Desktop showing but videos not on TV

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atk1

60 posts

Master Geek

#20428 26-Mar-2008 11:40

Hi, I have a 42" Panasonic plasma ( 70A ) connected to my PC via DVI to HDMI. The problem is my desktop is showing & I can view photos but I cant view videos? The player shows i.e. windows media, zoom player etc but it just shows black where the video should be showing? The video plays on the PC monitor just not on the TV. Any suggestions? I have had this working months ago when I 1st tried it. I have a Nvidia 6600 video card.
Also can I set seperate resolutions for the monitor and TV at the same time?
Thanks

atk1

60 posts

Master Geek

#118741 26-Mar-2008 12:24

Well I selected the option to "Also show it full screen on my..." Panasonic TV and now it automatically plays the video fullscreen on the TV which is good. What are the technical specs to select to have the best possible picture display on my TV? Resolution, Hertz, Progressive etc? Thanks

sbiddle

30853 posts

Uber Geek

Retired Mod

Trusted

Biddle Corp

Lifetime subscriber

#118758 26-Mar-2008 12:54

I'm asuming you are just running it in clone mode - the results you're experiencing are normal. I would not recommend running a HTPC in this as you will encounter problems trying to have different resoltions on different displays.

As for the optimum resolution you really need to look at the TV manual, a 42" Plasma is typically only ever 1024x768 and VGA @ 60Hz is probably the optimum display settings. Using DVI you will probably need to experiment to firstly see if you can get 1:12 pixel mapping and secondly try and minimise overscan which may mean using something like PowerStrip.

42" Plasma's are actually a terrible TV for HTPC use. 1024x768 is a 4:3 aspect ratio not 16:9 so if you're using a HDMI input and feel it a standard 1280x720/25 or 1280x720/50 input it has to scale it to the panel resolution which means you typically can't get 1:1 pixel mapping.