Billsotx Report post Posted May 23, 2007 (edited) How can I determine if a new flat screen monitor will work with my machine? I've been looking at 17" and 19". Sales people have done nothing except add to my questions and have no answers. My computer is about 7 years old - HP Pavillion 520c if that worth knowing. Came with Win. XP; the HP monitor is a CRT - Pavilion mx70 if that may help in the determination. I would appreciate any advice you guys can give. I'm hoping to get a little bigger surface and font size that easier for ol' eyes, but I may be barking up the wrong tree. Oh, one sales guy told me that a wide screen would be so distorted it would be unreadable, another told me that could be adjusted, but I'd only be using about 15" of the screen. - I should have said that I'm not really intrested in the wide screen, but they kept taking me to them. Edited May 23, 2007 by Billsotx Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
dsenette Report post Posted May 23, 2007 Oh, one sales guy told me that a wide screen would be so distorted it would be unreadable, another told me that could be adjusted, but I'd only be using about 15" of the screen. i don't know of the COMPLETE accuracy of either of these two statments....but with a 7 year old computer...you've surely got a 7 year old video card...that video card is probably not capable of the resolution settings that an LCD monitor is capable of using.. the part about the widescreen probably has some truth in it...an older graphics card wouldn't know how to display anything widescreen for sure.. however...i THINK that even with an older computer you'd be able to get an LCD/Plasma screen to work assuming that it's got a VGA input and that it's a square monitor not widescreen at all... another concideration is that with LCD/plasma monitors....there's a setting in XP called "clear type" which makes the text on the screen alot crisper....if your computer has XP then this would help it is possible that you could upgrade your video card to take care of ever last one of these issues though....the processor or age of the computer as a whole has no real bearing on the display resolution...that's all controlled by the graphics card..you could probably find a lower end PCI graphics card that would work perfectly on your ocmputer at bestbuy or any other computer shop for $100 or so. Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Beaverslayer Report post Posted May 23, 2007 Hi Bill, You should not have any problems with a wide screen. Personally I wouldn't go bigger than a 19" as the 21 and 23 inch ones are very big and kinda hard on the eyes. I had a 23" and had to sell it to my friend and go to the 19" as it was to big and to close to my eyes for such large images...it looked real nice but to big. But as to working on your computer, I see no problems with what you have, the monitor should come with a disk that has all the proper drivers for it to run on XP. Ken Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
CitizenKate Report post Posted May 23, 2007 Bill, The video card or chipset that came with your computer will probably have problems working with an LCD monitor, regardless of the format. But you should be able to install a newer video card that will support the newer display technology. All you need to know is what type of video card slot your computer has - most likely it will be PCI or possibly AGP. Most of the video cards you buy today should support LCD technology, and as long as you buy one to fit the type of slot you have, it should be pretty easy to upgrade your system. Kate Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
Billsotx Report post Posted May 24, 2007 Thanks for all your replies. I'm not familiar with video cards or chipset. I'll take the thing to a shop and get it done. I appreciate y'all sharing advice with me. talk later . . . . Quote Share this post Link to post Share on other sites
