ATI 2600xt HDMI adapter help

[fizzy]

Hi,

I recently bought a hidef tv, and have been trying to hook up my media pc to it. It's using an ATI 2600xt gfx card.

Was initially using a dvi to hdmi cable, and found the display didn't fill the screen. Found the overscan options in the CCC, and when I set this to 0, it showed a perfect 1920x1080 1:1 picture, which completely filled the screen and looked great.

The problems started when I tried using the hdmi adapter on the card. I could not get any audio through at all, even though drivers were present etc.

Then realised that the adapter I was using was not the one supplied with the card. Found the correct adapter (which was black, while the other was grey) and used that instead. Now I get audio of hdmi (finally!!) but the display is off. I'm still using 1920x1080, but no matter what setting on the overscan scale I use, its never a perfect 1:1 mapping anymore and looks blurry/fuzzy.

Any ideas why using the audio enabled dongle would effect the display like that? I've tried updating to the latest drivers but its still the same.

At the moment it looks like I can either have a perfect picture but have to use an audio card & seperate lead, or use the hdmi audio and get a fuzzy picture.

 

[Vimes]

What OS are you using..? I ask that because I have noted that Vista allows sound switching by application whilst XP I have needed to use a small application, which resides in the system tray, to switch sound devices to the Realtek HDA HDMI output.

With my 4870 and the 8.12 CCC I have found that I need a small amount of overscan to completely fill my 50" Plasma @ 1920x1080.

I have only used the DVI <> HDMI adapter that came with my Sapphire 4870.

I did update to the latest 2.13 drivers for both my 889a Realtek sound chip and the same revision for the HDMI driver.

Does it recognise your TV correctly within the CCC..? For some TV's you have to 'force' a selected setting to use. Mine it sees as the Samsung and shows within the CCC that it supports 1920x1080 @ 60hz and then I select that in the drop down list (IIRC it is 1080p 60 standard that I select).

 

[fizzy]

I'm using XP. I've installed 8.12 drivers but this has made no difference.

I've tried the various options in CCC to no effect. Its still the same - if I use a DVI to HDMI lead I can get a perfect 1920x1080 1:1 picture, with overscan on 0.

As soon as I use the audio enable ati adapter and a hdmi to hdmi lead, I get audio over hdmi but then can't get the picture to look non-fuzzy when at 1920x1080. Overscan has to be set to about 4 or 5 to get full screen rather than 0 as before, which is odd. 0 causes a hugely oversized picture and I can't see the task bar etc as its off screen.

Its almost as if the signal is identified differently when using the hdmi adapter, and unfortunataly the tv I am using does not have a 1:1/direct mapping or whatever override/manual option.

I've browsed the net and seen a few other people with this issue (from months ago too) but no obvious fix given.

Guess its option B then.

 

[Vimes]

With XP I had to use either QuickSoundSwitch or STADS (System Tray Audio Device Switcher) to switch the audio from the PC's speakers to the HDMI / DVI port.

Strange how you get the distortion, you must have the TV identified via CCC and set correctly.

EDIT: Just remembered that under XP I could not get the monitor to display at 1680x1050 and the TV at 1920x1080. The monitor would display the 1680x1050 ok but with a 1920x1080 sized desktop.
Using Vista I had no such problems and it worked correctly.

 

[fizzy]

Thanks for the replies. Audio is not an issue - as stated I can get it to work over hdmi when using the correct adapter.

The problem is the picture when using the adapter. CCC seems to identify the screen ok.

When using the DVI to HDMI adapter, CCC shows the DTV menu option as "DTV (DVI) 3". When using the adapter, it shows "DTV (HDMI) 4".

So it looks as if the HDMI port/card/tv switches between DVI and HDMI modes on the HDMI connection... or something like that. Looks as if the problem is a probably a limitation of the TV when using "proper" hdmi in that it does not have a 1:1 pixel option and expects normal video overscan etc - hence the fuzzyness as no matter how much I mess with scalling the pixels won't line up...

....or something like that anyway. Guess there's little chance of hidden menus on this tv - its a UMC model and a bit limited in the extra fancy stuff.