Odd Ball Sony Display Issue

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Ken H

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Odd Ball Sony Display Issue

#1

Post by Ken H » Sun Aug 12, 2018 3:37 am

Ive got a Sony PFM42-B1. It's a professional display plasma with native resolution of 1024x1024 in a 16:9 AR. It has VGA and component video in; no DVI or HDMI or DisplayPort. It will accept 1080i and 720p video, and up to 1600x1200 PC resolutions. The WMC PC is a Dell Optiplex 740 SFF desktop with Phenom X2 and 8GB of RAM. I'm using it with a AMD R7 240 graphics card which has HDMI, DVI, and VGA output, and the Catalyst Software is installed.

When I first hooked it up using VGA the display would only do PC resolutions and the Windows Control Panel Display section said 1280x1024 (5:4 AR) was recommended. When I started WMC it was still 1280x1024. In WMC, I checked the Configure Your TV or Monitor settings and it let me pick 1920x1080i, and the image went to 16:9 AR, which worked great. When I closed WMC the desktop image went back to 1280x1024, which was fine because I only used the system for WMC.

Fast forward to today. The PC internal battery died and I replaced it. When I connected everything up again, the display would only do the PC resolutions; the 1080i option in WMC disappeared. I played around for awhile but couldn't get the video resolutions.

I tried using Catalyst software to create a custom 1920x1080i resolution but the display went haywire and wouldn't auto lock. Then I hooked up the PC to a standard 1080p HDTV using VGA and HDMI, and the PC automatically went to 1080p 16:9.

To top it off I can't remember if I had to do anything special before to get the video resolutions.

Any ideas?

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garyan2

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#2

Post by garyan2 » Sun Aug 12, 2018 4:06 am

I'd poke around in the BIOS to see what video settings there are. If you had to remove your battery, you may have also lost all your BIOS settings.
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Keeping WMC alive beyond January 2020. https://garyan2.github.io

Ken H

Posts: 231
Joined: Sun Feb 15, 2015 9:14 pm
Location: Ann Arbor, home of the NCAA College Football National Champions!

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#3

Post by Ken H » Sun Aug 12, 2018 4:13 am

garyan2 wrote:I'd poke around in the BIOS to see what video settings there are. If you had to remove your battery, you may have also lost all your BIOS settings.
Yeah I thought about that for a hot minute but couldn't think of why it would affect the video. But, as typically you have a good idea and I'll definitely take a look and report back.

Thanks.

Ken H

Posts: 231
Joined: Sun Feb 15, 2015 9:14 pm
Location: Ann Arbor, home of the NCAA College Football National Champions!

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#4

Post by Ken H » Sun Aug 12, 2018 6:33 am

Ken H wrote:
garyan2 wrote:I'd poke around in the BIOS to see what video settings there are. If you had to remove your battery, you may have also lost all your BIOS settings.
Yeah I thought about that for a hot minute but couldn't think of why it would affect the video. But, as typically you have a good idea and I'll definitely take a look and report back.

Thanks.
Couldn't see anything there, it looked like nothing had changed from when I originally set it up. The video options were limited to auto for detecting a graphics card, and memory allocated if the integrated graphics were used.

Ken H

Posts: 231
Joined: Sun Feb 15, 2015 9:14 pm
Location: Ann Arbor, home of the NCAA College Football National Champions!

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#5

Post by Ken H » Mon Aug 13, 2018 4:19 am

So I decided to try a different approach. I have an active DVI/HDMI to component video adapter and am using it to get component video for input to the display. It actually works really well for video quality but I have overscan and can't find anywhere in Catalyst to adjust it. I then tried creating a custom resolution, slightly fewer pixels, but the Sony won't auto lock.

The Sony is just really particular about what it will take for input and what it does with it.

And again, I'm wondering if anyone has an idea, thanks.

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