"PC" said:
Hello, I'm interested in a HDTV out video card (no tuner) for my sff
shuttle sb65g2 (agp). I will not be playing games just watching tv.
What is a great card for this single purpose. Maybe try to give me
some ideas for a card sub $100 and a second sub $200.
If you have the time please let me know why you would choose the card
for me.
Thanks for your time.
There is a search engine here. Go to TV_Out option and
select HDTV of some sort. Go to Interface and select
whatever AGP your computer supports. Presumably there
is more than one way to connect an HDTV, and whether
yours uses component input (separate coaxes), or something
like a DVI connector, will determine which cards are the
best to use with your new HDTV.
http://www.newegg.com/ProductSort/SubCategory.asp?SubCategory=48
As far as I can tell (and I don't own a HDTV or plan to buy one),
the HDTV ready cards should come with an adapter cable. On the
cable here, you can see a red/green/blue set of plugs, and those
are component outputs. Something like Y/Cr/Cb. The fourth plug in
this example, is probably S-video (black, four pins) for older
video devices.
http://images10.newegg.com/NeweggImage/productimage/14-122-226-04.JPG
In any case, if you buy a video card for a purpose like this,
make sure it comes with any adapter cables needed. Trying to find
the correct cable after the fact, can be almost impossible, or
very expensive. I remember when a local radio/TV store wanted
$50 for a S-video to composite cable. When a cable is bundled
with a video card, you are getting it at closer to cost. So
in this case, you would be advised not to buy a Newegg "refurb"
that has been stripped of all cables.
http://images10.newegg.com/NeweggImage/productimage/14-122-226-04.JPG
In looking at an advert for an expensive HDTV, it had a ton of
different connectors on the back, and I'm willing to bet that
component hookup is only one of the interconnect methods possible.
DVI might be another method. As with all electronics, you'll need
to be able to see the connectorization on the backside of both
pieces of equipment, to avoid expensive mistakes.
On page 82 "Configuring HDTV" of this document, you can see Nvidia's
new support for HDTV. You can also browse this FTP site, for later
versions of drivers and manuals. I believe ATI also has options like
this, but the ATI web site is a PITA. In fact, for ATI, some
of their "partners" sites contain more useful info, than ATI
themselves.
ftp://download.nvidia.com/Windows/81.98/81.98_ForceWare_Display_Property_User_Guide.pdf
This is Catalyst Control Center for ATI cards. I cannot find an
up to date version on the ATI site, so I make do with this
doc downloaded from Visiontek.
Page 28 here mentions HDTV. When you connect a device by the component
interface (red/green/blue coax cables), there is no place for the
EDID serial bus. The video card cannot know the capabilities of
the HDTV display device, and Page 28 explains how to force the
addition of modes to the video card. I presume if you used DVI
then the EDID information would be available on a couple of
serial bus pins.
http://www.visiontek.com/CCC.pdf
Notice here, how there is a DDC clock and DDC data pin, for passing
EDID from the HDTV to the computer:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DVI
There is a wealth of information on here, about fighting with
your new display device:
http://www.geocities.com/jgeneedid/
Hope that is enough to get you started.
Paul
