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View Full Version : Getting video from PC to TV

epoclaen
12-14-2009, 02:19 AM
This should be extremely simple to do but for some reason it's been a headache.

First, the setup - I do not have nor do I want any HDTV televisions, boxes, or video components. My PC has an NVidia 7600GTwhich has 7-pin S-video output, standard VGA output and DVI output. My TV and VCR are both limited to component video input.

While watching a movie on my PC, I wondered why I couldn't just direct the output to the TV instead of the monitor and watch it in the comfort of my living room. I tried plugging an S-video to component cable in as a second monitor but got some very odd results. On the video input mode of the selected plugs, I got nothing. On a different unused video mode though I got a very static-filled image of my desktop with a lot of squiggly lines.

So what am I missing or why wouldn't this setup work? What do I need to get the PC output to the TV? And why would anyone invest in boxes like Vudu, Roku, AppleTV, and Boxee and stuff I hear about when your PC is already capable of interfacing with NetFlix, YouTube, and any video you have on your hard drive? Of course you have the convenience of controlling the video from the same room as the TV but I can live without that in lieu of $100+ boxes.
computoman
12-14-2009, 05:00 AM
There will be some odd issues mostly because of resolution and the like. You need to go into the video card utility and tell it to directly use the svideo connector. I know that is I what I had to do the last time I ran xp with a card and svideo out.
epoclaen
12-16-2009, 03:00 PM
Well your tip led me to the answer...

Nvidia was having trouble detecting my TV. My s-video to component cable (plus the Nvidia Control Panel notes) had me convinced that I needed to select "component" as the type of connection. Trying "S-video" as the connection type gave me no image on the TV at all where choosing "component" gave me at least the static-filled image.

I then tried toying with the resolutions but nothing helped. So I found a short s-video to s-video cable and hauled the TV over to the computer. After running the "TV setup wizard" from Nvidia's control panel and selecting "S-video" as the connection type and dropping the resolution to "480i", I was then able to get a clear, colored image of my desktop - all other choices gave me nothing except for "480p" which gave a static-filled image again. So that was good progress.

My next step was to see if a shorter s-video to component cable would work since the one I was using is 50 feet long (far above Nvidia's recommended 12 foot maximum distance) but I didn't have one. So I tried plugging in the long s-video to component cable again and whaddaya know... the picture was clear and in color! Note that I didn't change my Nvidia control panel settings after changing plugs.

I'm not sure what the exact reason was as far as why I couldn't set it this way before but at least it's working now. I suspect that Nvidia was just having issues detecting the proper video signal to use until I gave it a more direct connection to the TV.

Thanks for the help!
Jeff
davidbix
12-25-2009, 01:08 AM
Do you mean component or composite? Composite is the yellow plug which going by everything else you say sounds like what you have.
epoclaen
12-29-2009, 04:43 AM
Do you mean component or composite? Composite is the yellow plug which going by everything else you say sounds like what you have.

Sorry if I didn't get those terms right. By "component" I mean an RCA plug with one yellow video feed and a red and white, right and left audio feed.

Here's a further update to my system setup - all I needed was a cordless RF mouse and I now have full control of any media or application that can run on my PC usable at my TV. For cases where a little typing is needed, I might invest in a wireless keyboard but for now if you type "OSK" into the "Start">>"Run..." dialog box it gives an onscreen keyboard.
davidbix
12-29-2009, 09:14 PM
Sorry if I didn't get those terms right. By "component" I mean an RCA plug with one yellow video feed and a red and white, right and left audio feed.
The one yellow plug is composite video. Component is the separate red, green, and blue RCA plugs for video.
nav13eh
12-30-2009, 01:32 AM
The one yellow plug is composite video. Component is the separate red, green, and blue RCA plugs for video.

Correct! I was also confused as I have never seen a VCR with component video.

Let me ask you a question, if you are most of the time watching movies, why don't you invest about $20-40 on a DVD player and save all this hassle?