Two computers, one display

Aug 10, 2024 Last reply: 1 year ago 88 Replies

It's a TV set, and you drove the HD port, not the computer port.

The TV set user manual is key to a good time, since it has a table of available resolutions, per port.

Regular HD ports expect a "multimedia source", such as a BR set top box. The regular HD expect HD or SD res. Only one port is the "computer" port, and has the rich table of values.

HDMI#1 HDMI#2 HDMI#3 HDMI#4

1920 1920 1920 "computer" or or or 640,800,1024,1280, 1280 1280 1280 1440,1600,1920,"native",...

On Windows, you use moninfo.exe from entechtaiwan.com , to read the EDID and display the table of supported resolutions. There is a button for "Real Time" table display, and that allows reading out the table at the touch of a button.

Plug into an HD/SD port, check the EDID, note the truncated table.

Plug into the computer port, check the EDID, note the VESA+ table. The computer port would be multisync, have a scaler and so on, like a computer LCD monitor would have. Some panels support

60 to 72FPS, a 4K panel likely supports refresh at 24 or 29.97FPS or 30FPS, so you can play movies at movie rate.

On Linux, "readEDID" and friends, can read the EDID table per port, if you need to query what the hardware support is. If the computer port really wasn't marked, doing a "readEDID" until you found a "rich table of values", would be how you would find the computer port.

For reasons unknown, a decade ago, the "computer" port refused to have a "native value". So if the TV was a better one, the panel on the TV was 1920x1080 say, if you checked the EDID on the computer port, it would go to 1600x1200 perhaps, but it would not have 1920x1080 like the panel had. Since the idiots did not have the "native" resolution entry, this *guaranteed* a fuzzy output. Modern TVs, the scaler goes all the way to "native" or even past that. Some panels could be given a res larger than the set, and scale it to fit the 1920x1080 panel. Modern sets basically do the things you would expect of a computer monitor, on the "computer" port. I would see TVs promising to receive 1920x1080 and scale it down for their cheesy 1366x768 panel (I could never find confirmation this is what they were doing).

But cracking the PDF user manual, is how you learn of the port layout, without getting out of your chair, or needing a flashlight and stuff.

A laptop has modal video, controlled by an Fkey. Repeatedly pressing the Fkey, takes the hardware through the various option. Mirror would be one option. Spanned would be another option. There is likely an "independent" option so the panel runs native and the computer output port on the laptop can be set to 640x480 if you want. YMMV.

PanelOnly, ExternalOnly, Mirror, Spanned, Independent... PanelOnly, ... (repeats)

Some recent laptop CPUs and their video crossbar, have three outputs. They could drive two external monitors plus a TMDS panel. Some desktop designs show four ports on the back, but that does not mean they drive all four ports at once. One of the ports is a cheesy conversion of one of the other ports (HDMI to VGA converter chip perhaps, as the silicon people no longer like to do VGA in their silicon). If you look at a picture of the motherboard, with the heatsinks stripped, you will see a suspicious quad flatpak near the VGA port tower :-) You might plug into the DVID port or the VGA port, but both of those would not operate at the same time. Maybe an Asrock has a design like that. If your desktop has four ports like that, read its manual for usage details and limitations.

Paul

On a 2014 Samsung 4K TV I had, you had to *rename* a port to 'PC' in the monitor's settings and then it would behave differently, compared with any arbitrary string that the user could write there. Of course this secret codeword was never mentioned in the documentation.

Theo

Some of the larger panels at the computer store, back in the day, had 16 CCFL tubes in the panel, each running at 3 watts. This represented enough energy, you could "feel" the IR output from the panel. I noticed this while walking down the monitor aisle while Futureshop still existed. The largest LCD monitor the store had, was also the thermal pig, and right away I knew what I would not be buying. Imagine sitting in front of that, on a hot day. Sauna.

Now that there is LED backlighting, and edge-lit panels (optical tricks for uniform illumination), the power is a lot lower, and there might no longer be an infrared effect. There may still be panels with zone lighting and dimming (enhanced contrast in movie mode), and the power to do that is likely a little higher to a lot higher. Some of those may be bright enough to take an eye out (have a wide gamut and so on). While the edge lit ones, some are even borderline on having sufficient intensity. Most of the display devices, I always had to turn the intensity down. The latest monitor I bought, the output is weak enough, I never had to enter the OSD and make adjustments. And that's not a good observation, because when the LED backlight output drops in the panel, there will be no "turning it up" to compensate.

Paul

Wow, another fantastic tip, thank you!

Works perfectly from my laptop to a desktop running Win 8.1 Home.

Something worth mentioning is that some screens are matte, others are glossy. The glossy ones are a bit brighter (matte screens use an ND filter to cut reflection), but if the location gets sunshine onto the user and other parts of the room, they may be difficult to see without closing blinds or curtains. Matte screens also reflect brightly-lit objects, but to a much lesser extent.

Pretty standard on any PC with Windows Key + P (for "projector")

Wording of the options being PC Screen only, Duplicate, Extend, Second screen only.

The extend option allows both screens to run at different resolutions. (although the external does not have to be native).

Interesting.

I didnt know HDMI supported resolutions that low. Certainly nothing in the wiki spec mentions anything below HD levels

It's 24" class and 23.8" actual size diagonally. That should be the viewable diagonal. (I would have to check the results of the lawsuit about monitor size, to see how it was defined for future generations. That's why we have this scheme -- lawsuit.)

The aspect ratio then, makes a difference to how huge these things can be.

There are super-wide monitors, that are like four feet across, and the diagonal on those is getting pretty close to the width dimension. They are not very tall, and a lot of super wide monitors are curved (curved glass on a radius).

Whereas if you got a 4K monitor at 16:9, some of those end up being relatively tall. Such a monitor, the bottom edge of the monitor might have to sit right on your desk, so that the top edge of the monitor is (ergonomically) aligned with your eyes.

I'm not a big fan of diagonal as a spec, since people have some amount of trouble converting that to x*y dimensions and realizing their new monitor is the size of a steamer trunk :-)

Dell UltraSharp 43 4K USB-C Hub Monitor - U4323QE

formatting link
43 inch class 42.5 inch diagonal width: 38" height: 22" (includes bezel) = 43.9" diagonal (thin bezels)

When they get big enough, you check whether there are screw holes for a VESA plate. I think the Dell has 200mm x 200mm plate setup.

My eyesight needs a 32" monitor, but my desk only has room for smaller monitors. I'm typing this on a 17" screen. But when I picked up a monitor last January, that was a 24" and that's a bit of a nuisance. (I bump into that more than the other monitors.) That was an Acer R241Y (maybe $130 CDN).

I buy monitors on January 15, to try to get a good price on them. Usually Staples has a few cheap ones.

One of the reasons we have cheap monitors at all, was breaking up the price-fixing that was going on. But price-fixing as a scheme, just never stops. You lurch from one to the next. We caught them price-fixing bread here, and... they're still doing it. I guess it must be a point of pride or something.

Paul

That would be Mother's Pride, I assume!

(Sorry)

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