Hi all,

I have a question about HDMI outputs on GPUs.
I know they can be used to send a video signal to a HDMI monitor, much the same way as DVI, VGA and DisplayPort work.
However, I want use it to output video to a TV in the same way as my DVD player would.

My plasma has a PC input, which is VGA. It's 3 years old, and the PC input works fine, but reading a lot of Pioneer forums online, I can't view a PC monitor through an HDMI signal since the resolutions are wrong.
So, can I define (on an nVidia GFX which has 3 connectors HDMI/VGA/DVI) that the content of what's being sent down the HDMI channel is ONLY the content of an active window, such as VLC Player, or MediaPlayerClassic etc?

I'm trying to eliminate the tearing that comes with horizontal panning when viewing content through the VGA in of the TV (PC input).
The quality is superb - 720p H264 downloads look jaw-droppingly good, but the panning / tearing is annoying.

Put simply:
Is the specific signal of the HDMI port definable or is it simply another monitor signal and can't be modified?

Thanks all,
Diz

Erm, yeah you can, I am right now. My monitor is running at 1680x1050 running through an HDMI cable.

You should be fine, just set the resolution in the driver thing, and you'll be good to go.

No, sorry I meant on my TV, of course it's possible to do that with monitors.. It won't accept a PC signal through any of its HDMI inputs, but it does have a PC VGA input which I currently use.
I want to create the kind of of HDMI video signal that comes out of a PVR or DVD player and push that through the HDMI of my TV.
That way, since it's digital, there should be, in theory, no horizontal tearing (which is caused by the VGA bottleneck).
I'd like to try it, anyway.

Diz

the signals are all the same, its not like there is a signal for DVD players and a signal for PCs

set your resolution as low as it will possibly go in nvidia control panel, if that is the problem, this should work.

then edge the res up till it stops working again

Older hdmi inputs only accept proper resolutions. Stick the pc at 720p or 1080p and is should work fine.
Tearing is usually caused by the gfx card being overloaded or a mis matched refresh rate.
Newer drivers have presets for hdtv's

I know you were on about *your* TV, however i'm using a 32" Panasonic LCD TV as my monitor for the media centre and that's not get any problems.

If you use a Nvidia IGP then in the Control Panel you can set a custom resolution to match your TV (so i've actually set it to 1336x768 as opposed to 720p).

My media centre does 1080p over hdmi perfectly as well

When it first came along, there were problems with the full image not being displayed on Plasma screens, due to Overscan. Watching films over HDMI wouldn't be a problem, but you would lose a few lines from a desktop to the overscan.

I think newer sets (post 2004) should be able to cope with desktops, either by switching off overscan or they will automatically compensate.

As the others have said, stick to 720p or 1080p as the resolution. That is all a TV is, generally, expecting to cope with. Some higher spec TVs might cope better with non-TV resolutions, but as long as the computer can output 720p or 1080p, you should be okay.

Listen to your uncle Saspro, he generally knows what he is talking about.

I think

Many thanks all for your informative posts.

I should elaborate:

My Plasma Pioneer PDP436XDE has 3 HDMI inputs, and one VGA PC input, (and of course SCART, S-Video and Composite among others).
Currently I use my PC to output Desktop 1 to the monitor on my desk (1920x1200 on a 24" Dell) and the second Desktop (using the second head - 1280x768 @ 60 Mhz) has a DVI-VGA adapter, and then a high quality 15m VGA cable running next door through the wall into the living room. The card is an nVidia GeForce 9600 GT. It goes into the plasma through the VGA in, naturally.

720p and 1080p H.264 downloads look superb, the quality is excellent, even though it's coming through an analogue cable. However, there's this horizontal panning/tearing issue. It's not excessive, I just don't like it. My wife doesn't even notice it; it just irritates me.

I'm getting a new machine for my home office, and I want to get an HTPC for under my TV and use that instead.
So, I thought, a microATX board, and after the advice on a different thread here, something with an nVidia 9300 onboard.

So if I get this board (Zotac 9300), it has 3 outputs - VGA, DVI and HDMI.
If I connect the HDMI to the HDMI in of the TV, at what resolution should I set the card at?

Supported HDMI resolutions on the TV according to the manual are:

1920*1080i@50Hz
720*576p@50Hz
1280*720p@50Hz
720(1440)*576i@50Hz
1920*1080i@59.94/60Hz
720*480p@59.94/60Hz
1280*720p@59.94/60Hz
720(1440)*480i@59.94/60Hz
1920*1080p@24Hz

I read in Pioneer forums when I got the TV (April 2006) that there had been some limited success in getting a PC signal into the TV through HDMI, but that generally it didn't look that great or was a nightmare to get working.
Even if I get this working, my main questions are:

1) What's the ideal resolution for this TV? Or at least, which should I try first? Obviously it's going to have be something non standard that I'll create through the nVidia contol panel.
and
2) Is this going to solve my horizontal tearing issue? Cos if my 9600 VGA input tears, and the board I'm looking at is only 9300, but digital, I'm hoping it won't tear.

If you've taken the time to wade through this, many thanks. If you can answer any of the above, a thousand thanks!
Diz

Purely for bluray watching I'd go for 1920x1080p 24Hz. For TV watching I've always found 1920x1080p@ 60Hz looks nice.

As the panel is actually 1024x768 resolution the TV's having to scale down the input so 1280x720 or 1080i may look better as the scaler won't have to work so hard.

Tearing should be resolved using hdmi & hdtv resolutions (my htpc doesn't tear at 1080p over hdmi)

Christ you're quick at replying!

When I have a board with an HDMI output, will it allow me to specific Interlaced or Progressive?
I've never seen it as an option in the nVidia control panels I've played with, but then I've yet to setup a machine with an HDMI onboard.

You're a star!
Diz

Usually you just tell the driver it's a HDTV & you'll get new resolutions. ATi's drivers have them & I'm sure nvidia do as well.
YOu'll also get access to a slider to get rid of overscan.