Kate's Comment
Thoughts on British ICT, energy & environment, cloud computing and security from Memset's MD
Using TV screens as monitors (how to fix overscan/zoom)
I have a fairly cheap and generic 32″ LG 1080p screen connected to my media computer (a Mac Mini) as a backup to the projector which doesn’t work well during the day time. We mainly use that machine for watching stuff from Netflix (astonishing quality by the way!).
In my office I also have three 27″ Samsung SyncMaster TA550/T27A550 LED screens which I’ve recently used for a very successful little Xbox Halo: Reach LAN party (see left). 🙂 They appear to be perfectly adequate for gaming despite a 5ms response time. Accepted wisdom is that you need a 2ms response time for gaming, but I think that’s rubbish – humans cannot detect delays of less than about 20ms! I also selected the T27A550 because I wanted 27″ LED screens with VESA mounts on the back – not that many wall-mountable options it turns out!
I also intend to use the three screens in my office for work. In fact I’m typing on one now rigged up as the second screen for my Mac Air; it seems quite happy driving the screen at 1920×1080 via a moshi adapter, while also driving its built in screen. I’ve yet to decide how to drive the other two. I may use a DisplayLink device and my ‘Air or I might get another machine to drive them. I intend to use them as monitoring boards (network ops on one, sales/marketing stats on the other) rather than additional workspace, though it would be nice to have Tweetdeck/whatever open on one too. I have standardised around HDMI as the interface (see below for why I don’t use expensive cables though!).
However, when I first started using the screens there was “overscan” – the edges of the picture did not quite fit. See the picture on the right for what I mean. On the media PC it was mildly irritating and I tried fixing it with the “underscan” setting in the Mac’s system preferences.
This was far from ideal since it lost some of the crispiness. In the end I just accepted that I could not see the status bar on that computer if using that screen – I normally contolled it remotely from my laptop via VNC anyway.
But with the new office screens that was not acceptable. This weekend I invested a bit of time rummaging in the monitors’ options and found the answer: by default they all are programmed to “zoom” slightly. Not sure why that’s the case but it is possible to tell them to just display what they are getting on their HDMI imputs pixel-for-pixel. The image on the left shows the LG with the status bar now visible (ie. no overscan / zoom), without using the computer’s “underscan” facility. I must have navigated around the menus several times before stumbling across the necessary setting, confusingly masked by a picture size/aspect ratio setting of 16:9. Apparently in screen manufacturer land, 16:9 actually means “chop off the edges”. Who knew!
Anyway, on the LG you press menu then go into “Picture Mode” then “Aspect ratio” and change from “16:9” to “Just scan”. See below:
On the Samsungs it was Menu -> Picture -> Screen adjustment -> Picture Size, then change from “16:9” to “Screen Fit”. See below:
HDMI cables
As an aside, no I do not pay lots of money for HDMI cables. HDMI is a digital signal, not analogue like with VGA cables, so it makes no difference. It will either work or not work. I have seen one edge case with a cable that was too long, but it would lose sync every few seconds briefly – not some gradual degredation of quality as the morons in shops would have you believe. See this article from CNET on why all HDMI cables are the same for more info!
How utterly odd. One thought on why TVs may zoom slightly, it may be to remove any spurious odd lines at the top or bottom of the transmission. Very occasionally a PC TV card I’ve got shows one or two green lines flickering across the bottom of the picture. It may be unrelated, but if there is a conversion issue from old analogue programmes to digital TV format and, for whatever reason, they differ by a line or two, it may lead to odd lines and zooming slightly would then remove them. I am guessing consideranly here, mind!
I am reading this on a Sony Bravia monitor that is conveniently desk sized, able to be wall mounted and very savvy about being a PC monitor. It offers the option of exact representation of my laptop screen resolution, a slightly stretched version and a stretch out to the borders. As TV/film makers are aware of the overscanning predilection of television set makers (stops customers from feeling cheated and complaining about 29 inch pictures on 30 inch receivers), I use the fully stretched out version without any significant problems; were my laptop to output 1920×1080, then the image would fill the screen exactly with the ability to individually adjust over/under scanning. I guess this is an advantage of so many TV broadcasters using Sony kit.
