Video from Laptop to TV

[johnnymk]

A friend just bought a Dell laptop. He is a Karaoke DJ.

The laptop only has a VGA connector. He has to output the video to an analog TV. I saw a VGA to RCA adapter on Google search for about $6.

Is this the cheapest method and will the quality be acceptable?

[Devhux]

I can't see how anything could be much cheaper than a $6 adapter.

As for quality, it should be fine (it's not like karaoke requires high resolution or anything like that) :)

[Hoser]

If the output is coming from an RCA adapter, the picture quality isn't going to be that good. The best you can hope for is 640X480 resolution. The picture will probably be somewhat fuzzy. You'll have to use a bigger font so that you can read anything on the screen. If you can get an adapter for S-Video (assuming the TV has that input), the picture will be a little better. I've displayed 800X600 with S-Video, and it's not too bad if you make adjustments (on both the computer and TV).

This adapter has both RCA and S-Video for $5.49 (plus shipping)
http://www.computercasesandcables.com/ccc/CV-25120.html

In the first link, it is stated that this adapter may not work with all video cards. I suppose you wouldn't know until you tried it.

Here is an ebay item for $8.99 ($2.99 + $6.00 shipping)
http://cgi.ebay.com/Laptop-VGA-to-TV-S-Video-RCA-Adapter-Cable-NEW_W0QQitemZ220114681285QQcmdZViewItem

[DarkFury]

Picture quality is gonna be HORRIBLE on an analog TV. If he's only using it to show videos, then that would be ok, but if he plans on reading text from his PC, forget about it.

I'm doing the same thing right now with my new laptop and my HDTV using the DVI output and the HDMI input on the TV. Much better quality than the analog set by far.

[seksiexboy]

viewsonic has nextvisions, i'm not sure if they're still produced, but it's good quality video
-vince

[Devhux]

viewsonic has nextvisions, i'm not sure if they're still produced, but it's good quality video
-vince

The Nextvisions do the opposite (display TV/video on a PC monitor) from what I recall.

[johnnymk]

Bought the VGA adapter. He tried setting up the second monitor under Settings, but nothing even shows up. It's not recognized.

I was thinkng that the laptop out is digital but the TV is analog. How is the computer to know that a TV is even there?

Now about a USB adapter? I know that there are USB adapters which pipe a signal into a computer, but is there something similar going the other way?

[KrazyKidd]

usually for the laptop to know that the TV is 'there' you have to press some buttons on the keyboard. On my laptop (clevo), you have to press Fn+F7 to let the computer know that another display is attached to it. You can also try using a program that your video card drive installed (like catalyst control center for ATI cards). This could be a simple way to detect the other display. Lastly, you could try right clicking on desktop and then click properties then go to the settings tab and enable ur display from there

[Jeffbx]

Another thing that sometimes works is to boot up the machine with the TV on & connected - sometimes it'll recognize that there is another video source plugged in.

[Houdini]

Try Fn-F8 for a Dell. :shrug:

[Cheesypuff]

try ctrl+alt+del that usually solves a lot of problems.