ATI 600SE and Dell 2405FPW

T

Tom Scales

I'm having a weird problem.

I have Dell Optiplex GX620 SFF with a low-profile 600SE card. The card only
has a DVI connector, but comes with a Y-cable that has one VGA port and one
DVI port so you can do dual monitor.

It also has integrated Intel GMA950 when you remove the 600SE.

I am trying to get it to work with a Dell 2405FPW widescreen monitor that
has a native resolution of 1920x1200. My preference is to use VGA for the
Dell, as I'll be using the DVI side for a 1920x1080P LCD. That said, the
other LCD is NOT connected.

I am running pretty recent drivers from ATI, although probably a month old.
I have the latest INF file for the monitor installed.

Here's the problem.

The ATI card insists on running the monitor at 1600x1200 and panning. It
will not run at 1920x1200, even though the INF file is telling it to.

When I take out the ATI card and use the low-end integrated graphics, it
runs flawlessly at 1920x1200 and can happily run the LCD at 1920x1080p
through DVI.

Seems like the ATI card would be better, so I would like it to work.

Any thoughts? I've tried everything.

Thanks,

Tom
 
M

Mark

I had the exact same problem when I first tried to install a 2405 on a
radeon 8500. All I can say is that after repeated reinstalls of the
ati drivers and 2405 inf using different orders of operations and
rebooting it finally worked properly.
 
B

Benjamin Gawert

* Tom Scales:
The ATI card insists on running the monitor at 1600x1200 and panning. It
will not run at 1920x1200, even though the INF file is telling it to.

When I take out the ATI card and use the low-end integrated graphics, it
runs flawlessly at 1920x1200 and can happily run the LCD at 1920x1080p
through DVI.

Seems like the ATI card would be better, so I would like it to work.

Any thoughts?

Yes. 1920x1200 requires the gfx card to do reduced blanking over DVI.
IIRC there is a checkbox somewhere to tell the ATI driver to do reduced
blanking, but without an ATI card at the moment I can't check where it is.

Benjamin
 
T

Tom Scales

Benjamin Gawert said:
* Tom Scales:


Yes. 1920x1200 requires the gfx card to do reduced blanking over DVI. IIRC
there is a checkbox somewhere to tell the ATI driver to do reduced
blanking, but without an ATI card at the moment I can't check where it is.

Benjamin

But I'm confused. It works over DVI. It doesn't work over VGA.

Tom
 
B

Benjamin Gawert

* Tom Scales:
But I'm confused. It works over DVI. It doesn't work over VGA.

Oops, sorry, then I did get you wrong. In this case please forget what I
said.

But then, I'd never connect a 2405FPW over analog any more, especially
with the poor signal quality of most ATI (and Geforce) cards...

Benjamin
 
T

Tom Scales

Benjamin Gawert said:
* Tom Scales:


Oops, sorry, then I did get you wrong. In this case please forget what I
said.

But then, I'd never connect a 2405FPW over analog any more, especially
with the poor signal quality of most ATI (and Geforce) cards...

Benjamin

The problem is that the 2405FPW is the 'little' monitor. DVI is going to
my 37" 1080p LCD
 
B

Benjamin Gawert

* Tom Scales:
The problem is that the 2405FPW is the 'little' monitor. DVI is going to
my 37" 1080p LCD

Why not just get a cheap gfx card with two DVI outputs? Probably the
best solution after all...

Benjamin
 
T

Tom Scales

Benjamin Gawert said:
* Tom Scales:


Why not just get a cheap gfx card with two DVI outputs? Probably the best
solution after all...

Benjamin

Because this is a PCI-e low-profile card -- the only card that will fit.

And none of them are cheap.
 
M

Mark

Tom Scales said:
But I'm confused. It works over DVI. It doesn't work over VGA.

Sorry to not be of help, but that is also exactly what I experienced
with an 8500 - dvi was fine, but vga required numerous installs,
uninstalls, registry cleans, etc, until 1920x1200 would work properly
 
T

Tom Scales

Mark said:
Sorry to not be of help, but that is also exactly what I experienced with
an 8500 - dvi was fine, but vga required numerous installs, uninstalls,
registry cleans, etc, until 1920x1200 would work properly

Wish I could figure out the magic. I've tried every possible combination.
 
F

Fidelis K

Wish I could figure out the magic. I've tried every possible
combination.

Probably, there is an issue with the DVI-to-VGA converter & the ATI driver
(you're using a DVI --> DVI & VGA split cable, right?). If I use a DVI-to
VGA converter with my X1900GT, some resolutions don't work if though my
monitor is capable of displaying them. But with pure DVI, every resolution
works.
 
T

Tom Scales

Fidelis K said:
Probably, there is an issue with the DVI-to-VGA converter & the ATI driver
(you're using a DVI --> DVI & VGA split cable, right?). If I use a DVI-to
VGA converter with my X1900GT, some resolutions don't work if though my
monitor is capable of displaying them. But with pure DVI, every resolution
works.

I agree with that, but the specifications page on the Dell site lists
1920x1200 as a supported VGA resolution. Weird, huh
 
F

Fidelis K

I agree with that, but the specifications page on the Dell site lists
1920x1200 as a supported VGA resolution. Weird, huh

It's not weird. I know that the Dell 2405 accurately displays 1920x1200 if
you connect it to a pure VGA out because I used to own one. But, you're
using a split cable that converts DVI to VGA.
 
T

Tom Scales

Fidelis K said:
It's not weird. I know that the Dell 2405 accurately displays 1920x1200 if
you connect it to a pure VGA out because I used to own one. But, you're
using a split cable that converts DVI to VGA.

It's not converting anything. VGA is on a subset of the pins in a DVI
connector. It's standard VGA output.
 

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