Graphics Card/Onboard Graphics for Media Centre PC

[TheJay]

Sounds good to me. Perhaps I may be able to find a more up-to-date CRT TV on Freecycle. What kind of connection could I look out for on a CRT TV? Would any do HDMI? Maybe VGA/DVI?

 

[biggles1000]

unfortunately crt tvs with hdmi don't exist because of the resolution (not enough pixels)
a DVI connector for a crt tv would only display the analogue signal (the same signal as VGA) and this seems to say that VGA isn't very good: Displaying VGA equipped PC on a CRT TV - will this work? - AVForums.com
i do understand that you probably don't want to buy a new LCD TV as your main TV, and videos and games should seem fine on it, just not text.
The problem is, LCD TVs have had a lot more work put into them. The 32" Philips TV we used to have just had two HDMI connectors, but the new 50" LG we have has a VGA port in the back, which can make a netbook seem amazing
The thread linked above does concern me with what they say about using s-video, but I'll continue searching

 

[TheJay]

Hello again! When I was doing my research I found that thread and the bit about s-video concerned me too, which is why I was slightly apprehensive. It's daft really, I think the picture on a traditional CRT TV is better than LCD/Plasma TV's... Particularly displaying graphics for the Wii, N64, PS2, and Xbox (original). I would have thought if VGA showed nicely on a new TV, the same could be said for CRT?

I am particularly apprehensive about buying a new graphics card if it is not going to make a difference to my ability to display PC graphics output.

 

[biggles1000]

yeah, I think what could be the best 'plan of action' would be if you buy a really cheap low range graphics card with an s-video port to see if it works as one would expect, rather than the concerning picture colour

 

[TheJay]

Thank you biggles. Do you have any recommendations for this purpose?

 

[biggles1000]

from a bit of hunting, the nvidia geforce 6200 might suit this testing purpose. i'm afraid i couldn't get ebay to work properly to see the lowest prices as all my web browsers were acting up (had to do a fresh install yesterday as I couldn't cope with the constant errors any more ), but make sure to check it says s-video, and preferably a proper old one, not some new repackaged pny one or something. also, if this is just going to be for testing, no point going for one with lots of video ram (unless there is only one size, wasn't sure)

 

[TheJay]

Alright, how about this one? Nvidia GeForce 6200TC DDR TV DVI PCI-E - Silent TESTED | eBay UK

 

[biggles1000]

yeah, that looks like a great price and has an s-video port. remember, it probably isn't best to stick with the 6200 as your final one, as turbo caching isn't really that great (unless you have a lot of RAM) but hopefully it will give us an idea whether s-video will work well.

 

[TheJay]

Fantastic. Bought it, along with 3m svideo cable. Now let's play the waiting game.

 

[biggles1000]

yup
let's hope it arrives soon

 

[TheJay]

Hello there. It arrived today. I installed it, connected the s-video to s-video cable from the computer to the tv and got nothing. I tried another lead I have, s-video to scart. That worked during the post screens of Linux (operating system I already have installed) booting up (picture quality was quite bad).

When the computer loaded up the desktop, the TV had strange blocks of colour. I tried adjusting the screen resolution to the smallest I could and the lowest refresh rate, but unfortunately that didn't make a difference.

 

[biggles1000]

oh dear
is it possible you could check with a windows 7 install? from my experiences with linux, i've always found graphics settings a problem, but that could just be because i used awful six year old hardware
i hope the blotches aren't the issue from the rather concerning thread :S
was the quality extremely poor? (ie bearable from a typical viewing distance)

 

[TheJay]

Hello there, it seems your suspicions were correct. I have Windows 7 running nicely. Picture quality is fairly poor. Big improvement on before, but normal text is impossible to read. I think there is a problem with the TV too, as the picture isn't square, it is warped in the left and right corners.

Windows 7 was able to automatically work out what resolution and refresh rate to use to display on the CRT TV.

I've got the TV running alongside a standard LCD pc monitor at the moment, but the idea is to do away with the monitor. At the moment I have both displaying the same thing.

I am still looking out for any flat screen crt tv's with a screen size of 26" or greater (to match or supersede what we have already) on freecycle. I wonder how much difference this would make.

 

[biggles1000]

is it warped in th corners because of the curve of the screen? (or it working out there may be a curve and being wrong). Yeah, the problem with CRTs is that, well, they're CRTs There are some pretty awesome CRT TVs in existence, but because of the imprecision, you'll never get one as crisp as an LCD TV :/
another problem could be because the only possible connection between a CRT TV and a PC is s-video, which isn't too great :/
would've been nice if some companies had stuck around and continued improving the 'old' style of television

 

[TheJay]

is it warped in th corners because of the curve of the screen? (or it working out there may be a curve and being wrong). Yeah, the problem with CRTs is that, well, they're CRTs There are some pretty awesome CRT TVs in existence, but because of the imprecision, you'll never get one as crisp as an LCD TV :/
another problem could be because the only possible connection between a CRT TV and a PC is s-video, which isn't too great :/
would've been nice if some companies had stuck around and continued improving the 'old' style of television

I don't know why it is warped. It is a flat screen CRT TV, so there shouldn't be any problems like this...

 

[biggles1000]

odd :/
i was just thinking about CRT TVs, and it occured to me that maybe if the screen was bigger and the same resolution used, it might be sharper (but i guess that depends on quite how bigger CRT TVs work and how great the s-video quality can be)

 

[TheJay]

Hello again. Thank you for your continued help!

Another TV might have better connectivity options too!

 

[biggles1000]

no problem, always glad to help
true, that could be a bonus

 

[TheJay]

Damn, I give up. I am going out to see if this LCD TV is available today: Samsung LE32C530 | 32 inch LCD TV 1080p HD Ready Freeview | Richer Sounds

I suppose my next questoni,which Grahics Card should I get now which will allow me to play the games I want such as Sims 3, Rollercaster Tycoon, Total War series (full detail) at a reasonable price. I still want the usual monitor connection output, but no longer need s-video and can go for something which HDMI out instead.

Look forward to hearing from you.

 

[TheJay]

Also, at present I have Corsair TwinX 2GB DDR2 6400 C4 (2GB of RAM overall). Would you suggest I upgrade for improved gmeplay and watching media? If yes, please recommend a few possibilities.

Motherboard details for RAM:
Dual-channel memory architecture
4 x 240-pin DIMM slots support unbuffered ECC and non-ECC DDR2 1066/800/667/533MHz memory modules
Supports up to 8GB system memory
Due to AMD+ CPU limitation, only one DDR2 1066 DIMM is supported per channel. When four DDR2 1066 DIMMs are installed, all DIMMs run at 800MHz frequency by default for system stability.

I am running Windows 7 Professional Edition (32 bit) and AMD Athlon(tm) Dual Core Processor 5050e.