Display Ubuntu from a laptop to TV

May 11, 2007 1:32 PM

How to play movies from my Ubuntu 7.04 laptop to an external TV source.

I recently upgraded my laptop to Ubuntu 7.04 and have all the latest updates. Everything runs great, but I cannot figure out how to make it display on an external TV via the built-in 3.5mm video jack. To be more exact, I use one cable to plug into the 3.5mm jack which then splits into 3 coax ends which plug into my TV. Right now, I can get audio from the connection to play on the TV, but no success for video display. In Windows, I could go to display settings and change the video source to change display sources without a problem using the same physical setup (so, yes, I could play video in Windows with the setup).
I tried getting drivers from ati, but it doesn't seem they have linux driver for the card (IGP 345m), and unfortunately Omega Drivers doesn't do linux support.

I'm also pretty much a linux noob, so be gentle!

posted by jmd82 to computers & internet (5 comments total)

Getting laptops to properly drive external displays is a problem in general for Linux distros now. The X server doesn't know how to switch output devices, roughly speaking. We're all waiting for Xorg 7.3 and XrandR 1.2 (scheduled for May; it should be in Ubuntu 7.10 in October.)

In the meantime, you could try the tack suggested here -- run a second X server with its own, independent configuration file.

If there's a noob-friendly solution to this one, I hope someone else knows it, 'cause I don't.
posted by Zed_Lopez at 2:59 PM on May 11, 2007

Well, the first problem I'd think about is whether the TV output is supported under Linux at all. A lot of ATI cards/chips are not, because ATI's proprietary drivers are so bad, and the open-source people are permanently behind the curve because ATI doesn't release much in the way of documentation.

You might try asking around or doing some research over at the GATOS project homepage, which is an attempt to add some more advanced features (incl. TV-out) to the opensource ATI drivers. In particular, take a look at their supported cards list and see if TV out support exists for your chip.

The only other thing to consider, if you haven't already, would be to try ATI's proprietary drivers for your card. I haven't looked, but I'm sure there's got to be a HOWTO around on ubuntuforums on how to use ATI's drivers with 7.04.
posted by Kadin2048 at 4:45 PM on May 11, 2007

On second reading, I see you've already tried ATI's drivers.

In that case, I think you have one final avenue to pursue, assuming the OSS ones don't work. There is a company (I know nothing about them) who seems to produce a third-party driver for some Linux-hostile video cards, including the IGP 345M. But just to be warned, they cost money.

There is an article describing one person's experiences using it on a Vaio laptop with a 345M here. I have no idea if video-out is supported, though; the article seems aimed mostly towards getting 3D acceleration working.
posted by Kadin2048 at 4:59 PM on May 11, 2007

Here's a recent article on the issue.

(And, yeah, what Kadin2048 said... it could be that the driver just plain doesn't support the feature.)
posted by Zed_Lopez at 9:49 AM on May 14, 2007

Thanks for the responses.
However, not much luck. Probably doesn't help being a linux n00b on a complicated matter.
I'll probably just end up partitioning with XP so I can play DVDs when need be while continuing to experiment and hopefully figure something out.
posted by jmd82 at 7:36 AM on May 16, 2007