TV-out no longer works, NVIDIA GeForce4 Ti4200

[Phalanx-Imawano 0]

Seems that since the 30.xx plus detonator drivers, my Inno3D Tornado GeForce4 Ti4200 won't display anything on the TV out (on my TV, it just shows a plain blue screen, which it shows if Video In is selected and there's no video signal coming in). While in the NVIDIA properties it shows that TV out was detected, any attempt to activate it will just result in that blank screen on the TV, other than a "jump" (like when my monitor experiences a change in resolution or refresh rate) meaning the TV Out is trying to send a signal to the TV. Unfortunately I can't go back to the older drivers for some reason (Windows XP freezes after logon if I try to install drivers older than 30.xx and restart). As added info I have Windows XP Pro w/ Service Pack 1, DirectX9.0a, the latest Inno3D Drivers (not NVIDIA reference drivers, which give the same result anyway when I try them), and the Refreshlock utility (but I disable it when using the TV Out).

 

Anyone else with an NVIDIA card have an issue with TV Out? I really miss using my 19" color TV to watch DVD Movies played from my PC.

[Tomay 0]

First try tvtool http://tvtool.info/index_e.htm.

 

Then unconnect everything from your tv (e.g. vcr, antenna...)

I couldn't get a tvout picture on my sony before I unpluged the antenna from my tv.

 

Than try if your tvout works at all.

Connect the TV and unplug the monitor. Than turn the power on. You should see the boot screen on the tv.

 

P.S. check the cables and stuff first.

 

Post back if it helped.

[felix 0]

Ah, another fan of the TVTool.

Second best use of my credit card ever.

Best use was my black leather jacket.

 

Free upgrades all for one single purchase - now that's customer service.

[Phalanx-Imawano 0]

Wow! TV Tool is really something! It works and displays well on the TV, even better than NView! (i.e. the desktop doesn't look stretched or pincussioned on the TV like it usually does with NView). Plus I like the color bars display which assures me that the TV Out is still functional while the PC Monitor is the active display.

 

Can't wait to register it. 15 minutes of demo time is awfully short

[felix 0]

Good news is that there's a new version of TV-Tool out (8.2) that supports all GeForce4 cards included.

Basically the bloke who writes this software has been encouraging GF4 owners to write/sign a petition to release the datasheets on those cards TV chips however they didn't. The below explains.

 

From the site:

 

If you guess that nVidia has changed its mind because of the petition then you are wrong. From this side the feedback is still zero. Nevertheless it seems that a solution could be found how to integrate the support of the TV encoder used on GF4-MX and GF-FXs cards into TVTool.

 

So far TVTool works on low hardware level and accesses the TV and VGA chips directly. This possibility is ruled out for the MV chip because of missing datasheets. In contrast to the other TV chips the nVidia driver offers relatively good support for this chip including an overscan (fullscreen) option. This fact will be used by the next TVTool version which will access the TV chip via the graphics card driver.

 

"Why is TVTool necessary then at all?" That´s simple: Because it makes the configuration significant easier, more comfortable and much faster. Instead of clicking through various submenus, one mouse click is sufficient to start movie playback on the TV (including the sound configuration etc.) via the TVTool conext menu option for example.

 

Home of TV-Tool

Also, I'm not associated with this product other than being a very satisfied customer.

[Phalanx-Imawano 0]

Tried 8.2. It won't accept my key (for 7.2.5) so it runs in demo mode (i.e. will only work for 15 minutes then exit), and had some strange behavior when I tried changing resolution/display size while in TV mode. Besides I'm happy with 7.2.5.

 

Gah! It requires a new key. Will do that later.