720p Significanly Off Center

[mankyd]

Hi there. Hooked my box up to a fancy new 40" Sony LCD. Everything is running smoothly so far save for one thing. The screen image is way off to the left. I can open up the TV's menu and adjust it a little bit, but even setting the horizontal position to the far right leaves me short about and inch or two. What can I do to center the image?

On a similar note, I couldn't get the TV to recognize 1080i or 1080p signals. I saw something in the wiki that suggested that this might be a limitation of the NVidia driver. Is this true?

[leonja]

Hi all,
I am getting a very similar problem.  Did you finally solve this? 

I am running LMCE with an nvidia FX5700 chipset.  Display is through the VGA port directly to a Selectron 42 inch LCD TV.  When I set the resolution to 720p in the video setup wizard, which should give me the best image for the 1366x768 native resolution of the LCD screen, the resulting image is slightly larger than the screen vertically, but it is noticeably larger horizontally and off center to the left.

It seems like the video card is generating a 1366x768 image, but cropping it to fit the 720p resolution (1280x720).  This does not affect the GUI for the LMCE, because the setup wizard asks to adjust the image size for the GUI.  However, everything else --Mythtv screens, KDE, Computing -- is shown off center, shifted to the left, and cropped at the top, left and bottom edges.

I have been looking everywhere but don't seem to find how to correct this discrepancy in image sizes.

I don't have the same problem with 1080i resolution, but the system becomes kind of sluggish at this resolution, so I'd prefer not to use it.  This problem is not present when running the same hardware under Windows XP at the same resolution.

Can someone shed a light to what I may be missing?

Thanks,
Jaime

[totallymaxed]

Hi there. Hooked my box up to a fancy new 40" Sony LCD. Everything is running smoothly so far save for one thing. The screen image is way off to the left. I can open up the TV's menu and adjust it a little bit, but even setting the horizontal position to the far right leaves me short about and inch or two. What can I do to center the image?

On a similar note, I couldn't get the TV to recognize 1080i or 1080p signals. I saw something in the wiki that suggested that this might be a limitation of the NVidia driver. Is this true?

Hmmm... setting TV's up to optimum resolution is a bit of a black art! However here are a few tips we have discovered. If your screen has HDMI or DVI and your video card has either of these use them. Firstly its an all digital signal path and secondly your TV is designed to work at 720p/1080p/1080i best through these connectors... in fact in most cases we have found that flatpanel TV's will often not really support 720p/1080p/1080i over the VGA connector. It sounds to me like your TV is struggling at 720p over VGA... but managing to give you something. See here for more info on the AVwizard http://wiki.linuxmce.org/index.php/AVWizard

So use a DVI to HDMI cable or convertor or DVI to DVI and then run the AVwizard again. Don't forget you'll see a blank screen when the wizard runs initially as it outputs by default to the VGA connector at 640x480. So you will see a blank screen after the rising beeps. Just press '1' on your keyboard to select DVI output (choose this for HDMI too)... the screen should now refresh... now select a resolution... press the '8' key for 720p or '0@ for 1080p and the screen should refresh again... but this time you will see the AVwizards opening screen. Now just choose the options you need on the AVwizard screens as normal and your up an running. I bet your screen will look and perform much better now!

Also because the AVwizard writes a reasonably good modeline for the screen resolution you choose you will find that video performance is much improved (tearing is reduced or gone completely for example). Under VGA the AVwizard does not appear to write modelines so you often get a situation where the video card and the screen are having to work much harder to 'reshape' the video picture on the 'fly' and this results in much reduced video performance.

Hope this helps... let us know how you get on!

regards

Andrew

[leonja]

Andrew,
Ok, my video card in the core/hybrid is an Nvidia FX5700 and it has a VGA port, a DVI port and what looks like an s-video port (I got it from a friend, so no manual).  Will I need then a DVI to HDMI cable in order order to connect the computer to the TV without using the VGA port???

Thanks,
Jaime

[totallymaxed]

Andrew,
Ok, my video card in the core/hybrid is an Nvidia FX5700 and it has a VGA port, a DVI port and what looks like an s-video port (I got it from a friend, so no manual).  Will I need then a DVI to HDMI cable in order order to connect the computer to the TV without using the VGA port???

