Why is displayport a steaming pile of crap?

[VirtualLarry]

And I thought I had enough troubles with the relatively-standard (by now) HDMI. Not sure that I would want to switch to DisplayPort.

Part of it appears to be my monitors, my 24" Westinghouse HDTVs. I plugged one of them into the HDMI port on my PNY LP GT430 card in Win7 64-bit HP, and the NV driver at the time would lose the HDMI audio if the monitor went to sleep, or I power it down and powered it back up. Had similar problems with my AMD/ATI HD4850 card, using an ATI DVI-to-HDMI adapter. If I had the monitor powered up first, then turned the computer on, I would get HDMI audio. But if I let the monitor sleep, or powered it down and back up again, the AMD drivers would complain about a DVI-to-HDMI adapter detected, and disable the HDMI audio. Nevermind that the AMD/ATI card was advertised as supporting HDMI audio throught the DVI-I port, using the included ATI DVI-to-HDMI dongle. But strange that their drivers don't seem to like that arrangement.

(Although, I got it to work much better, by running the HDMI through a monoprice 3-way HDMI switcher. Apparently, it kept the HDMI audio connection "live" somehow.)

 

[saratoga172]

Using display port currently as my connectivity at work for the past year. Two different laptops. Lenovo t510 with integrated Intel graphics and now an m3800 with both integrated and a k1100m. Never had an issue. Using this with a Dell u2713h monitor.

Use a home with two dell u3011 monitors and used a gtx690 for over a year and now dual 780ti's. Never an issue.

What monitor are you using?

 

[smakme7757]

Yep, its awesome.
Only problem I can mention was a time when it wouldn't work with Debian Gnu/Linux with dual monitors. I think that is solved now though.

 

[Black Octagon]

Only ever had one issue, on the Samsung 950D where signal would randomly cut and only restore with an unplug and replug

Not necessarily DP's fault though. It's all but confirmed that that monitor (plus the 750D model) has some kind of mismatch between the DP version it supports and the version it asks the GPU to send. I.e., Samsung messed up on these particular models

 

[Black Octagon]

I actively want Displayport to take over everything as it is an open standard and more robust than the alternatives. Given their efforts thus far, I'm hopeful that DP2.0 will be able to handle 8K@120Hz... but that's obviously far into the future.

My thoughts exactly, Jack. Though USB is powering ahead in fascinating ways, too

 

[Lepton87]

My monitor doesn't detect that it's even connected to a graphics card using DP. It worked for a while and then I had the cable disconnected and it just stop working just like that. Using DVI now, not a big deal, my audio is connected through optical SPDIF to my Hi-Fi amplifier. My Audio system cost as much as my computer so why would I be using those tiny monitor speakers?

 

[Bateluer]

Never really had an issue.

 

[Puffnstuff]

I run display port myself and some issues can be attributed to not using the correct cable.

 

[AdamK47]

I can't even use Displayport with the two cables I've tried. No signal at all at POST or in Windows. If I have both the DVI-D cable connected and the Displayport cable connected the NVidia control panel will show DVI-D active (green) and Displayport disabled (dark grey).

I read a little today about cables being non-complient with 20 pins. I think the two I have are non-complient. Is there a guide that shows how to remove the non-complient pin? I think this may solve the issue, but I'm not sure.

 

[CakeMonster]

If you feel like it, go and chase that lead, but from what I can gather after being annoyed by this for a couple of years, those pins never fixed anything, its just something being suggested by customer representatives who have no real solution and just want to stall. There's people being plagued by this for years on the Dell forums who bought lots of cables only to find out it did nothing. I've given up and accepted that what you need to do is make a black screensaver, never turn off your monitors, and disable sleep.

 

[lavaheadache]

I can't even use Displayport with the two cables I've tried. No signal at all at POST or in Windows. If I have both the DVI-D cable connected and the Displayport cable connected the NVidia control panel will show DVI-D active (green) and Displayport disabled (dark grey).

I read a little today about cables being non-complient with 20 pins. I think the two I have are non-complient. Is there a guide that shows how to remove the non-complient pin? I think this may solve the issue, but I'm not sure.

Adam.. I have removed the pin in a cable. Cable still worked and problem still existed.

 

[dave_the_nerd]

Using it one my machine at home. It's fine. Using it on my machine at work. It's fine there too.

 

[CakeMonster]

But do you keep those machines on for days and weeks at the time?

 

[dave_the_nerd]

But do you keep those machines on for days and weeks at the time?

My work machine has been up 21 days. But I've disabled the lowest-power sleep mode so I can wake it up and log in remotely. That might have something to do with it.

My home machine is power cycled a bit more frequently - probably every week or two. I turn the monitor off manually most of the time, though - if I don't, when the computer goes to sleep, the monitor cycles over to the VGA input from my server.

