So what's the deal here?

[belmicah]

Hey all. I was gonna buy a 20" lcd this week and use it not only as a pc monitor, but also to watch HDTV from comcast digital cable. Should I just hook the cable box up to it directly (in the condition that it has DVI out) and hook up my pc through VGA, or should I pass it through a tuner card of some kind, then out through DVI on video card. If that's the case, what tv tuner card?

Also, at 1680 x 1050, can I see full 1080i HDTV, or will I have to use 720p. Lastly, what happens when I try to view 16:9 material on a 16:10 monitor.

Any help would be great, thanks.

 

[belmicah]

update: Cable box has no DVI output. SO I guess I will have to either buy a HDMI to DVI cable, or run it through my PC.

If I run it through my pc, what resolution should I set my desktop to to view HD content if my monitor's max res is 1680 x 1050? I have a 7800 gs which should work well to view hd content with Purevideo, etc. I have just never owned a widescreen before, and am confused about proper setup for viewing movies.

 

[IanG]

If you use a tuner card, you're going to only be getting a SD image from the box and then resizing it, it's not going to look anywhere near as good as real hdtv. Having said that: DVI would be your best bet.

You can't get a full 1080i image out of that monitor (1080i is 1920 x 1080 and your screen is 1680 x 1050) but it's also not a native 720p resolution so either way you're going to have to hope that the monitor can resize it. This is a feature of the monitor and every one is different.