LCD cables, analog versus DVI

[Conky]

I got my NEC 1760NX a few years ago when it was still $500 and never got around to getting a DVI cable for it until a couple weeks ago. I had read over and over about how noticable the difference was but for various reasons put it off for a long time.

After a suitable review period I can state that I can't tell the difference whatsoever in any game or application. It was $20 spent I will never see again. Thanks. :laugh:

 

[TheRyuu]

Originally posted by: Crazyfool
I got my NEC 1760NX a few years ago when it was still $500 and never got around to getting a DVI cable for it until a couple weeks ago. I had read over and over about how noticable the difference was but for various reasons put it off for a long time.

After a suitable review period I can state that I can't tell the difference whatsoever in any game or application. It was $20 spent I will never see again. Thanks. :laugh:

WELL, I think you might have started a flamebait here.

If you can't tell the difference between DVI and VGA, maby time to get some glasess.
Maby it's because your monitor is older/ 17in.?

 

[JBT]

Your right some monitors looked good on VGA as well. I know on my 2405 it looks very different on VGA compared to DVI.

 

[Trey22]

My E193FP looked great on VGA.

Ordered 2 E196FP's and they're still crystal clear to me.

Compared to my 17" gaming LCD at home, I can't tell the difference.

 

[kpb]

Quality of a lcd on a vga connection can vary quite a bit and when done right can look pretty good. DVI is typically much safer and consistantly better quality. It's not hard to understand why when you look at whats happening.

VGA cable- Video card does what ever to figure out what it needs to display. Converts the digital information in memory of the video card to an analog vga signal and sends it to the monitor. In an lcd because it's a fixed grid of pixels that is addressed digitally it then has to lock on to the analog signal and sample it at each point and convert it back to a digital signal to then display it. That can be done well or done poorly and if done poorly can definitely effect image quality.

DVI- Video card does what ever to figure out what it needs to display and sends it digitally directly to the monitor. No extra conversions to analog and back. No loss of data or major room for errors to come up. Just digital information going directly to the monitor to be displayed.

 

[aka1nas]

On most decent 17-inch and smaller LCDs, the difference between VGA and DVI is subtle at best. From my own observation and the anecdotal evidence of others, it seems much more noticeable on larger displays.

 

[neutralizer]

2005fpw, vga -> dvi. Huge difference.

 

[Conky]

Originally posted by: neutralizer
2005fpw, vga -> dvi. Huge difference.

Well, I am hoping for an upgrade to a 24" LCD later this year so at least I have the cord.

 

[SynthDude2001]

Originally posted by: neutralizer
2005fpw, vga -> dvi. Huge difference.

QFT. Although I must say, VGA at 1680x1050 is better on my X1900XT than it was from my old 6800GT, strangely enough. Not that I much care, since I would never bother using VGA anyway

 

[Brahmzy]

I can tell a pretty big difference between VGA/DVI.

 

[hans007]

from my experience, the reason is video bandwidth.

you have something like 165mhz of bandwidth or something on an analog connection. when you have analog interference it cuts out the edges of this, and you well have less effectively. analog cables even have special magnet rings that need to be installed at the ends of the cable to help with this (i forgot what the rings are called but they are built into most cables, though you can even buy them)

17 and 19" lcds are only 1280x1024 so thats a 1.3 megapixel image x some number of hz per second. something like that. a 1600x1200 display lik ea 20" 4:3 lcd is 2 megapixels, a 1680x1050 is like 1.8 megapixels (20" wide).

you start pushing into the limits of that analog video cable bandwidth and any interference will disturb that. that is what i've read anyway.


the big difference with dvi is with displays that need more video bandwidth on the display connector. a lot of older analog video cards had really bad ramdacs and bad capacitance issues as well that basically made this same problem happen anywya on smaller displays (geforce 2 cap desoldering if anyone remembers) but its not very common anymore except on really cheap video cards.


try an analog lcd on a really really cheap i810 era integrated video and it will look awful. same with some of the cheaper i915/i945g based boards now. then try it with dvi (i actually have a i915g/i945g dvi expansion card and have tried this) and ti will look perfect because digital connections are not prone to interferance.

another thing to try is running a monitor through a cheap kvm, which is a bandwidth robbing "connector/extension" and it will look worse. its just like attaching more cable tvs to a shared analog cable line.

 

[potato28]

I dont notice it very much on my 17" screen, but on my 26" LCD tv its a very large difference.