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best way to connect my macbook to an LCD tv?

T

Tazzydnc

macrumors member
Original poster
Dec 30, 2007
49
0
my tv has dvi, vga, s video and component hookups. I'm currently connecting it to DVI through the mini dvi on my laptop. It works fine but when I hook up my mom's apple tv, the quality is like 10x better! Not to say I'm surprised, but is there a better way for me too hook up my comp to my tv without getting apple tv?


When watching movies sound is np I have decent speakers hooked up to my laptop but at 13 inches the screen is much too small.

I'd appreciate any advice.
 
um my tv does 1080i and when I connect it usually says something 1080 for the external monitor. Could it be that my tv doesnt support very good resolutions?
 
MicBook said:
I use a DVI-HDMI cable I picked up at the Apple store for $20 and it works great with my Samsung 40" 1080p HDTV
Click to expand...

although i dont think the OP will see any difference with his macbook. not too sure, except the fact that maybe apple tv was designed to be output at that resolution and maybe the macbook wasnt? i think what you're doing now Mini DVI to DVI in the TV is as good as you're gonna get (could be wrong, maybe someone who has better experience would want to correct me?)
 
If you TV has DVI input, use that, you should get full resolution and it will look great. If it has VGA, use that, so get either a mini DVi to DVI or mini DVI to VGA based on what input your TV has.
 
hmm guess I'm stuck with what I'm doing. My tv probably just isn't a good computer monitor. Next one I get I'll have to make sure can do both well.
 
I thought DVI and HDMI were the best you could get on Macs. Are you using the max resolution with extended desktop, or are you just mirroring?
 
The cable worked great! I just did mirroring and used the default settings. Looked AMAZING! Now I have to figure out how to get audio to work...
 
Could I use my macbook as a dvd player with this mini dvi to dvi or hdmi cable you speak of and play through my lcd tv? Could I do it with the macbook closed??

2.16 macbook
 
Audio is still a problem - Here's why !

thebassoonist said:
The cable worked great! I just did mirroring and used the default settings. Looked AMAZING! Now I have to figure out how to get audio to work...
Click to expand...

Glad the picture is good. You have one problem with the audio though and that is that DVI does not support audio (analogue or digital) - it was designed purely as a digital interconnect between a computer and monitor for video. HDMI However supports digital audio too (despite being a smaller cable / connector) - but adheres to the DVI standard for digital video. The only way to get audio is to either have HDMI both sides (no conversion from DVI - which no mac supports - until maybe next week ;-) ), or using your audio-out from your mac. Hope this helps !
 
when i hook my macbook (CD 2.0) up to my Samsung 40" LCD 1080p TV via
DVI - > HDMI, I just cannto get it displayed full screen on the 40"..

there's always a black border of about an inch all the way round.

the "displays" option on the macbook says 1920x1080 interlaced (1080i)

it's using mirroring and even if i set it to "overscan" i get borders on the left and right side of the tv..

is there a way round this? or is everyone having this black border problem and just living with it?

thanks
 
mirroring may be the problem !

dalvin200 said:
when i hook my macbook (CD 2.0) up to my Samsung 40" LCD 1080p TV via
DVI - > HDMI, I just cannto get it displayed full screen on the 40"..

there's always a black border of about an inch all the way round.

the "displays" option on the macbook says 1920x1080 interlaced (1080i)

it's using mirroring and even if i set it to "overscan" i get borders on the left and right side of the tv..

is there a way round this? or is everyone having this black border problem and just living with it?

thanks
Click to expand...

If you mirror to an external screen, it mirrors the resolution of the original screen settings on your MB - the MB has a screen resolution of 1280 x 800, whereas the "Full HD - 1920x1080" resolution has a lot more pixels to full. The easy answer is (or should be) to turn mirroring off and setting the external screen resolution to 1920x1080 and that should work fine. Good luck :rolleyes:
 
davegoody said:
If you mirror to an external screen, it mirrors the resolution of the original screen settings on your MB - the MB has a screen resolution of 1280 x 800, whereas the "Full HD - 1920x1080" resolution has a lot more pixels to full. The easy answer is (or should be) to turn mirroring off and setting the external screen resolution to 1920x1080 and that should work fine. Good luck :rolleyes:
Click to expand...

d'oh!! is that that easy?

i'll give it a try when i get home and fingers crossed i'll have a full screen :)

thanks davegoody
 
HDMI Cable but still bad resolution

Hi,
I have a Macbook and I bought a HDMI cable, but the resolution is not good. I thought it was normal but then I went to a friend's house and he had his PC connected to a LCD TV and it looked much better (and he had his computer connected through the VGA inlet). Please help me...
 
I also have some weird problems with connecting my macbook to my 32" 720p samsung TV (DVI->HDMI)
The image is too large so you can't see the dock and menubar. The colors are weird too with blue/green "shadows" around black letters etc.
When I watch movies this way colors appear a little strange and the whole movie looks a bit "compressed" or something (so I stream to the Xbox 360 instead but it sounds like a jet plane..).

