Video Monitor Delay -- what to do?

[Dave Labrecque]

Got my wide screen hooked up as the overlay out on my Matrox P750 so I can be better equipped to work on this HD film. Problem: the wide screen display (it's an LCD TV) appears to be about three frames behind SS's video viewer. Not good for critical lip sync issues (lots of ADR on this). Never noticed this issue when going into a regular ol' CRT TV.

Any ideas of what I can do about this? I checked the user manual for the TV and there's supposed to be a "lip sync" adjustment. Perfect! But it appears that they decided to pull that feature from my TV! Or maybe it was a feature that was added after mine was manufactured? I don't know. I bought it used and downloaded the manual. :(

I put a copy of the video region on another layer and slipped that one 3 frames. But that means that if I'm going to check sync by scrubbing, I've got to remember to look down at the video viewer AND switch back to the original layer. Not optimum for workflow.

Anybody have a way to deal with this?

BTW -- this is all using the composite input to the TV, coming from the S-video output of my Matrox (temporarily adapted to composite due to a missing cable). I don't imagine this delay will go away if I go to RGB or component or HDMI? I don't even think the P750 will do HDMI. Looks like it'll do DVI. Hmmm... what's the difference?

Thanks!

[Bob L]

This has been an issue that you will read about mostly on the gamer sites... there appears to be a delay on most HD tvs when playing back non-HD signals and having them up scale.

I ran into this when I built my video rig last Xmas... I solved it on my particular HD TV display by using the PC Input instead of the SVideo or RGB inputs.

It appeared to be the analog circuitry inside the TV that had the problem... going into the PC Input (which mine has) took away the delay issue.

Others have solved it by using an external scaling converter box that takes any input and forces the scaling to HD output of a certain format.

It was a nightmare to figure out... but it is very real.

Does your HD TV have a PC input? If so... try that instead of using the SVideo or RGB... the Matrox will do the overlay out the same way thru the second PC connection.

Bob L

[Dave Labrecque]

This has been an issue that you will read about mostly on the gamer sites... there appears to be a delay on most HD tvs when playing back non-HD signals and having them up scale.

I ran into this when I built my video rig last Xmas... I solved it on my particular HD TV display by using the PC Input instead of the SVideo or RGB inputs.

It appeared to be the analog circuitry inside the TV that had the problem... going into the PC Input (which mine has) took away the delay issue.

Others have solved it by using an external scaling converter box that takes any input and forces the scaling to HD output of a certain format.

It was a nightmare to figure out... but it is very real.

Does your HD TV have a PC input? If so... try that instead of using the SVideo or RGB... the Matrox will do the overlay out the same way thru the second PC connection.

Bob L

Thanks, Bob. Good to know that not all of the inputs (hopefully) suffer from this. Yes, I have an PC input on this thing. I hope the cable's not too pricey -- I've got to go about 25 ft.

Question: my LCD TV has a single "RGB PC" input. It looks to me just like a computer monitor multi-pin connector. Does that sound right? I ask because it sounds like you're making a distinction between RGB and PC inputs.

Thanks, again, for your help.

[Tim Miskimon]

It should be the 9 pin connector - the one that is the usual PC hookup cable.
By the way - I just hooked up my 28 inch wide screen monitor today - I love it.
One thing - I had a long cable that I was using with the 19 inch monitor (that the 28 inch replaced) - I always noticed that the quality was not as good as my second monitor but I thought that it was because the second monitor was a better monitor.
I found out today that it was that cable all along.
I hooked up another cable and now the monitor looks great.
I guess the long cable I bought a few years ago at a computer show was just a piece of junk.
So if you need to buy another cable make sure you spend the extra money and get a good one.
It's amazing how much of a differance a cable can make.

[Bob L]

Yes Dave... the regular looking VGA PC connector... the RGB inputs I referred to are the analog BNC connectors, which I thought would give the highest quality picture... not true.... for HD, the PC input has proved far better on my system... and interesting enough on my old JVC projector from my trade show days... there was no such thing as HD video back then... and the picture looked terrible coming in the analog inputs... it also had a PC connection and by using that... that old projector is giving me an incredible picture projection at almost 6 ft across... Giant HD from an old peice of gear that survived the fire.

Got to love that. :)

Bob L

[Dave Labrecque]

Yes Dave... the regular looking VGA PC connector... the RGB inputs I referred to are the analog BNC connectors, which I thought would give the highest quality picture... not true.... for HD, the PC input has proved far better on my system... and interesting enough on my old JVC projector from my trade show days... there was no such thing as HD video back then... and the picture looked terrible coming in the analog inputs... it also had a PC connection and by using that... that old projector is giving me an incredible picture projection at almost 6 ft across... Giant HD from an old peice of gear that survived the fire.

Got to love that. :)

Bob L

OK, we're all truly emasculated now that you've topped us all with your 6-foot HD monitor! :p Wow, that's gotta be sight.

OK, thanks on the PC clarification, Bob and Tim. Yeah, that's what it must be -- old-school VGA monitor connector. I bought a cable last night online. It was the highest quality cable I could find at cablesforless.com, so I'm hoping it'll be good. Only $11 (plus $8 priority mail).

We shall see... :)

[akdar]

I'm glad I came across this thread, I am experiencing the same problem with my new Samsung 52" LCD. I am currently using a DVI to HDMI cable. Now, my current video card only has DVI outputs. If I use a DVI to VGA adapter to go into my PC input (regular 9 pin VGA) on the Samsung, will I continue to experience the slight delay that I'm getting? Should I put my older (but still more than adequate for SS) analog video card in?? I noticed that even the meters in SS and SoundForge have a slight delay, really notice it on kick and snare, drives me nuts!!! I'll just switch to the PC input, with the DVI to VGA adapter, and see what happens, if that doesn't do the trick, I'll crack the case and put the video card in that just has VGA outs. Will report back.

[Bob L]

The issue is not on the PC side... it is in the HD TV... no guarentee whether you can get around the delay or not... but generally it seems using the PC input of the HD TV bypasses the ciruitry that adds the latency.

Bob L