If your computer and TV both have a DVI connection:

http://help.bluebones.net/img/dvi_port.jpg

Then a normal DVI cable should work.

If your TV's DVI port is any different then it won't work. Must be some sort of special port if that's the case.

Strange that your TV has no VGA port on it though, I thought most HDTV's did.

I assume you've tried both HDMI ports then to rule out a bad port on the TV?

My guess is that the cable itself is just not adapting properly from DVI to HDMI.

You might have better luck with this:

Startech HDMI Male To DVI Female Adapter - Ebuyer and a DVI cable

OR

Startech HDMI (Female) To DVI-D (Male) Adapter - Ebuyer

and an HDMI cable.

They should both work. The DVI option depends on if you have a proper DVI video port on the TV.

If that doesn't work then you should look into a new graphics card.

One last thing...have you tried connecting other devices to the HDMI ports to see if there are any problems there? That would point to bad HDMI ports on the TV and not anything to do with the PC.

The tv definately doesnt have a dvi connector which i find strage as i mentioned in the last post that it has 2x 1 pin connectors for dvi audio input???

TV also definately doesnt have a vga on it either.

Yes i have tried both hdmi ports and it is no different.

I dont particularly want to spend any more money but its looking like i have to. my mate is bringing his cable round so that i can use it to determine if it is a faulty cable, the graphics card is only a year old and is a very good one so i dont think its that, its a Nvidia geforce 9800 GTX.

And lastly i dont have any other devices that are hdmi :-s

Also some extra information - the green dots of discoloration only seem to be on dark colors, mainly black. also when i put the resoloution on the tv to 1024 x 768 very few green dots appeared compared to when its higher resoloution but even on 1024 x 768 when i changed it form 60hz to 70 the were millions of green dots, cud it be a hz problem?

Thank you for continueing to try and help me :-)

The cable my mate brought round was vga - vga so couldnt use it, any other ideas that doesnt involve spending anymore money?

Just made another discovery. when i change the tv resoloution to 800 x 600 either 60 or 75 hz the picture is perfect not even 1 dot. but the minute i up the resoloution to teh next one, 1024 x 768 hundreds of green dots appear. i have tried every resoloution in the nvdia control panel after that but they all show the green dots. There is still the option to make custom resoloutions where you type in what exact resoloution you want but i wouldnt know what to put it.

Although the picture is perfect at the minute it at the end of the day is only 800 x 600 and what i really want it a hd image cus i have hd video files on my pc and i would also like to play games with a wireless xbox pad connected to my pc but on my tv which is in front of my bed as it is more comfortable there. I know my graphics card is good enough to throw out a hd image. Any ideas?

Okay. So is this an LCD HDTV?

As for things to try...seems like your cable is not showing HD resolutions. Maybe the graphics card is limiting it.

Click Start > Right Click My Computer > Properties > Hardware Tab > Device Manager

Then click the + For Display Adapters

Right click your display (should say nVIDIA on it) and choose Uninstall

If it asks you to Restart, choose Do Not Restart / Restart Later

Then...

Click Start > Run > Type in system32 > Click OK

Right click a white space and choose View > Details

Right click the gray column at the top and choose More...

Scroll down and near the bottom tick the box for Company

Click the company column to arrange the files by Company.

Delete all the files that are registered to nVIDIA.

Its okay if they dont all get deleted, just delete what you can.

Finally, restart the PC

The drivers should install automatically. But these will be basic drivers. Then try some higher resolutions and see if things have improved.


Let us know how it goes.

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Also can we just confirm exactly how you are connecting the PC to the TV? Is it:

A single HDMI cable
A DVI-HDMI cable
A DVI to HDMI adapter with an HDMI cable connected to it

I wouldn't trust a DVI-HDMI cable to work properly.

Ideally you want a direct HDMI to HDMI connection.

Otherwise you want a DVI to HDMI adapter (aka dongle) and then an HDMI cable going from the dongle to the back of the TV.

thank you for the reply amtech, it sounds a bit risky and i am using my computer for my job, i dont really want to do anything that could risk ruining my computer. do you have any other suggestions?

David

The worst thing that would happen is Windows would use its own universal / basic video drivers.

All that happens is the screen refreshes every time you scroll a page. And the "problem" goes away as soon as you install the proper nVIDIA drivers.

If the "basic" drivers work then you know the problem is with the video card drivers.

So are you saying that what i will be doing is wiping the latest drivers for the graphics card so that when i restart it installs the most basic drivers, if so to help me understand where do these basic drivers come from? are they stored on the memory of the graphics card, are they in windows xp's slection of default drivers or do i need to be connected to the internet so it can download the most basic drivers?

Im working part time at the moment tuesdays and wednesdays so i will try this method soon after wednesday so that if anything does go wrong (i know you say it wont but ) i have a few days to rectify it before tuesday and work rolls round again. I'll let you know how it goes?

p.s its a DVI-HDMI cable, so one end is dvi which plugs into my pc and the other end is hdmi which plugs into my tv. i appreciate that a hdmi - hdmi and a hdmi-dvi adapter is better but im trying to get what i have working first before i spend anymore of what little money i have

David