Nvidia tv-out, what is the best way?

Nicom · Guru Joined: 30 Jan 2003 Posts: 380

What is the best way of doing nvidia tv-out? Using twinview in XF86Config? Using nvtv? Swapping XF86Config with a TV one?

I use it for watching video mostly, snd the occasional emulator game. I use the commands "xrandr -s 2 -r 60" and "nvtv -t -r 640,480 -s small -S ntsc" , as shortcuts on a gnome desktop. Unfortunately kde doesn't have autoscalling yet. This works ok, but sometimes it messes up and I have to do a full reboot to get it proper again, and it only looks good on the TV and messed up on the monitor. What I wish there were is autodetection for nvidia tv-out, and proper resolution on TV and monitor.

Does anyone have a better solution?

Peach · Posted: Sat Jul 19, 2003 11:08 am Post subject:

I think the only way is using TwinView option in the device section of your XF86Config, in fact for me nvtv doesen't have the right standard (PAL-G/B), or otherwise define a new screen that is not a clone of your first one

currently I have that set like this:

sortkatt · n00b Joined: 05 Mar 2003 Posts: 13

What about using Vesa framebuffer? fbdev?
What about the DirectFB way?
Haven't tried this myself. Converted to Matrox.

Havent heard from people playing with the framebuffer on a nvidia, other than getting that silly penguin in the corner.
With my G550 im addicted to framebuffers, and not just because I think they sound l33t.

Im not happy with showing a movie by first showing the desktop.
I think tv-out should show only the movie and nothing else.

If you have some time to kill (15 minutes) and you can stand my awful english, I wrote quite a rant about my experiences wrestling with the nvidia i had before at this place:

https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?p=433722#433722
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triad · Posted: Sun Jul 27, 2003 10:04 pm Post subject:

I personally like doing my TV Out on the Nvidia as mentioned in this forum

https://forums.gentoo.org/viewtopic.php?t=66679&highlight=mplayer+fullscreen

It allows me to work on my comp while I play videos for the kiddies at the same time.

Hope this helps out a bit.

Triad

sortkatt · n00b Joined: 05 Mar 2003 Posts: 13

the post you refer to has alot of info on both the twinview-method and the nvtv. I'm sure you are refering to the nvtv one (single xfree-session without twinview and using a script to initiate the second display and start the movie). When i tried methods like this i lost my main xfree session.

So im wondering. What kind of card do you have?
i was working with a single crt with tv-out (Gainward GF4mx)

Do you have double ramdacs (more than one port for crt/dvi)?
Or is it the drivers that have been updated since then

Can you mess around with opengl-stuffs at the same time on both screens?

This is a limitation of my current g550 (which is sweet! supasweet!), but im thinking of buying a nvidia the next time (prolly with two ramdacs if the support is there to let me be able to play movies and using my computer at the same time)
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triad · Posted: Wed Jul 30, 2003 1:49 am Post subject:

Howdy sortkatt,

I have a generic geforce2 MX Video card with 64MB of RAM. The TV Chip is a Brooktree BT869 Rev. 2. It has one CRT output and an S-Video output to hook up to TV. Thinking about upgrading to a better Card just for the Main purpose of being able to use the OVERSCAN option that is not supported on cards earlier then Geforce 4. But I run TV at 640x480 and really have just a little edge of black on each side of screen. If I run at 800x600 it gets pretty bad.

I am currently running as described in post I linked to above. I am not using NVTV just setup up 2 screens in my XConfig . I dont have TwinView enabled.

As for OpenGL stuff. Havnt really tried anything. Just basically use one screen (TV @ 640x480) for Movies and the other (MY Monitor1280x1024) for all other things. Havent had one XFree Crash yet running this setup. Been going for a good week. (Keeping Fingers Crossed).

Have been contemplating adding a USB mouse and keyboard (Maybe wireless) and keeping out by TV. Then editing XConfig to pint the screen that the TV is on to use the wireless stuff so it can be used for something else other then just watching movies. Would be cool because then like having 2 PCs. Definetly would try games with this scenario

Oh well hoped this answered some of you questions.

Triad

lurid · Guru Joined: 12 Mar 2003 Posts: 595 Location: Florida

Feh. Tv-out is a big pain in the ass. I never was able to get that Twinview thing working well. I just have two XF86Config files and use a shell script to switch between one configured for CRT and one configured for TV. The TV script swaps XF86Config files, starts up Fluxbox (instead of Gnome) and launches nvtv. Its as simple as clicking 800x600 and then clicking Tv On. *shrug*
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