Thanks,
Jaime

So I would suggest using the DVI out on your 5700 card... and using either a DVI or HDMI on your TV. At the TV end it does not make much difference which you choose. Then go and get the appropriate cable ie DVI -> DVI or DVI -> HDMI.

Then follow the instruction in my earlier post... good luck. Shout if you need more help!

Andrew

[leonja]

Thanks Andrew,
Its got to be a DVI to HDMI cable then.  My LCD TV has no DVI port.  I will try to find one today.

Regards,
Jaime

[leonja]

Andrew,
I thought a bit about what you said about the VGA port connection to the TV being the possible cause of my problem with having the screen image off center shifted to the left while running LMCE.  If this were the case, shouldn't the problem show itself regardless of the operating system?  However, the shifting and oversize only appears when running Kubuntu/LMCE.  I did not have this problem when running Windows XP with the same hardware and screen resolution.  I would guess this points more in the direction of the video graphics driver or its configuration.  Is there a way of tweaking the video card configuration?

Thanks,
Jaime

[totallymaxed]

Andrew,
I thought a bit about what you said about the VGA port connection to the TV being the possible cause of my problem with having the screen image off center shifted to the left while running LMCE.  If this were the case, shouldn't the problem show itself regardless of the operating system?  However, the shifting and oversize only appears when running Kubuntu/LMCE.  I did not have this problem when running Windows XP with the same hardware and screen resolution.  I would guess this points more in the direction of the video graphics driver or its configuration.  Is there a way of tweaking the video card configuration?

Thanks,
Jaime

Hi Jaime,

I think your problem stems from the fact that lmce is not configuring your xorg/x properly for your particular TV's requirements... your TV is just about managing to give you a picture though. So I am sure that with enough experimentation you could fix that in the AVwizard or with some manual tweaks of the xorg.conf. Sure under Windows vga to vga gets configured correctly - and it could under lmce too with effort.

However your 5700 had a DVI and your TV has HDMI so why not use the best quality output on your card to the best quality input port on your TV? You will not believe the picture quality improvement when you see - you really wont!

[Zaerc]

It does sound like a "modeline" problem, see: http://wiki.linuxmce.org/index.php/Display_Drivers#Refresh_rate_.2F_ModeLine for some info on that.

But if I were you I'd take totallymaxed's advice and go for DVI -> HDMI, likely to be a lot less hassle with better results to boot.

[totallymaxed]

It does sound like a "modeline" problem, see: http://wiki.linuxmce.org/index.php/Display_Drivers#Refresh_rate_.2F_ModeLine for some info on that.

But if I were you I'd take totallymaxed's advice and go for DVI -> HDMI, likely to be a lot less hassle with better results to boot.

...and the AVwizard generates a reasonably good mode line for DVI/HDMI connected screens so its easy as you dont have to 'hand craft' ;-)

[leonja]

Thanks for your help,
I think I got the off center image resolved yesterday.  Checking the TV documentation, I found it doesn't list 720p as a supported resolution using the VGA port; only using the HDMI port.  Since I have not been able to get a DVI to HDMI cable locally (I had to order one from Amazon), I tried changing to another resolution.

After playing with the System Settings under KDE, I got it to work quite well choosing a "Generic Flat Panel" with a resolution of 1280x768@60hz, which is close to 720p.  The image is finally sized exactly to the screen.  It took several reboots for these settings to "take" (don't really understand why).  I would set everything perfect in KDE and after rebooting I was getting a different resolution, or a horrendously big GUI.  It seemed to me LMCE was sometimes rewriting the xorg.conf file.  Luckily I had made a backup copy of the correct file and was able to reset the video properties back to where they were.

I couldn't find a way to have the AVWizard list this resolution so in the end, I had to do everything by hand in xorg.conf.  I also deleted all the modelines with resolutions above 1280x768.  It worked well, though.  The only thing is I won't be able to run the AVWizard again.

Thanks,
Jaime

[totallymaxed]

Thanks for your help,
I think I got the off center image resolved yesterday.  Checking the TV documentation, I found it doesn't list 720p as a supported resolution using the VGA port; only using the HDMI port.  Since I have not been able to get a DVI to HDMI cable locally (I had to order one from Amazon), I tried changing to another resolution.

