HELP! Video cards are frying my brain

[Morella]

I was told, a few months ago, that the HDI output on the computer could not be connected to the component-level shit on the TV, because one was analog and one was digital, but my new video card says it will work fine.

The documentation uses the terms HDI and HDJ interchangeably, but it doesn't say what an HDJ connector is. It has two outputs marked HDI, and one will actually plug into my flat panel and work, but the pinout is just a little different. Where the HDI on the card has four holes and a cross in the middle, the cable just has a single tab on that end. I will try to show some pictures. There is also an adapter that plugs into one of these ports, with the four pins, I think, that has VGA on the other end, and it can be plugged into the monitor as well. It has both types.

If this is all OK, I'm happy, but then it's over to the TV. It has two component-level video inputs. The difference is that one, which was made for a HD receiver has these two extra jacks, labeled H and V. Can I feed the computer's video in and leave those open? The other input set is taken up by the DVD player.

Thanks for any advice. I'm exasperated.

-denise

[Morella]

Well, this card is going back to Best Buy, because it blue screens my computer. The machine came with a card that would have done fine, but it only had one VGA output. More horse shit.

Will try a different brand than ATI this time.

-denise

[Morella]

Well, I tried enabling the DTV input and assigning it to YPbPr, then I plugged my DVD cables into the HDTV ports and left those H and V open, then I played a DVD and it worked fine. Now if I can just get a video card with a decent 1080 output that won't blue screen, I can make my evil genius plan work. I would still like to know why there are two different cable connectors that go into those ports, and what is analog and what is digital. Somebody here must know.

Windows Vista is like upgrading to XP was at first. You have to remove and disable a bunch of shit, and get used to it. I disabled all of the "free software" because it's all BS...many years ago, they really did give you free software, but now it's all just trial versions. That doesn't bother me too much, as long as the same software I've had for 15 years still installs. I keep the installation source backed up on machines and DVDs, especially the shareware that I've paid for, and I just put the key on the disk as a text file.

-denise

[Morella]

Problem solved! 500w PS and a non-ATI card. I can watch hi-def through the flat panel, or record it to a disk or DVD DL and lightscribe and shit, and play it back at 1080. My movies on the video server look fan-fucking tastic, even the old ones that play in a sort of synthesised 1080 now, like the Vincent Price classics. They look like film.

When I read Tony the specs on the card and the machine, he asked me what the fuck I was going to do with all of that power. Render! Biggest problem in the world, render time with a big stack of effects won't take hours anymore. So I set up a desk where the composite cables can reach into the next room where the TV room is, and my easy chair remote control mouse can still control the HDTV or video player.

Gawd, these computers have changed...a thousand pins in the power connector and two or three in the ATAPI cord for a drive. Is this all a pipe dream?

Back to sleep. My screen is fading.


-d

[Scary Guy]

Glad you figured it out so I don't have to

[Morella]

Have you ever heard of VSO Software? I was looking for something to replace Santa, which I love to use for burning, but it still doesn't do DL. I tried a program from VSO...Copy To DVD. God damn, that was a mistake! First I selected "copy a disk", as you usually do when you want to burn one from a VIDEO_TS directory on your hard drive, and it asked me what program I wanted to use to do the copy. Ummm....maybe this one? I was reminded of "Mr. Tea", from Saturday Night Live. It was just a stand in a funnel. You put your cup with a tea bag in it, pour hot water through the top, and Mr. Tea does the rest!

Then an interface came up, it was happy with the directory that I selected, but it said that the disk probably wasn't going to play. My computer crashed and I had to take the battery out, I let Windows fix it, then it ran, and of course I uninstalled the program. Then it told me that I was missing the driver for my Patin-Couffin device, and VSO wanted me to pay for it! WTF???

OK, I'm not a Windows person, but I managed to get everything fixed here, even my file sharing. Now what do I need to do to be able to burn DL disks? I can create an 8-gig DVD on a hard drive on the desktop and play it into the composite holes on the TV, but I can't make a DL disk if my daughter wants a copy to play in her room, or Tony wants to play it on the truck or whatever. I think this is the last step to completing my system.

Anybody find something that works?

thanks

-denise