PC-out from e1705 to samsung hdtv - please help

Hi, I'm looking for some help on connecting my laptop to my tv for playing games (and for watching movies, etc.). I have a Dell e1705 and a samsung dlp hdtv. I have used the s-video just fine to output to the tv, but i haven't been able to get the pc-out to work. There is a pc-input on the tv. When I connect it, the tv says "Not Supported Mode". I set my laptop to display 1024x768 resolution and I get the same result. I have the refresh rate set to 60 hertz. Any ideas on what is going on here? In my tv manual, it says something about not supporting interlace mode. Could this be the issue? I'm not sure what that means...would my laptop be running in interlace mode? If so, how do I turn that off? What else could it be? Thanks for your help!

 

quick follow up question: If i can get this to work, will the DVI connection be better than the PC one? Thanks.

 

well, i think i figured it out...if i set the tv to be the primary monitor, then it works. I'm not sure why...but I won't question it...hehe. it looks amazingly better than s-video.

will dvi be even better than this, or am i fine sticking with the pc hookup? THanks!

 

I use the DVI port to connect to my HDTV. What GPU are you using? Is it the 7800 or the x1400? If you have the 7800, you can easily access the nvidia tool tray by right clicking anywhere on your desktop. From there, you can go to the display setting and choose the external LCD option from the drop down menu.

I'm sure that the ATI tool tray has something similar, but I'm not familiar with it. If you're using the ATI video card, I'm sure someone like Chazman can help you out with this.

 

I have the 7800. I don't see the option you are talking about. Can you describe exactly where it is? Thanks.

 

If you right click on the desktop, there should be an option to bring up the NVidia desktop tool. It's in there, under display options (I think). If you are using the stock Dell drivers, then this may not be in there. You may want to visit tweaksrus.com and download the newest X-treme G Mobile Forceware drivers.

I'm actually at work right now, otherwise I could give you the exact location of the display option.

 

Hey, I installed the drivers that you recommended, and I bought a DVI to HDMI cable. I'm not sure exactly what I should do, but maybe I should sometimes use the PC connection and sometimes use the DVI to HDMI connection. The reason why I say this is because the only game I tried, Quake 3, seemed to look MUCH nicer with the pc cable than with the DVI to HDMI cable. Maybe there is some tweaking that I could do to make the DVI to HDMI cable look better in games. There were some problems though, like the screen flickering a bit in places, and the resolution didn't quite work perfectly, so part of the quake window was off the monitor's viewing area. WIth the PC cable the screen fit perfectly and no flickering.

That said, for watching videos such as divx files, the DVI to HDMI connection is sooooooooooo nice. So maybe I should use the DVI to HDMI connection for movies and the PC connection for games. Or, is there some tweaking I can do to get games to look better?

I realized with the DVI to HDMI connection that the screen would flicker a bit, even on the desktop, on the higher resolutions. I guess I just can't use the highest possible resolutions.

Anyway, do other people have the problem of getting games to look really good on their tvs with a DVI to HDMI connection? And ideas on what I can do to fix the problem? Thanks.