NVIDIA GeForce 8600M G driving 1920 x 1080 LCD?

[Moof1904]

I have a friend who is thinking of buying an LDC display to use as an external with her MBPro, but I can't find anywhere a listing of the various resolutions supported for an external monitor, only info on the maximum resolution supported.

Does anyone know if the video card in the new MBPro (the 256 meg card) will drive an external LCD at a native 1920 x 1080?

 

[Eidorian]

LCD TV or monitor?

 

[Aea]

I have a friend who is thinking of buying an LDC display to use as an external with her MBPro, but I can't find anywhere a listing of the various resolutions supported for an external monitor, only info on the maximum resolution supported.

Does anyone know if the video card in the new MBPro (the 256 meg card) will drive an external LCD at a native 1920 x 1080?

The MBP will support up to and including a 2560x1600 monitor, so a 1080p widescreen will be no problem.

 

[Moof1904]

It's a 46" LCD monitor. I know that the resolution I'm asking about is lower than the maximum resolution of the card, but I'm wondering if the video card can put out exactly 1920 x 1080 externally.

 

[Eidorian]

It's a 46" LCD monitor. I know that the resolution I'm asking about is lower than the maximum resolution of the card, but I'm wondering if the video card can put out exactly 1920 x 1080 externally.

I've heard a few, few cases where you won't get the proper refresh rate and resolution on an LCD television with strange (non-computer) resolutions.

 

[macjonny1]

I don't know that it will output exactly 1920x1080, so you may get some overscan.

I have a Sharp Aquos 52" 1080p LCD. I plug my MBP in it and set the view mode to Dot-by-dot, and the screen looks perfect with no overscan.

This may get even better with resolution independence in Leopard

 

[fishkorp]

It's generally a TV issue, not the video card. As long as the Mac recognizes the TV properly and the TV can take a 1920x1080 input over DVI/HDMI, it'll work fine. I have a 1080p Sharp 46" and my MBP outputting to it is perfect at 1920x1080 (again, using the dot-by-dot method the user above mentioned). Some TVs (generally cheaper, no-name ones) I don't think the Mac can figure out which resolutions it can handle, so you have to use some extra software to try to force the resolution (like DisplayConfigX).

 

[Aea]

I don't know that it will output exactly 1900x1080, so you may get some overscan.

I have a Sharp Aquos 52" 1080p LCD. I plug my MBP in it and set the view mode to Dot-by-dot, and the screen looks perfect with no overscan.

This may get even better with resolution independence in Leopard

Well 1920 x 1080 is the standard 1080p standard, and if the OP's TV is marked as 1080p then he should have no problem outputting that. Resolution independence is more of a element scaling feature (relative sizes instead of pixel sizes) which are supposed to make text and other elements on large screens appear at a readable size.

 

[theman]

It can run it fine:

http://barefeats.com/rosa03.html

check out those gaming benchmarks with a 1920x1200 screen.

Not only can it run it, it can run it fast too.

 

[Moof1904]

So, is the consensus that if I steer my friend towards a major brand (Sharp AQUOS or Sony Bravia, for example), she'll probably be okay?

 

[Moof1904]

It can run it fine:

http://barefeats.com/rosa03.html

check out those gaming benchmarks with a 1920x1200 screen.

Not only can it run it, it can run it fast too.

This seems to be talking about 1920 x 1200, not 1900 x 1080, which is the native resolution of the monitor under consideration. Am I misunderstanding the benchmark tables?

 

[crazzyeddie]

I run a Sharp Aquos as my main display (32") and it looks perfect. 1080p over DVI and I use the dot-by-dot mode on the TV with overscan enabled in OS X.

The Aquos does have some funky dynamic color adjustment that you may notice from time to time, but it looks fantastic.

 

[suneohair]

With LCD TVs you may need to get something liek DisplayConfigX or ResX or whatever they are called (I always get them confused). Use those to set up custom refresh and resolution if you notice any problems.

OS X put my 24" LCD in overscan because I am going over HDMI. Quite strange.

On a side note, I can't believe peopel still question the ability to drive 1080P on modern GPUs. We have had resolutions like this for quite some time. Heck, my Radeon 9000 can push out 1920x1200 to TWO 24" LCDs.

 

[Moof1904]

With LCD TVs you may need to get something liek DisplayConfigX or ResX or whatever they are called (I always get them confused). Use those to set up custom refresh and resolution if you notice any problems.

OS X put my 24" LCD in overscan because I am going over HDMI. Quite strange.

On a side note, I can't believe peopel still question the ability to drive 1080P on modern GPUs. We have had resolutions like this for quite some time. Heck, my Radeon 9000 can push out 1920x1200 to TWO 24" LCDs.

I'm not questioning whether the MBP can output to 1900 x 1200, I'm questioning whether it can output exactly 1900 x 1080 without any overscanning, distortion, or other funkyness.

