Ever heard of a 12 pin VGA cable?

[GmanBat]

I have 2 Samsung 955df 19" monitors which I bought 15' extensions for to put my computer in the next room, ( for sound reasons, I record audio ). One monitor hooked up fine to the extension, the other didn't want to go. Unfortunately, I pushed it too much and bent some prongs. I looked at it and it only has 12 pins. The other monitor cable had 15. Same model, bought at different times. I re-bent the pins and got the extension to slide over it. Hooked it up and it works.

An electronics-smart friend of mine said they only come in 9 and 15 pin, and I was lucky I didn't get zapped. Well, this thing had 12, what is Samsung doing here?

 

[jamesbond007]

It's a 15-pin VGA cable. My 955DF uses one anyways. There's 15 pins there.

If you look at the end of the cable coming out of the monitor, do you see holes for the other 3 "missing" pins? I've found that some companies don't use all 15. Maybe some are used in grounding...I don't know, though. I don't design monitors. I'm sure it's just a fluke or misunderstanding. It could be a design change, too.

I highly doubt it's technically a 12-pin cable. Maybe you broke some off? Can you provide a picture? If you've used it in a videocard before, then it's definitely a 15-pin.

 

[bozo1]

Yep - not all 15 pins are used and it is common for them to have 3 pins missing.

 

[DimZiE]

my monitor got 15 pins...

the only time i see a monitor w/ 12 pins is back on the "hey-day" of 256KB VGA Cards..
i think the brand was GTC

 

[GmanBat]

Thanks, Fellers.

It definitely just had 12 pins, had wife, (with better eyes), count em to be sure and none broke off. The monitor is now working just fine now that I've bent em back and hooked it up to the extension. My other 955df had 15 pins, and also the pop-out controls that the new one doesn't have. It just has buttons on the bottom and the frame is a different size. In my opinion they have cheapened them. Maybe they had trouble with the pop-out. But they shoulda stayed with 15 pins for stability, how much can 3 less pins save them? I woulda paid the extra $0.50!

 

[zephyrprime]

The old macs used to have 12pin connectors.

 

[glugglug]

Out of the 15 pins on a standard VGA cable (9 pin is EGA), only 12 have EVER been used for video signal/grounding/etc.

It used to be that on macs the additional 3 pins were wired to either 5V or ground (or left unconnected) to give 3 tri-state signals for 27 combinations to indicate the size of monitor, since the old mac monitors were non-multisync, and the computer would use those 3 pins to identify what resolution to use.

On PCs since about 1996, those pins are used again for monitor identification, but instead of a constant state on each pin, its basically a 3-pin serial connection in addition to the 12 pins being used for the actual video. The serial connection is used for the monitor to tell the computer its model # (plug and play). If you use a cable with the 3 extra pins missing its not a problem, just windows will identify your monitor as "Generic" and not know what refresh limits to use in each resolution by default.

 

[GmanBat]

Thanks!

I have quoted you at the N-Tracks forum.

Appreciate it!!!