My girlfriend just got me a new Samsung SyncMaster 913v monitor. The 19 inch screen is much better than my old monitor, but I have some trouble with videos. When I watch something on the new monitor, it plays fine at 100% size but this is often too small...the point of the monitor was to view video on a larger screen. So I switch to full screen mode, but when I do the video is a lot choppier, it doesn't run smoothly, as if there is a lag. I have changed my refresh rate to 70 hertz, the max it shows I allow. The listed response time for my monitor is 12ms, which is not 8, but by most reviews it seems 12 should be okay. Is there anything else I can do? Is this because the monitor is analog instead of DVI? Also, the store we got it from lists a DVI-D video cable as a recommended accessory for better video playback. Will this work with my monitor for better performance? I am hoping there is some fine tuning I can do or an accessory to improve playback rather than trying to return the monitor itself and start fresh, but I need to know the root cause.

Using a DVI cable should improve video performance. With the analogue cable the video card is converting a digital signal to analogue, sending it along the cable where the monitor converts the analogue signal back to digital to display it, all of which takes time. With DVI cable and a video card that has a DVI output, you eliminate all the digital-analogue/analogue - digital conversions that are going on. Stuart

Thanks a lot Stuart, I appreciate the advice and the swiftness of it too. I understand that the conversion between analog and digital slows down the display, I just wanted to make sure that a DVI cable would be compatible with my new Samsung SyncMaster 913v. It's listed as an analog monitor and I guess I don't really understand what that means with regard to displaying digital video. But as long as I'm not wasting money on a DVI cable that won't do me any good with my type of monitor, I will be happy to go out and get one. : )

The Samsung 913v doesn't have a DVI connector. It's an analog monitor.

Zorkil, that's kinda what I was wondering. Future Shop has a DVI cable listed for it as a recommended accessory, but the monitor itself is analog, so the cable wouldn't be compatible, right? Is this poor picture quality on the full screen version just typical with an analog monitor? It looks fine on the smaller version of the screen. Maybe there is some setting I am missing?