I've read about it and it lead me to try a program called displayConfigX to try and change refresh rate and so on. Didn't get a good result and then I found out that this program can wreck my TV so I havent used it since...

Figured I'd post my problem here, if someone with similar problems had found a way to get it right.

:)
 
When running Windows Vista Home Premium on my Intel based iMac I cannot get it to project the desktop onto my TV using the mini DVI to VGA adaptor with the VGA port on my TV. It projects perfectly when running OS X and It worked perfectly with my old virus ridden PC the source of the frustration that caused me to make the switch to the Mac side of the force. One of the main reasons I bought windows for my Mac was to game. I was looking forward to playing battlefield 2, the world best online game on my 52 inch Mitsubishi 1080p TV. Could someone please tell me what’s going on. Before this I was a believer that the world’s best PC is a Mac.
 
macthille said:
I also have some weird problems with connecting my macbook to my 32" 720p samsung TV (DVI->HDMI)
The image is too large so you can't see the dock and menubar. The colors are weird too with blue/green "shadows" around black letters etc.
When I watch movies this way colors appear a little strange and the whole movie looks a bit "compressed" or something (so I stream to the Xbox 360 instead but it sounds like a jet plane..).

I've read about it and it lead me to try a program called displayConfigX to try and change refresh rate and so on. Didn't get a good result and then I found out that this program can wreck my TV so I havent used it since...

Figured I'd post my problem here, if someone with similar problems had found a way to get it right.

:)
Click to expand...

First, try using the dock on the left or right side of the screen, instead of the bottom. Your menu bar will still be cut off though.

Otherwise, unclick "overscan" in OSX Display Preferences. The picture doesn't look quite as good, and you'll likely get a black border unless you've a 1080p unit, but at least you'll see everything that's displayed, instead of having the menu bar and dock cut off.

natacortes said:
Hi,
I have a Macbook and I bought a HDMI cable, but the resolution is not good. I thought it was normal but then I went to a friend's house and he had his PC connected to a LCD TV and it looked much better (and he had his computer connected through the VGA inlet). Please help me...
Click to expand...

In my experience, VGA offers the best quality on 720p HDTVs, achieving a 1360x768 resolution.
 
mikedarrow said:
When running Windows Vista Home Premium on my Intel based iMac I cannot get it to project the desktop onto my TV using the mini DVI to VGA adaptor with the VGA port on my TV. It projects perfectly when running OS X and It worked perfectly with my old virus ridden PC the source of the frustration that caused me to make the switch to the Mac side of the force. One of the main reasons I bought windows for my Mac was to game. I was looking forward to playing battlefield 2, the world best online game on my 52 inch Mitsubishi 1080p TV. Could someone please tell me what?s going on. Before this I was a believer that the world?s best PC is a Mac.
Click to expand...

I have a MacBook and a 40" LCD Sony Bravia XBR2.

You are right, the best personal computer experience is with a Mac, I have been using them since 1986 and I can do anything on them I ever needed, maybe some of the new models don't offer the same features they had, for example the video and audio input/outputs they had in the 90s, anyway nowdays they offer new different features that compensate.

And for your question: it turns out that Windows doesnt' have the drivers to use the miniDVI ports on your iMac, neither the Apple drivers in the Boot Camp installation include them, and I have no idea if they are goign to.
To solve this what I did was to use Parallels Desktop in Full Screen Mode, and by that way I can use MS Windows in Full Screen while using the miniDVI video output to my Sony TV. It works perfectly.

My suggestion to all to improve the quality of the image by using the highest resolution possible from your Mac's video board and by using the miniDVI to DVI adapter, and use either a DVI or HDMI input in your TVs. About the cable it doesn't matter which brand you use or its price, becasue it's a digital signal so don't pay for expensive monster cables, they aren't really needed.
Also inside the System Preferences you'll have 2 widnows to adjust your Mac's and TV preferences:
In my case becasue I'm using the digital video input my Mac's recognize the TV as a SONY TV, if you use the analog video like RCA or S-VIDEO your mac just see it as a NTSC/PAL TV.
The first window you'll have is named LCD TV, in that one you'll define your Mac's video resolution and in the Arragenment tab you will define if you want to mirror to your TV all what you see in your Mac's screen or if you what to use your TV as a second screen.
And when you click the Gather Windows button you will obtain the second preferences window, in my case named SONY TV, where you can adjust the video to your TV capabilities with the :apple: video adpater Im using, in my case the max resolution I get is 1920x1080i (interlaced)

Now with www.abc.com offering some of their TV series in HD streaming, the experience is getting even better, it's free!!! and all the seasons of LOST are there.
This is getting better and better every day.

Forthe audio you use you Mac's audio output, either stereo with a miniplug to RCA stereo cable or the miniplug to optical.

The rest is just a matter of how nice looking you want your cables to look and how long you need them to have a nice arrangement/integartion to you Home Theater System.
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