Computer Help - Displaying from my laptop VGA-Component

[Mr Unoriginal]

I'm trying to display my laptop to my HD LCDTV. I'm using a VGA-Component cable to plug into my television. The TV is displaying an image that is my computer screen but the screen is basically crappy and un-readable. The colors seem off and in the best case scenario, the desktop image is shown 3 times on my television. Is there something I'm missing?

[crystalklear64]

Could be a bunch of things. Your TV just might not have good support for it, the cable could be bad, your resolution could be off, drivers might need updating.

[Mr Unoriginal]

Could be a bunch of things. Your TV just might not have good support for it, the cable could be bad, your resolution could be off, drivers might need updating.

Hmm doesn't look good for me then I think. I tried upgrading the drivers to my video card in my Toshiba Satellite, but for whatever reason, the program they tell me to download doesn't work.

How should the resolution be set?

[SOSTrooper]

Are you saying you have this cable (http://www.aitech.com/products/product_images/HDView_VGA_component.jpg) hooked up between your laptop and the HDTV? Does your TV not have a VGA port to accept the typical VGA-to-VGA cable (http://www.musicxpc.com/images/products/s2_images/dual_vga_cable.jpg)?

You'll want to tell us the HDTV brand & model that you got, as well as your laptop model (Toshiba Satellite something). Most recent and newer laptops should be able to support HDTV (16:9) resolutions. If your TV supports up to 720P/1080i, then you should set the resolution to 1366×768 in your VGA output. If your TV does 1080P, then your resolution should set to 1920x1080 (though 1366x768 will still work).

[Mr Unoriginal]

Are you saying you have this cable (http://www.aitech.com/products/product_images/HDView_VGA_component.jpg) hooked up between your laptop and the HDTV? Does your TV not have a VGA port to accept the typical VGA-to-VGA cable (http://www.musicxpc.com/images/products/s2_images/dual_vga_cable.jpg)?

You'll want to tell us the HDTV brand & model that you got, as well as your laptop model (Toshiba Satellite something). Most recent and newer laptops should be able to support HDTV (16:9) resolutions. If your TV supports up to 720P/1080i, then you should set the resolution to 1366×768 in your VGA output. If your TV does 1080P, then your resolution should set to 1920x1080 (though 1366x768 will still work).

Yes, that is the cable I have. The laptop is a Toshiba Satellite A205. The TV is a Sony Wega KDF-42E2000.

The TV does support 720p/1080i but I can't set my laptop resolution higher than 1280/800.

The TV may have a VGA that I missed, but I did look and feel around back there and I didn't find anything.

[SOSTrooper]

It seems like your TV supports up to 1280 x 720 Pixels, so see if you have that setting. A quick search shows that your TV doesn't have VGA port, but has 2 HDMI. If you're still unable to get a clear image on your TV through that cable it might be simply a cable problem like crystalklear said. I've never used that kind of cable before so I'm not sure how well they fare up against other types of cables (VGA to VGA, Component output cable (http://c1.neweggimages.com/NeweggImage/productimage/14-121-237-07.jpg)) in terms of image quality. Your laptop is new enough to support HDTV resolutions so it's unlikely to be a laptop/drivers problem.

[Plac1d]

My Toshiba 1080p HDTV won't display any resolutions above 1366×768 with a VGA cable. For whatever reason, a HDMI cable must be used if I want to use my TV's full resolution. Maybe your TV caps the resolution like mine? If your laptop has a DVI port, this may aid (http://www.monoprice.com/products/product.asp?c_id=102&cp_id=10231&cs_id=1023104&p_id=2505&seq=1&format=2) your troubles.

[Mr Unoriginal]

I'll try messing with the resolution from my laptop. As far as my TV goes, I don't see any way to manually change the resolution for a particular input.

Placid, my tV does have HDMI so I could try a VGA to HDMI cable next. Do you think I would have better luck or would it be the same thing as the component?

[SOSTrooper]

I'll try messing with the resolution from my laptop. As far as my TV goes, I don't see any way to manually change the resolution for a particular input.

Placid, my tV does have HDMI so I could try a VGA to HDMI cable next. Do you think I would have better luck or would it be the same thing as the component?

TV resolution is adjusted based on the input signal, so there's no way to change it from the TV, on any TV.

There is no such thing as straight through VGA to HDMI cable for computer. A cable like this (http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.13189) is not compatible with computer's VGA signal. You'll need an analog-to-digital signal converter box which usually cost around $200 in order for you to output VGA (analog) signal to HDMI (digital).

One thing you can do though, is to connect the laptop to an external computer monitor (LCD or CRT) to see if the VGA to VGA signal is fine. This eliminates the possibility that the VGA output on your laptop is wonky.