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    Unusual external monitor disconnection

    Discussion in 'Hardware Components and Aftermarket Upgrades' started by DeusXM, Oct 29, 2008.

  1. DeusXM

    DeusXM Newbie

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    Having some trouble with an external HDTV…

    I’m running a Toshiba Satellite A210, with an ATi Mobility Radeon HD 2600. I’ve got this connected up to an HDTV through a VGA to VGA cable.

    Now, for ages, I was able to use the HDTV as an external monitor for the laptop without any problems at all. Then one afternoon, I was playing Crysis and had a massive system crash that required a hard reboot to fix. When I switched the laptop back on, it had stopped outputting to the HDTV. So I went into the Catalyst Control Centre to reconnect the monitor.

    CCC detected the presence of an external monitor, but when I set it up to output to the monitor, there was no signal. The HDTV didn’t even acknowledge any signal – usually if it’s set up incorrectly it pops up with an error saying ‘Invalid sync signal’, but I didn’t even get that.

    I disconnected the laptop, and a few days later I tried reconnecting it the HDTV, going through the exact same configuration mechanism – and this time, I got an output on the TV, no problems at all. But after a couple of hours or so, the TV just cut out, although the laptop carried on working absolutely fine. I tried reconnecting the TV (which was still detected by the laptop), but came up against the same problem I’d had before. I’ve also tried disconnecting the VGA cable entirely and reconnecting – again, the laptop discovers the TV and even claims to be outputting to it, but the TV remains dead.

    Where this gets really weird is that I’ve used an identical laptop with the TV and don’t have any problems at all – even if I connect it immediately after the first laptop cuts out. So there is no problem at all with the HDTV or the cables used to connect it, and there also doesn’t appear to be an problem with the configuration on the laptop. But the same thing keeps happening. The first laptop will interact fine with the TV for a couple of hours, then cut the output and refuse to connect for a day or so – despite the fact that the TV will accept outputs from identically configured laptops.

    I’ve checked all the sleep and screensaver settings (ie. switched them all off) and the physical connection between the TV and laptop (the cable isn't popping out the port) but the problem keeps happening. Any ideas why laptop 1 kills its output and refuses to output (despite detecting the TV) after a couple of hours, while identical laptop 2 has no problems at all?
     
    DeusXM, Oct 29, 2008
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  2. LPTP-LVR

    LPTP-LVR Notebook Deity

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    Did you try using the laptop with a different screen?
     
    LPTP-LVR, Oct 30, 2008
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