 

[Eidorian]

I'm not questioning whether the MBP can output to 1900 x 1200, I'm questioning whether it can output exactly 1900 x 1080 without any overscanning, distortion, or other funkyness.

Like previous posters have said, yes it can. You just might run into some issues that can be corrected, most of the time with additional software or configuration changes.

 

[Aea]

I'm not questioning whether the MBP can output to 1900 x 1200, I'm questioning whether it can output exactly 1900 x 1080 without any overscanning, distortion, or other funkyness.

Does anyone know if the video card in the new MBPro (the 256 meg card) will drive an external LCD at a native 1920 x 1080?

LEDs aren't CRTs, if you try to output a 1900 image to 1920 monitor (1080p) you will get distortion and fuzziness. Why can't you go for the extra 20 pixels?

Now if you mean 1080p then it's a maybe, but as people said it's a 99.99% maybe, the only problem may come with bad / cheap LEDs, and even in this case there's workarounds. Just be sure you go for a full-HD 1080p TV.

 

[sealab2021]

I have a westinghouse 42" 1080p Monitor/TV.

Plug it in with the MBP, and its a thing of beauty man! My friend bought the 30" thinking he could outdo me, but an extra foot of screen!!! Come on man, there ain't no 30" that can beat a 1080p 42" +.

If you look around you can even find them cheaper then the 30"

Oh, and my friend, he comes to my place to surf the web, and now tells me how he will soon beat me with a Sony Bravia 50" 1080p. I told him he better start doing those odd jobs, cause at $3700, you're going to need some.

 

[richinspace]

Off-centered Mac Mini on my Sharp Aquos 52" LCD

I have a Sharp Aquos 52" 1080p LCD. I plug my MBP in it and set the view mode to Dot-by-dot, and the screen looks perfect with no overscan.

I also have a Sharp 52" 1080p LCD (model "LC-52XD1E") but for some reason I don't have any view mode called "Dot-by-dot". All I have is "Full" and "Underscan" when connecting my Mac Mini (Core 2 Duo, 1.83) through DVI-to-HDMI.

One strange thing though is that I only get full display-coverage if I select "Underscan" on the Sharp together with "Overscan" on the Mac (seems crazy to me).

A second strange thing is that the Mac only lists the display as 1080 (interlaced). Shouldn't it be 1080 (progressive) if it communicated well with the Sharp?

Finally, and most disturbingly, the entire picture is offset by 4-5 cm to the left when displayed on the Sharp. After two days of fiddling, I still haven't been able to solve this extremely irritating problem. Not even my local Apple dealer has a clue. I have no problem connecting my old PowerBook G4 though (full screen immediately, and perfectly centered). Also, when I start up the Mac Mini, but before the login screen appears, the white background with the dark Apple is perfectly centered. The trouble starts only at the login, but then continues on for as long as the machine is running.

Any suggestions?

 

[aliquis-]

It's generally a TV issue, not the video card. As long as the Mac recognizes the TV properly and the TV can take a 1920x1080 input over DVI/HDMI, it'll work fine. I have a 1080p Sharp 46" and my MBP outputting to it is perfect at 1920x1080 (again, using the dot-by-dot method the user above mentioned). Some TVs (generally cheaper, no-name ones) I don't think the Mac can figure out which resolutions it can handle, so you have to use some extra software to try to force the resolution (like DisplayConfigX).

I would be very surprised if you can add those modes yourselfs somehow into a file of whatever sort =P

 

[Krevnik]

This may get even better with resolution independence in Leopard

No, it won't.

1) it is already fine, pretty much every machine Apple has made in the past 2-4 years can output to an LCD TV just fine (with exceptions based on the TV, obviously).

2) Resolution independence has nothing to do with what resolutions that the computer can output, it is all about scaling so that everything appears the same size, no matter what screen it is on.

 

[odinsride]

It works fine for me on my 37" Westinghouse 1080p LCD TV. The only problem I had was getting WoW to display correctly at that resolution - it would display in 1080i and have horrible overscan. I fixed it by purchasing SwitchResX and defining a custom resolution for WoW

 

[aliquis-]

I have a westinghouse 42" 1080p Monitor/TV.

Plug it in with the MBP, and its a thing of beauty man! My friend bought the 30" thinking he could outdo me, but an extra foot of screen!!! Come on man, there ain't no 30" that can beat a 1080p 42" +.

If you look around you can even find them cheaper then the 30"

Oh, and my friend, he comes to my place to surf the web, and now tells me how he will soon beat me with a Sony Bravia 50" 1080p. I told him he better start doing those odd jobs, cause at $3700, you're going to need some.

I'd rather take the 30" due to higher res and probably better quality.

 

[CaptainWOW]

Works fine for me

I hook up my MBP to my 40" Samsung 1080p LCD and it works beautifully. I've run it on both HDMI and VGA (my TV actually has a "PC Input") and both work fine. My Sammy does 1:1 pixel mapping so there's no overscan. It's great when I want to run a second display or play those 1080p Trailers from Apple's website in full res.