Even more impressive is the TV’s ability to connect directly to the internet, letting me watch iPlayer, YouTube, LoveFilm etc in HD. I can use my laptop as a keyboard, if required, plays USB sticks or media servers and interacts with other wired and wireless devices.
I had intended getting a Samsung or LG monitor, but my requirement for 1080p, IP awareness and a 24 inch screen narrowed the field considerably.
TV manufacturers picked up their nasty habits during the days that ‘bottles’ were first used to reproduce broadcast signals.
Thank you! Just got a new LG TV and had been struggling with this.
Oh hey switching 16:9 to “Screen Fit” on my Samsung TV did the trick! Thanks for the info! As a note, The NTSC standard overscans so setting your TV to 16:9 makes it assume you are using it as a TV, not as a monitor.
Brilliant! ‘Just Scan’ and it’s sorted 🙂
Late to the game, but normal TV signals transmit extra info around the edges, hence the reason for any overscan at all.
For a Sharp TV go to View mode and hit “Dot by dot” instead of “stretch”
Thanks, worked great
I have an LG TV, and your advice to look for “Just Scan” worked perfectly. Thank you! This was a tremendous time saver.
the over scan is not a good option if you go to the source option for Samsung TVs then tools and rename the HDMI source to pc it gets rid of the over scan and quality becomes a lot better in the native screen resolution.
nicely explained is the manufacturers website.
just the fix i needed. thanks. Youre a star!
thank you thank you thank you thank you thank you.
This is the clearest most well explained solution to anything I’ve ever needed to internet to help me out with. Thank you for that! 🙂
Thank you! I’ve been using my LG as the monitor for years and suddenly it switched itself back to 16:9 and I spent the last hour messing with display settings before finding this article and fixing it in 5 seconds.
Thank you!
I had been struggling 3,5 hours with my LG TV and I finally have it properly installed.
I went as you suggested to
Menu -> Picture -> Screen adjustment -> Picture Size
there I selected 16:9 aspect ratio and then I scrolled down to a menu I didn’t know was there:
Screen(RGB/PC)->Auto Config
That did it!!!!
Thank you so much for your advice!
A warm hug from Mexico.
Ivan
“This is the clearest most well explained solution to anything I’ve ever needed to internet to help me out with. Thank you for that! 🙂 ”
Nothing to add – thanks and all the best
Best solution. Hats off
I cant get the option to just scan 🙁 whyyy
One note…. I am on a Mac, bought Samsung 32 LED 1080 5000 series. In the Mac monitor preferences “overscan” is checkmarked by default. I unchecked it and it shrunk and had over an inch of black all around. Went into Samsung menu to picture options>Size>screen fit….. nothing happened. The fix is to have “overscan” in mac monitor preferences selected. That way “screen fit” will scale down, it will not scale up !!
Ivan V – thank you so much! Finally figured it out after your help. Had to scroll to the BOTTOM of the “Menu -> Picture” screen!
Thank you for this tip. I’m using a macbook pro and a 32″ samsung and I could not work out why I was loosing the top menu of my mac on the tv screen. Now I can see it by using the Stretch screen. It has however shrank slightly on the sides, but I don’t care much for that.
Although my tv is full HD the colours are slightly washed out compared to the screen on my mac, (which is not HD by the way). I take it that that’s how it’s going to be really..! I fooled around with the settings on the mac and decided that the 1080i setting with the 50Hz for PAL gives me the best results, though no perfect. Any suggestions for this, would be equally helpful…THANK YOU…
@Zach are you using a Samsung TV?
Thanks! That was so NOT obvious – and I thought I knew what I was looking for too. Fit to screen, or whatever it’s called, did not sound like an overscan setting.
