Is Dell stupid to not include a HDMI and/or DVI port in the new Inspirons?

Hi all, apologies in advance for the question, but how about computer monitor connection? Does vga-only also mean external monitor quality will be lower?
Also, would hdmi yield significantly better screen characteristics if you connect a laptop to an hd lcd for gaming only? thanks!
Personally i think dell's mucking up not having at least the option. I'm looking at a zepto which has the same problem: vga only, with the prospect of hdmi in august. not waiting tho.

 

Yes....DVI/HDMI are Digital Out...Flat Panels with DVI/HDMI take advantage of that for a better picture. Read above, serious difference in Pixel count and colors between the digital formats and the analog VGA.

 

This is a serious mistake. My question to folks who know this stuff well: Is this situation remediable at the user level e.g. using some add on express card or something?

 

I think there was a dell model before that gave DVI out if you attached it to a docking station.

 

NBR members do not seem to mind that the Dell Inspiron series is missing a few useless ports. The number 2 and 3 more popular laptops are Inspirons and the only laptop that is more popular is the Dell XPS M1330.

 

I wouldn't call HDMI a useless port. I connect my laptop all the time to my TV to watch videos and having the one cable (HDMI) to connect with for both Audio and Video (and much much higher quality than s-video) is invaluable. I've got to say that's the one thing that HP got right over Dell. HDMI is no longer just a premium feature. Most TVs sold now have HDMI ports, people will start using them a lot more soon as they realize the difference in quality / convenience over VGA or s-video.

 

I think it's a huge miss. I'm looking at the Sony FZ190 w/ Blue-Ray and then I found this Dell. When I went over and priced out the Dell I was really surprised and happy with the config. Then I noticed no HDMI port...

If I'm going to purchase a new laptop with Blue-Ray I want HDMI, bottom line. In the future we can only assume it's going to be the standard and will be the future way to hookup camcorders, TV's, DVD players, etc. At least for the next year until something new comes along and makes us all buy new laptops

 

Is this even possible? I thought blu-ray needed a "protected path" to be output on an external display. This means HDCP which requires DVI or HDMI.

Boo to Dell for not including HDMI! Vote on Dell IdeaStorm here in hopes Dell will add it.

-Tom

 

I think the "protected path" is only required if the disc maker (the movie studio) chooses to require it for that disc. And I think most (or all) of them aren't doing that just yet. At least that's what's happening with HDDVD, and I think it's the same for Blu-Ray... not 100% certain though.

Anyway, I certainly think it's lame that Dell is offering a Blu-Ray drive but not offering HDMI on this machine.

 

"Content providers for HD-DVD and Blu-ray media can set an Image Constraint Token (ICT) flag that will only output full-resolution digital signals using a digital HDCP connection. If an HDCP enabled player is connected to a non-HDCP-enabled television set with a non-HDCP-compliant analog connection (VGA or Component), and the content is flagged, the player will output a downsampled 960x540 pixel signal."

-From wikipedia

You can still use the VGA to pass the video. But because it won't pass that protected path, which is required to output the video at it's full native res, it will downconvert the video to a resolution of 540p. This is my understanding at least and also my experience when I was trying to output my 360 hd-dvd drive from my laptop to my tv via VGA.

 

The downconversion happens only if that Image Constraint Token is set on the disc. At least that's my understanding. If the token is not set, then it can output native res over VGA.

 

You are correct. However, more and more studio's are adopting the ICT and discs will soon slowly start rolling out with this constraint. Dell COULD have avoided this by simply adding an HDMI port, but I guess that's what this post is for.

 

I really don't care for HDMI on a laptop. I have a PS3.

 

HDMI brings simplicity in term of connections, the PS3 browser won't let you do a lot of things that your PC will allow you to do. I have a ps3 as well but HDMI on my laptop is something I cant live without.

 

LOL Yeah I wasn't trying to imply that Dell shouldn't have put in an HDMI port.

 

Would a VGA-DVI connector work, it came with my video card, would that transmit a digital signal even though the inspirons have a VGA port.

 

Definately not. What you have is a DVI to VGA, not the other way around, and in any case, you cannot get a digital signal out of a cheap adapter. If you really want, you can buy a Matrox VGA to dual DVI, it's about $250. Or Belkin's Expresscard port replicator that has a DVI $200.

 

Please keep this in mind. Dell sells an adapter that connects to the yellow port that provides component out and digital audio out.

That should be good to get 720p if you have the blueray drive.

 

What yellow port?

