I searched the boards, but can’t find an answer that helps, at least one that I can understand.
My laptop (HP Pavilion ze4805us) has an S-cable port, as does my television. I want to play videos stored on my laptop through the tv. I connected them, and can’t get the video to export. Am I missing some software? Can this even be done?
somewhere on the laptop there should be a function key to switch your output between the LCD that is attached to the laptop and an outside source. It is likely on one of the Fkeys and has a small picture of two monitors next to one another. That key should change the display output if a second one is available.
Yes, it can be done. Go into Control Panel -> Display. Go to Settings, if your video drivers are properly installed you’ll see two rectangles labeled 1 and 2. Number 2 should be your TV-out, click on that and check the box “Extend my Windows Desktop to this monitor”. Now your TV out should be working and you can drag windows to TV (usually on the right, although you can change that).
This applies to XP, YMMV.
There are two different methods being described here; they both work, but they do slightly different things; holding down the FN key and pressing the key with the screen icon should cycle between one, the other and both displays, but the output on both will be the same; activating the second monitor in display properties will create a brand new bit of desktop on the second monitor.
Unless your video player software has specific dual-monitor capability, you probably want the first method; if you go for the extended desktop, you’ll probably find it hard or impossible to get a playback window maximised on the second monitor; you may even find that playback in a window just shows black when dragged across to screen 2.
This wasn’t mentioned, but it’s important. On most TVs, you have to use the remote to “tell” the TV that you want it to look for a video signal on the S-video input. There is probably a button on the remote labelled “Input”, “TV/Vid”, “Video” or some similar thing. Some TVs include the S-video and baseband inputs in the channel sequence, so that tuning down below channel 2 or above the highest programmed channel will bring them up, as well. A very few TVs will automatically switch to the S-video when a video sync signal is present, but most require a manual input change as above.
There was not a function key that got this to work.
What do you mean by “drag windows to TV”?
Thanks for your help, I was surprised how little help Google was!
This is for the 500 series but it may work for your unit
HP z540, z545, z552, z555, and z557 Digital Entertainment Centers - Setting Up Composite Video and S-video
If you set up the machine to use the s-video output as a second monitor (by enabling the second monitor in the Display Properties dialog, Windows will create a new area of desktop, extended across both screens; half of the total desktop will be visible on your laptop’s own screen and the other half will be visible on whatever device (TV in your case) is displaying the s-video output; when you move your mouse off the right-hand side of the laptop display, it will appear on the TV; if you happen to be dragging an application window when you do this, it will move off your laptop’s display and appear on the TV.
The alternative (and better, in your case, I believe) solution is to hold down the Fn key and press the key that has a little monitor symbol on it; it should work something like this:
First press: laptop screen goes blank, desktop appears on TV
second press: desktop appears on both devices
third press: TV goes blank, laptop screen remains visible.
…as I said before; if you do it with the function key, you usually just get exactly the same desktop echoed on both displays, not a large desktop extended across two devices.
Thank you! I got it working, now to start knocking off some of these videos I’ve been accumulating!