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[catgut]

I think I finally found an image source that my Dell 2001FP LCD Monitor can't handle.

To review, I play my xbox in HDTV resolutions on my 2001FP by using an

X2VGA

adapter connected to the d-sub input on the 2001fp.

The majority of xbox games support 480p through the x2vga, which works great on the 2001FP.  You can find a list of which games support which HDTV modes here:

HDTVArcade.com

I have two games, Dragon's Lair 3D and Enter the Matrix, which go up to 1080i.  I tried both of these on the 2001FP last night, and they both had the same display problem.

In 1080i, the picture is sharp, but the contrast/brightness and colors are a mess.  There is a "flickering" effect as horizontal bars of darkness, almost like shadows, randomnly move up and down the screen, often obscuring the majority of the image and darkening it so it becomes difficult to see the game and suppressing any display of color.  Sometimes they go away briefly, and I see full color, but it's only for a second or two and then everything is back to bands of darkness moving up and down.

I'm going to hook up my old Dell 19" CRT monitor later and see if I get the same effect.  Anyone else running 1080i on an X2VGA and an LCD monitor?  Is it my monitor, or the X2VGA adapter?

[Mr Ed]

Does your monitor ever claim to support interlaced?  Does it work with 480i?

[Mr Ed]

QUOTE (Spitwad @ Jul 30 2004, 11:44 AM)

No the dell 2001fp doesnt support 480i.

Then it probably won't support any interlaced mode, such as 1080i.

QUOTE (Spitwad @ Jul 30 2004, 11:44 AM)

Hey catgut, does your 2001fp have some wierd left over images, like burned in images on a crt, left over after gaming for a while?  Mine do, and although they disappear after an hour they are quite annoying.  And I got dell to send me another 2001fp and I had the same problem on that one, so it's gotta be either my vga cable or my x2vga+ itself.

Uh, no, it's LCD burn in.  It's a known thing that LCDs do.  It isn't permanent.

[Foe-hammer]

It's not so much whether if it's interlaced or not, it all has to do if the horizontal frequency is high enough.  480i has a H frequency of only about 15khz, and most monitors will not sync that low.  1080i has a frequency of about 33khz, and most all crt monitors will sync with that (480p is about 31khz).  I would never use 1080i on my computer monitor, allways use 720p; the picture is much better and more stable then 1080i.

[Spitwad]

ya everything looks great, and that lcd burn in issue i have does go away after ~30min

[catgut]

I've never seen any "burn in" yet on my 2001fp.  I've never had any image stay on the screen after the image source goes away.

Thanks for the info on 1080i, I'll disable that mode in the MS dash.

Nitty Gritty, I'm really happy with my x2vga/lcd monitor setup.  480p, which most games support, looks great, much better than Svideo on a regular TV.  Emulators look great in that mode too.  Just be aware that the 2001FP have a very low response time for the LCD, 16ms I believe.  Older monitors that longer response times may show "ghosting" when there is a lot of screen updating.

[catgut]

QUOTE (nittygritty @ Jul 31 2004, 09:09 PM)

Catgut I've actually got my xbox hooked up to the lcd through my video card and was getting that lag in response time but i thought it was just because it had to run through my computer first.  so its just the monitor itself? x2vga won't solve this?

Yes, it may just be the monitor itself if you have an older LCD monitor.

"Response time" for LCD monitors refers to the time it takes for the individual pixels to go from on to off, white to black, change colors, etc.

Older monitors that have higher response times will exhibit "ghosting" or "smearing", because with a fast moving screen update (likely quickly turning left to right in a first person shooter), the video image will be changing faster than the pixels can.

For gaming, you want to find an LCD monitor with a response time under 20ms, generally.  The 2001FP has a 16ms response time.

[catgut]

QUOTE (xction @ Aug 5 2004, 05:43 AM)

That cool you guys got yours to work out, i have my x2vga hookup directly to my dell 2001fp, but all i get is a black screen with the OSD menu. Like this: No dead pixels so far on my dell 2001fp, but i wish my x2vga worked on my FP.

Did you enable 480p mode in your MS dash?  You might have to hook the x2vga up to a CRT instead of your dell 2001fp to do this because the 2001fp won't display the Easy view mode.

[jeep77]

Has anyone tried 720p on the Dell 2001fp monitor?

[Spitwad]

720p looks f'ing amazing

[catgut]

QUOTE (jeep77 @ Aug 16 2004, 11:27 PM)

Spitwad, does 480p look good as well? I have heard that when the lcd has to scale the resolution down that the screen looked blurry.

Look for yourself.  I took these images tonight.

These screenshots are of an xbox+x2vga+Dell 2001FP LCD Screen.  All screenshots are in 480p mode.  I took these with a canon s30.   Some are slight blurred due to long exposure time required (no flash to avoid reflection from screen):

Carmen Evox Skin

deetee Evox Skin

homer xbox skin

Full Spectrum Warrior

Soul Calibur

Ninja Gaiden

Ninja Gaiden 2

Samurai Shodown IV on Kawa-X emulator

Metal Slug X on Kawa-X emulator

[catgut]

Burnout 2 and Project Gotham Racing 2 only support 480p.

Try turning off 720p in dash and see if that changes anything.

If not, check dip switch settings on x2vga.

Also make sure you're using a good quality shielded VGA cable and that it isn't running near anything that generates a strong electrical field.

If you still have problems, email x2vga about possible service/replacement.

[catgut]

Get in touch with Neoya.  They should either fix it or send a replacement.  Mine has no symptoms like that at all.

[Mr Ed]

QUOTE (neomits @ Aug 22 2004, 03:02 PM)

There is no way to send progressive output over s-video cable is there?

nope

[catgut]

QUOTE (neomits @ Aug 22 2004, 11:02 PM)

catgut thanks for the shots, any change I could see what it looks like compared to the 480i on that monitor?

I'll see if I can do some comparison shots of composite vs. svideo vs. 480p on my 2001fp.  It'll probably take me a few days to get the time to do them.