After playing with the System Settings under KDE, I got it to work quite well choosing a "Generic Flat Panel" with a resolution of 1280x768@60hz, which is close to 720p.  The image is finally sized exactly to the screen.  It took several reboots for these settings to "take" (don't really understand why).  I would set everything perfect in KDE and after rebooting I was getting a different resolution, or a horrendously big GUI.  It seemed to me LMCE was sometimes rewriting the xorg.conf file.  Luckily I had made a backup copy of the correct file and was able to reset the video properties back to where they were.

I couldn't find a way to have the AVWizard list this resolution so in the end, I had to do everything by hand in xorg.conf.  I also deleted all the modelines with resolutions above 1280x768.  It worked well, though.  The only thing is I won't be able to run the AVWizard again.

Thanks,
Jaime

Great. When you get your HDMI cable you can then re-run the wizard and set the 720p resolution up correctly using it. Its worth doing as you will then get a mode line which will sginificantly improve the video performance you get from your video card & TV. Just follow my original instructions posted earlier and that should get you up and running... if not let me know :-)

[leonja]

Hi
This is to report that I got the DVI to HDMI cable from Amazon.com.  I hooked it up to the graphics card and my LCD TV.  I backed up my xorg.conf file, and asked to change the screen resolution with the AVWizard.  Upon rebooting, the Wizard gave me a blank screen to the DVI port, so I rebooted and then pressed 1 when entering the Wizard and that activated the output to DVI.  I used the AVWizard to set the output to DVI at 720p resolution and 60hz refresh rate.  Finished the wizard, but unfortunately, the image is again slightly larger than the screen, off center and shifted to the left.

I would say it looks the same as the problem I reported earlier when running 720p resolution via the VGA port to the TV.

I reinstalled the VGA cable and restored the xorg.conf file to how it was before.  So I guess the DVI to HDMI experiment did not turn out as good as expected.  What else can I try? I haven't tried it yet, but I would like to try to restart the X11 configuration from default, to try and give the AVWizard a clean slate with which to start over.  Can I simply delete the xorg.conf file?

Thanks for your support,
Jaime

[Zaerc]

Worth a try and keep a backup just in case.  Another option could be to generate a default one and start from that, as described on the wiki page I mentioned earlier.

[totallymaxed]

Hi
This is to report that I got the DVI to HDMI cable from Amazon.com.  I hooked it up to the graphics card and my LCD TV.  I backed up my xorg.conf file, and asked to change the screen resolution with the AVWizard.  Upon rebooting, the Wizard gave me a blank screen to the DVI port, so I rebooted and then pressed 1 when entering the Wizard and that activated the output to DVI.  I used the AVWizard to set the output to DVI at 720p resolution and 60hz refresh rate.  Finished the wizard, but unfortunately, the image is again slightly larger than the screen, off center and shifted to the left.

I would say it looks the same as the problem I reported earlier when running 720p resolution via the VGA port to the TV.

I reinstalled the VGA cable and restored the xorg.conf file to how it was before.  So I guess the DVI to HDMI experiment did not turn out as good as expected.  What else can I try? I haven't tried it yet, but I would like to try to restart the X11 configuration from default, to try and give the AVWizard a clean slate with which to start over.  Can I simply delete the xorg.conf file?

Thanks for your support,
Jaime

Hmmm... it may be that the AVwizard is just not detecting the settings your screen needs using its automated process. Try the following with the DVI -> HDMI cable attached;

From another machine go to Web Admin -> Wizard -> Devices -> Media Directors scroll to the Hybrid you are configuring (should be the first MD) and manually set the following fields to these values;

Connector: DVI
Audio Settings: S
Video Settings: 1280 720/60
TV Standard: 720p

Set the Video Cards pop-up to "GeForce or TNT2"

Set the Audio Settings pop-up to: Stereo

Then click "Update" to save those changes.

Now go to Web Admin -> Wizard -> Devices -> Orbiters and find the the Orbiter for your Hybrid (it should be device #20) and tick the "Reset Router when done regenerating" box and then click the "Full Regen" button. Let the regen finish and the reload complete... and hopefully your Hybrid's Orbiter will now be on screen and correctly configured for your screen.