TV-out cards and their effectiveness???

[SuperCheetah]

I have a Gainward GeForce 2 Pro card and it came with a TV-out port in it and a small connector cable. First of all, what other cables do I need to buy to connect to my TV???

Second, will it really be worth it if I do use the TV-out option to watch ripped DVD's or TV episodes I've downloaded? By this I mean is the resolution ok, because I've heard stories of it being really poor and unreadable. The videos I have now are of very good quality, by the way.

Third, could I do any gaming on a TV screen??? And also would the desktop look good when using it instead of a regular computer monitor?

Sorry about all the questions, but I'm new with the TV-out concept and I haven't heard it's pros and cons.

The TV has a 25 inch screen and my monitor has a 19 inch screen so it's not that much of a difference, but I was just wondering. Thanks for any advice.

 

[MrGaribaldi]

I answered a post about this a bit earlier (in the Audio Video forum) which you can find here...

In short:
If you are ok with watching with 640*480, then you should use it.. If not... It depends on your card, but don't expect too much...!

As for the other Q's....
What kind of a cable is it? composite, S-VHS? If it's the former, you should be able to plug it in without further hassle...

If it's the latter, you'll either need a TV/video with an S-VHS in, or a converter...

Hope this helps

 

[poertner_1274]

I have video out on my card, and personally I think it looks really well. I have watched many things from my computer on my TV. Of course I have the option for composite and SVideo. You probably only have the option for SVideo. In this case like MrGaribaldi said you would have to find either a converter to get it into composite, or use a TV that has SVideo on it.

As far as regular usage, it doens't really look that great on the TV. The words are very blurry and hard to read, but the video portion of it is pretty good. I would recommend looking into it.

I really like mine.

 

[lokem]

It's perfectly fine watching videos or playing games with TV out. But doing any web surfing or reading text using TV out is a big no no as pointed out by poertner_1274.

Not sure whether they have improved on that or not, but on my old Spectra 2500 (TNT 1), I couldn't really read any text on it. I had to strain my eyes to do it. And apparently at that time, the TV out for that card is above average.

 

[SilvrNBlack]

I agree with Iokem. I had a DVD drive and used my Radeons TV Out and it worked great. Also any videos worked fine as well. It was everything else that sucked big time. Your TV plays DVD's at the 640 X 480 resolution as it is, unless you have HDTV or any other digital TV. Use the S-Video if you want the most out of it, but it isn't much better.

 

[Mictlantecuhtli]

DVDs are (usually) made with resolutions from 704 x 480 to 768 x 576, so I'd recommend using 800 x 600 resolution for TV.

 

[lokem]

Originally posted by Mictlantecuhtli
DVDs are (usually) made with resolutions from 704 x 480 to 768 x 576, so I'd recommend using 800 x 600 resolution for TV.

800x600 shouldn't be a problem. You should be running 800x600 for TV output all the time if possible.

 

[SuperCheetah]

Thanks for the info guys! I'll have to get the connector cables and try it out!!! I can't wait to watch some Divx rips and DVD's on my TV!

Super