Thanks for the advice on fixing this sort of problem. I tried it on my TV after losing a bit of the picture when hooking up my HTPC to the TV and it worked fine afterwards!
Hello.I have a Medion MD20099 32 inch tv.When I use it with my PC (via VGA cable) my screen is fit on the center of the TV(not by the bottom and top edges,but it has black background on left and right).When i’m using it as a TV,my picture is a little bit cut off on edges,but It’s much better than PC screen. eg. I can’t see the sport scores,or I can see half of the channel sign,I can’t see half of the subtitles,etc. I hope you can help me and thanks in advance. 🙂
@Jovan Have you checked that you’re in the correct aspect ratio and not zoomed in or anything? I’ve never owned a Medion TV so I can’t really advice. Best bet is to explore all the menu options and buttons exhaustively I’m afraid!
The overscan issue IS tedious. For me it is resolved by attaching a 1080p Vaio laptop to a Bravia 1080p screen – its ALLLLLL native. And quite lovely with it. Am about to investigate 4K, my failing eyesight appreciates very high definition, my brain rebels at low refresh rates. I bet 4K will take some refreshing.
Okay i had a similiar problem,Now the fact is im using as a second monitor my tv plasma samsung And when i try to open even if i minimized or maximized and again normal screen nothink doesnt came up with…I hear the halo music but i cant see it on my screen What should i do please help me!
Should i have to go on halo properties ? I wish if there was a bottom saying except windows 7 if you wanna run this program also tv lol 😀
What you have tried max from so far?
Did you check your video resolutions
Well,dude As far as i know Because i have tried it You can change the settings from the main menu.
My mum had to take me my pc and i thought might be able the tv screen works on the pc as a second monitor and guess what i had right.The fact is i can play any other game i wish too but Halo combat evolved or custom edition i hear the sound perfect normally but i cannot see it On my screen i see only what i have set up as a background blue lagoon 😛 Well,if anyone can help me i would apreciate it i do not mind if there is a girl also in the conversation i will accept any advice
Thanks alot! This was bugging me for ages 🙂
Thank you Kate! I was close to just having to live with having underscan and a slightly fuzzy screen.
I just bought a mac mini, and connected it to Samsung via HDMI. I adjusted the under scan on the mac system preferences. I get the top bar now.
Thx a lot
Thanks! I have been trying to resolve this problem for most of today. Goodness knows how my new LG 55 inch switched aspect settings. Good though its magic remote is, sitting on one or putting it in your pocket can cause all manner of setting changes.
wow… I had the same problem on my samsung. your solution for LG worked the same way for samsung. thank you!
just scan option it worked for me thanks!
Thank you! I was looking all over for an overscan setting, not sure I would have through to try that Just Scan option.
Had the same problem, then found this article.
Many thanks, it worked.
I use Intel Compute Stick as mentioned here > http://www.giftick.com/raj/20/ to use my television as a computer monitor and I don’t face any such problems you mentioned. My son wanted to play internet games over television with bigger screen and this stick worked.
thanks a lot…it was really driving me nuts..i usually stream live sports on my Samsung HDTV
Thank you!! Been looking for days for this solution and this was it!!
Thanks! – 2016
I picked up a HiSense F24V77C on Craigslist for $60. It’s a fine TV (24″ 1080p), but it is absolutely terrible as a monitor for this reason. There is no way to disable the overscan!
I can do it through DisplayLink, but when I have two DisplayLink monitors connected, the “Fit to TV” function is disabled.
Even when I do manage to get the display scaled down properly, the text always looks fuzzy and hard to read. So I’m selling it on Craigslist with that full disclosure, hoping to find someone who doesn’t care to use it as a monitor.
HiSense doesn’t even have an owner’s manual for this thing anymore because it’s an older model. They told me they couldn’t find it, which is completely absurd. Manufacturers should ALWAYS archive their owner’s manuals and make them available online.
Thank you so much for sharing this solution. It worked great for me.