I connected my Toshiba Satellite notebook to a TV using the S-Video. There was no problem displaying the desktop on the TV. However, when I try to play some Real Player video, the screen portion of the Real Player was black. The same thing happened when I used Windows Media Player. The screen portion is also black. Do I need some special drivers for playing video on TV from the notebook?

I had an older video card that needed to be connected to the TV before turning on the PC, then it would recognize the TV as a display device. You may want to try that.

You need to tell Real not to use overlays for video playback. Look around in video or performance options.

Nodsu, I went to Preference>>Hardware>>Video Compatibility and move the slider to 'Most Reliable' to disable Optimized Video and Overlays. The problem was still there. Was this the option you were talking about?

Probably.. I personally wouldn't touch anything Real with a 10-foot pole so I can't check Did you click OK and restart the playback after disabling overlays?

The colour depth on the TV should be 24 bits too..

Nodsu, you were right. Although I clicked OK and restarted playback, it seemed like I needed to restart RealPlayer after changing the option. It is working now. Thanks.