of stock and $600 retail) or get a new monitor.
If there are enough monitors made at 16:9 instead of 16:10 in time 16:9 resolutions will be standardized. So if you plan to use this monitor for a few years, I think eventually you wont have any graphics cards problems. But until then, I would say the GeForce cards are very accomodating to non standard resolutions. I cant say much for 16:9 but I know that all VisionTek GeFroce2+ cards and certainly 4+ cards support 16:10 resolutions. GeForce2 was one of the few vendors that also supported 16:10 when there were only a handful of monitors running at that resolution.
If you cant find anything that runs 16:9 and that monitor can rescale to 16:10 then I think a decent Geforce4 wont be much of a compromise. Plus, you should be able to hook up your DVD directly to it and still have it hooked up to your PC so you can still watch your movies at 16:9.
My next monitor is the SGI F220 which im ordering next week, and lucky me I can get a GeForce4 to render, now I just have to find out if its compatible with non-SGI systems. ^_^
Do a search for "powerstrip" on download.com. For certain sure, you can use an ATI 8500, or GeForce 4 anything.
(Lots of other cards will work, but these are the only ones I can personally attest to.)
I'm not sure about your specific application, but Matrox has always been pretty progressive with DVI support. I think they have at least one model of the G400 series with two DVI ports, and the new I think the new Parhelia card has three.
I use PowerStrip to control my video card. If you get a card with DVI out, this program should support it. It supports about any card under any O/S, too. In the Display Configuration, you should be able to configure custom resolutions. One of the presets is already 1360x768. A few more clicks should get you to 1366x768.
I'm the Devil the Windows users warned you about.
First, to answer your question:
:)
Any modern ATI or Nvidia card should work just fine. Plasma displays are very sensitive with regards to having their exact resolution displayed, so use a program like Powerstrip to make sure Windows starts up with the exact resolution and refresh rate your plasma monitor requires.
If you haven't bought a plasma display yet, then I recommend you think twice about getting it. There are some really low cost monitors out there that can interface pretty well with a PC. Take, for example, the JVC AV-48WP30, at around $1,700 you can have a 48" HDTV that supports DVI(*). People are using this TV with their PC's at 1280x720, or 1920x540. There are also new 42" (HLM427W, I believe) and 50" (HLM507W) Samsung HDTV's that support DVI and are based on badass DLP technology (I heard this set is particularly sharp when connected to a PC). These Samsung DLP's are MUCH cheaper than other comparable sets, something like $3,000-$4,000.
Note, however, that while the theoretical HDTV resolution is 1920x1080i, very, very few HDTV's can display a discernable pixel grid at this resolution. Still, the price difference between a modern rear-projection HDTV and a plasma monitor is significant (you can buy a decent used car with the money you save).
Here are some very helpful links, I used them extensively when I was shopping around for a new set:
AV Science Forum: great forum with lots of very knowledgeable people. Many of them are into using displays like plasmas/HDTV's with their PC's.
Home Theater Spot: similar to the above, different layout. Another great, helpful site.
(*) Regarding these DVI connectors - yes, these are the new DVI connections used to transfer encrypted data to prevent people from copying future HD broadcasts. It is often documented that you can't use this DVI interface with your computer's DVI out, but more often than not this is not true and it will work just fine. However, ask around on the above sites about your particular DVI TV before buying an expensive DVI cable.
Although my ATI 8500 should be able to drive my HDTV-ready monitor at 1920x1200 resolution, I've yet to be able to coax the X driver into delivering that resolution through the DVI interface.
... indeed, I suspect you could easilly coax that out of an ATI 8500 or ATI 7500 under XFree 4.2, and almost certainly if you use ATI's drivers.
However, using the Nvidia binary-only X 4.2 drivers I have no trouble driving the monitor in 1920x1280 24-bit color resolution with a GeForce4 Ti4600.
Such a setup should work fine for a relatively low-resolution plasma like the one you are considering, at 1366x768
If you're going to spend that kind of money on a plasma, though, I'd wait a couple of years, until they support true 1080i at least. 768 lines of resolution is analogous to 1024x768 resolution on a computer (yes, I know you get more horizontal pixels in a 16:9 format, my monitor is 16:10 so I'm intimately familiar with that), so keep in mind that you are buying an expensive product whose resolution will likely be disappointing to you in a couple or three years.
The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
HDTV resolution is 1920 x 1080 ..
.. whenever ur buying a so called HDTV ask to find out the actual resolution and make sure it's 1920 x 1080. Here's a tip if you're not paying thousands of dollars ($7k up) you're probably not getting HDTV.
.. will it ever be a reality?
There are MANY MANY manufacturers selling TVs with SVGA or XGA resolutions trying to pass it off as HDTV.
Be extremely careful of this
What happens? People buy it thinking thats true HDTV and think HDTV is no big deal and a waste of money. And in turn the concept of HDTV gets screwed.
Honest business practices
With power strip you can dial up any resolution that you want and create a profile for it. Take a look at the nice PNG screen shot and see for yourself.
A few months back I was setting up a Plasma screen for a client, connected to just a Geforce 4, the big problem I found immediatly was the connector! DVI is not just one plug!
:( What I had to do after talking to both an A/V suplier and Pioneer was use a DVI-I to VGA cable as no DVI-I -> DVI-D exists! Apparantly the quality loss is insignificant, but it just didnt feel right. :( Still it did look brilliant at 1024x resolution!
It turned out the Plasma screen (Pioneer I think) has a DVI-D connector and the GeForce (and every other video card I checked) has a DVI-I connector, they are not compatible!
From what I was told by various sources is that DVI-D is purely digital, where as DVI-I is part analogue, I never had time to find out more, but if anyone can clarify this and why it would be something to take into consideration.
Just found this info on DVI connectors: All About DVI
Hope this helps..
(Not quite what's asked for here, but worth a mention anyway: the dual-head 'DVDMax' output in the Matrox Windows drivers, which displays a video overlay full-screen on a second monitor, is absolutely excellent, and works with the video window in the background: quite useful for displaying video on a larger monitor while using a smaller one to operate the computer, which is ideal for certain residents of Betelgeuse 5).
Actually, some semi-modern video cards like the Matrox G550 and older versions have a limitation of 1280x1024 for their DVI output. There's a story one step up that talks about a tweak utility which sounds like it might circumvent this, but with the normal drivers settings it is not possible to go higher. The GeForce 4 and possibly the ATI 8500 do not have that problem.
I should have been a bit more specific with my question.
Firstly I want to use the DVI input on the display because I want to get the highest fidelity possible. I also want to be able to use the natvie resolution of the screen because I don't want the screen to have to scale the video image. The problem with using the DVI interface is that the DVI spec allows the screen to tell the video card which DVI resolutions it supports, and even though the screen may have a native resolution of 1366x768 (16:9) it may not advertise that mode to the card, and even if it does the driver or the card may not support that mode.
I know that most DVI-capable video cards will support video modes larger than that of the screen (1600x1200, for example), but as far as I know the selection is limited when the DVI interface is being used.
I know of the PowerStrip utility and its ability to create custom resolutions, but it doesn't necessarily mean that the display is capable of being driven at those resolutions.