VAIO Z - Blurry Text on External Monitor

I've got a Sony VAIO Z690. I'm trying to connect it to my Westinghouse L2410M monitor - it is a 24" 1920 x 1200. Connection is through HDMI.

I've got it running at native resolution, but the text on Windows and applications look blurry. Colors also look dull. Strangely, when I played a 1080p movie, the quality seemed ok. But once I closed the movie, the text is still blurry and the colors are dull.

I think I've played with pretty much every setting I can find. ClearType is on as well. Any ideas? I know it's not a problem with the monitor because it works fine with my other laptop (although that one runs XP instead of Vista).

edit: I should also add that although it works fine with my other laptop, it is with a different cable, since that one doesn't have HDMI. But like I said, watching a movie is fine, so I don't think it's an issue with the cable...

 

Same issue with the same monitor. I'm using a Z590 with XP. I did the whole Sony repair and they tested it thoroughly and even switched out all the parts. They told me that I need to be on Vista to get a clean HDMI output.

Are you on vista?

 

Yeah my Z is on vista

 

They told me that Vista fixed it when they tested my machine. The said they swapped out my HD (with XP) to their reformatted (Vista) drive and the HDMI output was fine. Can you try it on a TV with HDMI or another monitor. Maybe its our Westinghouse screen?

 

I will try when I get a chance. Currently away from home and this is the only screen I have here.

 

I was having the same problem when connecting my Z555 to a 24" 1080P Acer monitor with HDMI but also noticed that mine was not fully filling my screen, there was a black border all the way around it even though I set it to 1080P. I went to the Nvidia control panel where you can custom scale the output so it properly fills your screen. Once I did this text was crisp and clear and everything looked 100% better.

 

This is a function of TVs called "overscan". Due to historic reasons, TV signals have never covered the entire maximum display area, but only a box in the middle. Old analog TVs could manually be adjusted to make this match the edges of the display.
Enter digital, and the need for compatibility with upscaled "overscan" content. Due to this, digital TVs don't really show 1920x1080, but a smaller box blown up to 1920x1080. So if you feed a true 1920x1080 signal to a HDTV, you end up seeing just the middle part, with the edges missing.
Due to this, the default output on your computer is scaled to a smaller resolution and then sent to the external TV, who blows it up and it fills the screen. Blurry, but it fills the screen.
But that introduces the apposite problem -- if you use a monitor (or a TV that allows for turning on/off overscan, but no auto-detection), you end up with a letterboxed and pillarboxed image, like you did.

Luckily, as you discovered, you can set the nVidia display drivers to send a full 1920x1080 frame instead, which will give you higher resolution at full crispness.

Is the default of sending a scaled down image sensible? As long as the average consumers buy TVs without even knowing that what they see is upscaled and not native, and still believe they have full HD quality, I would say "yes".

 

I don't have any problem connecting my Z with my 24 in Samsung 1920x1200 through HDMI, 64 bit vista. Everything looks clear. Although the VGA output on the same screen looks horrible compare to my old laptop.

 

Same as me, I set 1920x1200 HDMI output to my Samsung 26". Everything is clear. VGA is bit blurry. I am using Vista 64bit.

 

VGA on my Westinghouse 24" is better than it was on my X60s. I think the HDMI on the Westinghouse is just busted

 

When I go into my nvidia control panel, I see an option for "Change flat panel scaling". However when I choose my external monitor, all the options are greyed out