Dell 2405 and DVI

[SmackdownHotel]

hey guys, just got my 2405 in today and I had a couple of questions (running on a Geforce FX 5200 AGP)

The monitor runs fine in VGA mode. But in DVI mode, I get rolling vertical/horizontal white lines ONLY when the computer is booting/posting. As soon as Windows starts up, the picture is 100% fine. Is this normal and/or a driver issue?

Also, I'm having trouble getting it to display 1920x1200 in DVI mode. It just always defaults to 1600x1200 even when i try to force the resolution (tried Rivatuner as well as "custom" res in the driver settings). Is the FX5200 just too underpowered to handle that res? If so, what AGP card under $100 do you guys recommend that would run it fine (no need for gaming). Thanks.

 

[keeleysam]

http://www.newegg.com/OldVersion/app/Vi...Desc.asp?description=14-127-153&depa=1

 

[JBT]

Find the setting Reduced blank interleave in your video drivers and make sure it is checked. Should fix your DVI issues. If not then I guess the 5200 just won't cut it.

 

[5150Joker]

Why do people with nice monitors keep crappy vid cards?

 

[Peter]

GeForce cards do have limitations (and some even issues) with the DVI output. Replace with an ATi card (even an equally low-specification card), and you're sorted.

 

[Alto101]

I had this same problem. When I got my 2405, I could not get 1920X1200 to work with my FX 5200 AGP using DVI. I could set the resolution, but my desktop would not fit onto the monitor - I could scroll left to right with my mouse. Everything worked fine using the old connector. Several people recommended to adjust the blank interleave settings in my driver as JBT suggested, but I could not find that setting.

After several hours messing with this, I decided just to buy a new video card. After all, the FX 5200 likely could not run any games at anywhere near the resolution of the 2405. I ended up with the 6800NU which runs 1920X1200 DVI without any issues.

I don't know much about video cards under $100, but I did read that any video card that has dual DVI output should run 1920X1200 over DVI. I also read that ATI cards generally have better DVI chips at the lower price points than NVIDIA.

 

[Peter]

... point being that NVidia's primary DVI encoder doesn't do that ultra-high resolution reliably. ATI's does, so ATI's cheap cards will do 1920x1200 while NVidia's don't.

 

[SmackdownHotel]

Originally posted by: Peter
GeForce cards do have limitations (and some even issues) with the DVI output. Replace with an ATi card (even an equally low-specification card), and you're sorted.

Thanks....I thought so.

On my way to pick up a cheap 9600 Pro.

 

[SmackdownHotel]

In case anybody is interested, the new vid card (9600 Pro) did the trick.

 

[neutralizer]

Happens to me too on my Geforce3 Ti200 with 2005fpw, on post, the DVI sometimes reads the signal as NTSC and get a bunch of white lines which is actually at the posting info smushed into middle, but once I get into Windows, it's gone. But sometimes the DVI reads the right signal and it displays right. Weird :roll:

 

[SmackdownHotel]

Originally posted by: neutralizer
Happens to me too on my Geforce3 Ti200 with 2005fpw, on post, the DVI sometimes reads the signal as NTSC and get a bunch of white lines which is actually at the posting info smushed into middle, but once I get into Windows, it's gone. But sometimes the DVI reads the right signal and it displays right. Weird :roll:

Yeah that's exactly what was happening with my FX5200. I don't get that with anymore with the ATI card, however.

Damn this monitor is huge. :Q

 

[gunblade]

Nvidia had issues with the on chip TMDS encoder on the FX 5200 and 5600 line. They are limited to 135MHz and it is barely enough to drive 1600x1200 resolution, so the display cannot go higher than that. However, the new Geforce 6 and 7 series have fixed the on-chip TMDS signal bandwidth issues. I believes it is a cost-cutting strategy in the first place, to cut down signaling filtering stages and point-point interconnect in the output to save transistor.

Most Ati's line has good TMDS signal. Therefore, if you are buying low end to use the DVI pick an ATI. If you are buying high-end, any card should do.