Power DVD DX

[[email protected]]

I recently got this new laptop for work with windows 7 and all this new stuff that thats the same but looks different. I'm adjusting slowly.


We were watching some DVD's on it today, it is hooked up to my TV with some cable but I don't know what any of this crap is called. Anyways, I noticed that any DVD that I put on for the kids looks weird. Hard to explain but the best way to put it is that they look cheap. The thing that gets me is that when I watch the same DVD on a real DVD player, it looks normal.

Case in point, I put in spiderman 3 for my son and he is watching it for the 1000th time and I've seen it quite a few myself. Watching it thru Power DVD DX with "true theater" ( I have version 8.3.1.6029) just looks wrong. It seems like I'm watching a documentary or something. Something is missing but I can't put my finger on what. The movies just don't look right. I've tried it with true theater on and off but it doesn't make much difference.

Curious if anyone out there has any idea what I'm talking about and if there is a way to fix it.

 

[mattness]

make sure the cable going to the tv is in all the way lol! u can turn off the graphics booster stuff or send more memory to your graphics card in your control panel if you have to.

if the TV is too big the video card can have a hard time keeping up.

you said its a laptop so im assuming its an integrated video card. so yes you can dedicate more memory to it.

also check to make sure that your laptop is sending the right resolution to the TV, so if your laptop is above 1080p and your tv is just 1080p you need to tone it down.

start>control panel> appearance and personalization> display> screen resolution


if its lagging at all you can also set its CPU priority to number 1. although 90% of your problem is gonna be video card.

cntrl+alt+delete>task manager> tab over to processes> find the dvd program, right click the process and mouse down to set priority> then you can increase it to above normal or high.

if youre serious about using the laptop you can buy an external video card for it. it will increase the laptops performance and speed 10 fold. no shit. it just frees up so much processing and memory and takes a lot of load off your motherboard. only so much data can go through your north and south bridge at a time and an integrated video card uses a ton of it

 

[RaWarrior]

My guess is the resolutions aren't lining up, as in the laptop is sending out the video in a resolution the TV isn't native to. Actually had this problem with the 25' big-screen in the new student forum, whenever you played video on it it would, as you said, look "cheap", kind of grainy, kind of laggy, just overall shitty looking. The TV is trying to resize the image on-the-fly, which results in low quality.

If your TV is a "true" HDTV, it's highest resolution will be 1080. Get into your monitor configuration, and adjust the resolution for "monitor 2" (it'll show up when the output is plugged in) to something with 1080 as the second number. If it's only a 720 HDTV, pick accordingly. In other words, mess around with it until it looks good.

If adjusting the resolution doesn't help, as mattness said, your laptop might not be up for the job. If it's a mid or low range laptop, it almost surely has an "integrated graphics", which means the main processor and memory pull double duty to do the graphics too (rather than having a dedicated graphics card with it's own processor and memory). You can allow more memory for the graphics "side" of things, but in my experience that doesn't usually help much, since the processor tends to be the bottleneck. Also, when exporting the video, try turning the laptop's screen off. Most laptops have a "function" key somewhere in the F-line that cycles through a few pre-set display modes. Usually "screen" "screen and output" and "output only". My computer it's Function+F2 but it's likely yours might be different. For whatever reason, this also seems to help.

 

[[email protected]]

I'm REALLY bad with computers so I have no idea what you guys are talking about. I wouldn't have a clue on how to do any of the stuff mattness said, LOL.

I played around with it some more and tried turning off the "True Theater" setting again. Looked totally different after that. Not sure why it didn't work the first couple times. First times I tried it while the movie was playing. After I posted, I stopped the movie and went into settings and shut it off and now it looks normal.

Thanks for the replies

 

[Diablotin]

Mike, just make sure yo have the video output only on your TV and not on both screen (TV + Laptop).
When you display on both the resolution is the lowest on both which is the laptop, so you have to redirect the output only on the highest resolution device which is your TV.

For selecting the output:
Press Windows key + P = Presentation Display Mode menu. ernal projector.
On the popup, just select Projector only.


If you laptop is able to do it, connect your laptop to the TV with an HDMI cable.
It will provide the best quality possible.

hope it helps.