I'm considering getting a DVI cable to hook my monitor up to my computer, rather than the old VGA cable I'm currently using. Will using a DVI cable have any effect on picture quality? Will movies look better on my monitor?
2007-05-11 03:44:20 · 5 answers · asked by Anonymous in Computers & Internet ➔ Hardware ➔ Monitors
I forgot to add, yes, I do have a DVI monitor and a DVI video card.
2007-05-11 03:50:01 · update #1
If you have a DVI input on your video card you'll get a better picture, if your monitor has a DVI output.
DVI is a digital signal as compared to an analog signal of a standard input/output.
Just using the VGA to DVI adapters won't do a thing for you.
2007-05-11 03:49:55 · answer #1 · answered by Bob-O 3 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Digital from the PC to digital in the monitor is going to give you the best picture you can get.
Digital (GPU) to analog (RAMDAC), down the cable, to digital (sampled in the monitor from a re-engineered pixel clock) has a lot more opportunity for error and signal degradation. However, at 1280 by 1024 or below the monitors have gotten pretty good at doing this now so I doubt you would see a great improvement.
If you analog signal is poor then you could most likely get an improvement by:
Running at the native resolution of the panel.
Putting up a full screen of text an hitting the auto setup button on the monitor.
As for the cables, there are good VGA cables and there are bad ones out there. There is very poor specification on the cable quality.
For DVI there are good cables and then there are better ones. The DDWG who wrote the DVI specification put in requirements for the cable quality. The few situations that I have seen where a cable has been blamed for poor quality turned out to be the video card out of spec. The better cables could cope with the bad signal, the merely good ones could not.
2007-05-11 05:17:47 · answer #2 · answered by Simon T 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Difference in picture quaity depends hugely on the specifics of the card running it and the monitor.
VGA is an analog system, sends variable voltages to monitor, DVI is Digital, lots of 0s and 1s.
If you have a good VGA cable to a good monitor and compare to a cheap DVi cable feeding a dheap monitor I'd say the VGA will look better.
The only way to be sure with your setup is try it, if monitor supports DVi buy all means try it, if you don't like it, go back to VGA
2007-05-11 03:51:05 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 1⤋
First things first, do you have a DVI hookup on your video card? It is different than VGA. DVI has four pins in a square with a whole bunch of little pins next to them. If you do have a DVI hookup on your computer ensure that you're monitor has one, used a coupler to go from VGA to DVI won't make any difference you have to go directly from you monitor to your computer in DVI.
Oh, and other than that VGA is analog and DVI is digital.
2007-05-11 03:49:17 · answer #4 · answered by Katie F 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The only benefit you will get from DVI is if you also get a DVI monitor and DVI video card
2007-05-11 03:48:08 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 2⤋