Connecting Macbook to Sony Bravia 32" - Won't fill screen and not clear

I just picked up a Mini-DVI > DVI and DVI > HDMI cord today from my local Apple Store and hooked up my Macbook to my new Sony Bravia 32" HDTV. Unfortunately, I having some problems setting it up. My issues are:

I'm not sure how to make my TV the MAIN and ONLY display. I'd like to play games like WoW and watch movies from iTunes on it with the best possible quality and resolution.

When connected, the image doesn't fill the whole TV perfectly. It either gets cut off or has black borders. Using the TV's zoom fuction just distorts the image further and possibly cuts off the edges.

The quality is less than what I was hoping for. Text is hard to read and pixilated and images just don't look that great. I suspect this might be because it's not filling the whole screen but I am unsure.

I'd really appreciate detailed instructions on how to deal with the software side of this since my connection is fine.

TV's are not made to display computer text. It just is not going to look good on a TV because the pixels are bigger than computer displays. The MacBook may also not support your TVs native resolution and that may be why the image is being cut off.

I've read many people's threads saying they got this working with "perfect picture". As for TVs not being made to show computer text, aren't modern HDTV's basically just big LCD monitors? I'm sure my Xbox 360's text would look great. Is there no way I can make this look better?

They are but they use larger pixels than the pixels in computer monitors. Computer monitors are usually higher resolution on a smaller area and TVs are lower resolution over a larger area. An Xbox is designed to be used on a tv and the designers took TVs larger pixels into account when creating the consoles text. You may be able to improve the picture some but I don't think text will ever look great. Try going into system pref->display properties and adjusting the resolution to your TVs native resolution and see what that gets you.

well to make your TV the main you should just have to make your settings as do not do anything when you close to laptop ... hook it up to the TV, set the comp to share (extend) the display (windows) from your comp to the tv..then close the lid.. it should default to the TV as your main screen... if you have any other questions send me a message... i have a PC but the concept should be the same i have a 46" samsung LCD (1080p) and i watch downloaded movies all the time on it...

p.s. also you could just extend the screen and drag the itunes window over to the TV and maximizes the window.. on the TV then do what ever you want

I have mine hooked up to a 32" vizio using mini dvi to VGA and it looks dandy. The resolution is 1366x768 at 65Hz. I get black boarders on the right and left sides. I think this is just the way the macbook works. I don't think it is capable of filling the entire screen of a large LCD TV.

The macbook is incapable of pushing apple's 30" monitor, so I would assume it would have trouble with any LCD TV or monitor at or higher.

The best you can do is play around with your display preferences. Make sure you have mirroring turned on and if it is there, uncheck the box for over scan.

What does the monitor name say when you plug your LCD into your macbook? Mine reads VX32L, which is the model # for my LCD. If your LCD reads something other than the name or the model #, maybe you have old or incompatible drivers installed in your LCD? Who knows? It just may never live up to your expectations?

Mine looks fine though, except for the boarders on the sides. But I have no distortion, text is legible and pictures and movies are sharp and crisp.

You can also try switchResX:

http://www.madrau.com/html/SRX/indexSRX.shtml

I hope you get it working to your liking!

I have a first generation PPC Mac Mini hooked up to a 37" Vizio LCD television at 17 hundred something by something else resolution and don't get black borders. In fact it looks quite fine. I only use it for watching movies/TV shows, however, but it looks quite nice. I haven't hooked up my Macbook with the mini-DVI connector, but I'm sure it would perform similarly.

While HD televisions are essentially big monitors they are pretty much optimized for viewing uh, well, television rather than text.

I run my desktop on a 32" monitor using dvi - vga because its a tv and obviously does not have a dvi input. It looks great however one day i decided to get a dvi - hdmi convertor to see what would happen if i plugged it in through hdmi and it looked shocking i mucked around with heaps of display settings and ended up going back to vga haha. Point here is maybe try getting the mini dvi to component input you'd be suprised just how much which input you use changes things. Hope you get it fixed though, i know how frustrating it can be..

U mite need overscann to be turned on - My MB C2D - I turn it on with the MINIDVI to DVI plugged in - then runs HDMI cable to TV - as soon as it bongs- Close the lid - boots up with screen as main display - Knows what the TV is - ses samsung in name and configures it all itself - SOOO simple - PWNZ all the fuss my windows owning n00b friends have>

There are some good 3rd party software programs put out my video card manufacturers (ATI and Nvidia) that help with troubleshooting resolution.

dadsgravy said:

The macbook is incapable of pushing apple's 30" monitor, so I would assume it would have trouble with any LCD TV or monitor at or higher.

Click to expand...

I don't think that's the case, because the resolution on a 1080p TV (of any size), is still smaller than on the 23" ACD, which the Macbook supports (it's 1900x1200).

Text always looks fuzzy on TV's, and unless you're watching HD movies, I would do what dadsgravy did and go with a VGA connection.