edwi.nl/og » tv http://edwi.nl/og Edwin Woudt's weblog Sat, 18 Apr 2009 00:15:42 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9 en hourly 1 Mac Mini early 2009 and your old TV http://edwi.nl/og/2009/04/07/mac-mini-early-2009-and-your-old-tv/ http://edwi.nl/og/2009/04/07/mac-mini-early-2009-and-your-old-tv/#comments Tue, 07 Apr 2009 17:27:44 +0000 edwin http://edwi.nl/og/?p=201 TVNot having jumped on the LCD or Plasma bandwagon, I still have a fine three year old CRT television in my living room. When I recently bought a Mac Mini (early 2009 edition), I could not get it to show any output on my TV. According to the Apple support tech: the newest Mac Mini’s do not support this combination anymore. As my previous PC was a Windows machine, I tried to Bootcamp in XP and try there, but even then I could not get it to work. I guess it’s the combination of the new GeForce 9400 graphics and the Mini-DVI to Video connector Apple sells.

Plasma and LCD TV’s usually have a DVI or HDMI input. However CRT TV’s usually only have S-Video or Composite inputs, which is a problem as the official connector does not work. However I found a solution by buying a special device that converts any VGA signal to S-Video, Composite or RGB. It’s the Konig PCTV adapter, and works like a charm:

  • Resolutions up to 1280×1024. Even though a CRT TV does not support resolutions like this, this is important if you want to run your TV in mirrored display mode with a normal computer monitor.
  • Outputs S-Video, Composite, RGB or YCbCr
  • PAL or NTSC
  • On Screen Display (OSD) to change various settings
  • It even has a remote control!

Found this device for €59 online, and had to buy a €19 Mini-DVI to VGA adapter from Apple. Way cheaper in any case than buying a new TV :)

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