HTPC and Plasma

[fasterthanlight]

I have a media center that I built and it has an ATI x820xt agp card with dvi. I read on my plasma manual that the pc would not work through a hdmi DVI converter.I want to know why specifically this won't work. I have a Hitachi 42" plasma. Is there any way to make this work? BTW, are there any hdmi vid cards yet?

 

[Ockie]

It will work, but it will not work on it's native resolution settings. Due to the conversion, the TV is unable to send back identification signals back to the computer for proper resolution.

Meaning you wont be able to get native resolution even if you wrote your own drivers or forced it (I've tried, no go).


What you want to use is a VGA cable if possible or perhaps you may be able to dry a real HDMI card with HDMI out, so that way it shouldn't have any issues.


I simply switched to VGA cable and it looks a hundred times better with native resolution, makes really no diffrence either.


Two companies out there are now producing HDMI cards, they are PCIE and are 150 and 250 dollars, quite expensive. Check newegg.com


If you are looking for an HDMI to DVI cable, please let me know, I'm selling a Week old monster Ultra 600 cable for $30.

 

[fasterthanlight]

I don't have a vga or dvi on my plasma, instead I have 3 hdmi. The vga won't work for me. Based upon your reasoning, even an hdmi card with the wrong resolution won't work. You would have to make sure the resolution is set correctly before you turn the pc on. But to say again, a video card with an hdmi port would work fine?

 

[Ockie]

I don't have a vga or dvi on my plasma, instead I have 3 hdmi. The vga won't work for me. Based upon your reasoning, even an hdmi card with the wrong resolution won't work. You would have to make sure the resolution is set correctly before you turn the pc on. But to say again, a video card with an hdmi port would work fine?

You need to run native resolution if you want to have it look perfect or some other 1to1 ratio.


So I guess you have to buy an HDMI out card to fix your issue.... it's probably not too much of a bad thing, as HDMI is the future and it also carries sound. (less clutter)


The worst thing that can happen is that you can always return the HDMI card if it does not work, but I don't see that as in being the case.

 

[twsmit]

I have a media center that I built and it has an ATI x820xt agp card with dvi. I read on my plasma manual that the pc would not work through a hdmi DVI converter.I want to know why specifically this won't work. I have a Hitachi 42" plasma. Is there any way to make this work? BTW, are there any hdmi vid cards yet?

My father has a 52" Plasma with HDMI. A DVI-D ---> HDMI cable will work just fine. HDMI and DVI are 100% compatible standards, withDVI only lacking sound, and usually lacking copy protection.

As long as you are sending non copy protected (non HDCP) media down the cable, I can't see any issues.

If you want to do this cheap use your existing DVI cable, and buy a $10 adapter that makes one end HDMI, you don't need to buy an expensive cable. Digitial is perfect over short distances, you can pretty much use any DVI + HDMI adapter.

 

[mentok1982]

Check out this thread that I made.
It lists all the HDCP compliant cards and some of those cards have HDMI. You will see that
there are 5 cards that have HDMI right on the back plate.

2 x Sapphire X1600 Pros
1 x GeCube X1600 Pro
1 x GeCube X1300
1 X MSI 7600 GT Diamond Plus