 

[Lepton87]

If you feel like it, go and chase that lead, but from what I can gather after being annoyed by this for a couple of years, those pins never fixed anything, its just something being suggested by customer representatives who have no real solution and just want to stall. There's people being plagued by this for years on the Dell forums who bought lots of cables only to find out it did nothing. I've given up and accepted that what you need to do is make a black screensaver, never turn off your monitors, and disable sleep.

Why not just use DVI if DP is giving you so many problems? Do you need its capability to transmit audio or is it something else? Are there DP only monitors?

 

[CakeMonster]

I use DVI.

I've had 1600p + 1440p monitor for many years now. Those need DualLink-DVI or DP to work at native resolution. But I need 2 DL-DVI. So with my AMD 6970 and then 7970, which both have 2 x DVI but only one of them supporting DL, I was forced to use DP for one of the monitors and this bug drove me crazy.

When I got my 780 which had 2 DVI ports, but now finally supporting DL-DVI on both ports, my problem was solved. Then I was able to turn off my 2nd monitor when not using the PC, saving lots of power + wear and tear and not worrying about all my window positions being messed up from the monitor "disappearing".

My current problem is I can't really upgrade since the industry is moving to more DP, sacrifising the 2nd DVI port on all 980s I've seen. A few 970s have 2 DL-DVI but a 970 is not an upgrade. The very short sweet spot for us who want to avoid DP for dual 1440p+ monitors was the 780 and 290, the only generations (save for a few 970s) who had 2 DVI ports both supporting DL-DVI.

 

[imagoon]

There is an option:

http://www.monoprice.com/Product?c_id=104&cp_id=10428&cs_id=1042802&p_id=6904&seq=1&format=2

To bad it costs so much.

 

[CakeMonster]

AFAIK that does nothing different than an active adapter. The output is still DP, it will still lose sync no matter what you convert it to later in the chain. I have tried several of those adapters that came with various cards.

 

[imagoon]

AFAIK that does nothing different than an active adapter. The output is still DP, it will still lose sync no matter what you convert it to later in the chain. I have tried several of those adapters that came with various cards.

They work for me. I have a pile of DP -> DVI boxes for my monitors. They work great with the DVI boxes. Via DP -> fails all the time, everytime.

It is actually fairly annoying because I have to (mini-DP -> DP -> DVI) x 2 so I have an entire string of crap strung behind the computer.

 

[StinkyPinky]

I've had more issues with HDMI.

 

[postmortemIA]

I've had too many issues with both HDMI and DisplayPort. DP is way worse, if monitor is not on, adapter would not see it at all, so on dual monitor setups it would constantly turn off the second monitor.

 

[CP5670]

Why not just use DVI if DP is giving you so many problems? Do you need its capability to transmit audio or is it something else? Are there DP only monitors?

The one I have (Samsung S27A750D) only has DP and HDMI inputs, and requires DP to get 120hz. I used to use one of those active DVI-DP converters with it. The converter allowed it to wake up from sleep properly, but introduced other strange issues of its own.

 

[Chaoticlusts]

I've only been using it a few days (My new card only has one DVI port so one monitor had to switch to DP or HDMI) but I haven't had any major issues.

It doesn't display on boot but I assumed that was an issue with my MB (dated bios or something) since the other monitor is on DVI that's not a big deal. The only other thing that's happened is even though I switched the audio output off in windows after a game crash it decided to re-enable itself causing me to sit there wondering why my headphones where suddenly very quiet and distant .

Honestly I had way more problems with HDMI (although this could be the circuitry of the monitor not sure) where when I plugged it in it refused to display as a 60hz 1200p monitor and instead was recognised as a TV I think and seemed to be putting out a 30hz low colour 1080p signal or something? (not sure but it looked awful).

I think it comes down too the fact that more 'intelligent' methods of communication allow for more errors on either end of the process if some idiot forgets something(I mean idiots designing the hardware/software ^_^). The old dumb 'it just works' cables have their benefits there but the newer 'smarter' standards have a lot going for them even if they have issues. Change has to happen if we want adaptive sync/120hz 1440p/60hz 4K or any future features ^_^

 

[iCyborg]

DP is way worse, if monitor is not on, adapter would not see it at all, so on dual monitor setups it would constantly turn off the second monitor.

I hate this too. Sadly, this is not a bug, at least from what I've found - adapters use HPD (Hot Plug Detect) to detect if the other end is connected. DP spec requires monitors to put this signal to low when turned off, so adapters cannot distinguish between disconnected and turned off monitor. It's a stupid design/feature...

 

[StinkyPinky]

Sometimes my monitor just goes into standby with HDMI and won't come back on until I reboot the PC. Had that happen a few times when gaming. Such a POS standard. DVI is better.