 

Yellow Port ? s-Video ? LOL -_-

 

but you cant go from a lower quality port to a better quality port if i understand it right. Its like trying to take a hose and adding a funnel at the end, the end of the funnel is not going to increase water volume.

 

most ppl dont use it. enthusiasts have xps or lat or even precision maybe in which case they either have or have docking stations which would be used when ur going to be docking it down to connect to the monitor

 

keyword is "now".. most people dont use it "now" but check the specs on any modern TV that's being sold and you'll see at least one HDMI port... give it a couple of months with HP having HDMI standard and see how things evolve. If you only plan to use the notebook for a month, true it probably wont matter. Long term, you will feel the lack of the HDMI port..

 

i never noticed any difference between VGA and DVI

is HDMI use even wide spread yet? there are plenty of other ways to connect to a TV, S-video, VGA, or DVI through a converter

 

Not having a HDMI port on the latest Inspirons definetly has put me off. Yes, they are targeted at basic home users, but then whats the point of plugging in an 8600 GT then (or even an 8400) - obviously thats aimed at gamers isn't it, not "basic home users".

 

The point with HDMI is that they offer a blu-ray drive, but no way to output HD video.

The 1420's upgraded screen can display 720p but not 1080p, so the point of full HD video is... nothing, since there is no possible way to view 1080p using your 1420.

 

Also the dell 17" used to have a DVI port, but they removed it.. so it's kinda like they are taking a step back.

 

I think it looks like a deliberate case of "crippling" a feature in a product to differentiate between two product lines (ie. Inspiron and XPS)

Which is stupid, particularly because HDMI ports are the de-facto standard for (digital) TV's these days. having a VGA port is like not including a USB port and throwing in a serial instead.

I reckon the "average joe" would find it way easier to hook up an HDMI cable from his inspiron to his 26" LCD TV, than to find, plug in, and screw on a VGA cable (Which his TV might not have!)

 

Okay, I figured I'd post this because there seems to be some misconceptions as to how these video ports work and what they're capable of.

There are currently 3 widely used video standards: VGA, DVI, HDMI.

VGA came first. However, you were confusing VGA the resolution standard with VGA the video cable standard. VGA the video cable standard (and henceforth what I will be referring to when I say "VGA") can output up to 2560x1536, and because it's strictly analog it can output whatever color depth your video card's digital-to-analog converter supports -- usually 24-bit color, but can go all the way up to 36-bit (that's about 65 billion colors). However, for higher display resolutions the pixels have a tendency for becoming blurry unless you are using extremely high quality cables.

DVI is next in line, and is a hybrid in that in essence also has the exact same analog capability as VGA, which is why DVI->VGA adapters are so cheap -- there really is nothing in them except wires connecting the input pins to the output pins. However! DVI ALSO has digital wires that can be used to communicate with monitors with NO SIGNAL LOSS whatsoever -- if the graphics card wants pixel 44367 to be exactly 22% red, 65% green and 97% blue, the monitor knows that that exact pixel is exactly that color. Analog DVI supports the same resolutions as VGA. You were correct in your statement of max resolutions for DVI, except that applies only to single link DVI -- dual link allows for higher resolutions (which is why you can drive that crazy high resolution Apple display higher than 2212 x 1243).

HDMI is the newest standard of the three, and basically it contains the digital part of DVI -- which is why DVI->HDMI and HDMI->DVI adapters are relatively cheap. However, DVI also added High Definition Content Protection to the digital communication. HDCP encrypts high definition video from protected sources such as Bluray and HD-DVD movies so that external devices can't snoop in and rip the video. If the monitor doesn't have the capability to decrypt this video, then the machine will fall back to unencrypted standard definition. Also, HDMI includes digital audio. HDMI however, does NOT have analog, so you cannot use a cheap adapter to convert from it to VGA.

However, the latest and greatest version of DVI now also includes HDCP, which means that with cheap adapters, it can not only be converted to connect to VGA and non-HDCP HDMI devices, but can also be converted to connect to HDMI devices with HDCP. This means that VGA and HDMI (with the exception of the digital audio) are now full subsets of DVI -- Anything they can do, DVI can do as well.

My take on it, is that it is absolutely idiotic for Dell to not have DVI on all of their notebooks. DVI is directly supported by Intel's integrated graphics as well as nVidia's discrete graphics, which means that the only difference is in the connector they used. It is a massive oversight on their part, especially considering that these laptops can get Blu-ray drives but not the 1920x1080 LCDs or HDCP video outputs required to display FullHD.