Up and running, but no sound

[yman]

I'm about 90% complete with my first cabinet, but after hooking up my cab monitor, I have no sound.  My setup is as follows:

Windows XP
Atomic FE and/or Hyperspin
Mame 32 UI
Monitor - 27" Panasonic HD CRT TV - CT-27HC15 (speakers removed)
Cyber Acoustics CA-3550WB 2.1 Speakers
MSI R5450-MD1GD3H/LP Radeon HD 5450 1GB 64-bit DDR3 PCI Express 2.0 x16 video card - DVI, HDMI and VGA out

To set up the computer before installing it in the cab, I had it hooked up to an old PC monitor through the VGA port and speakers through the 3.5 mm rear output on the video card.  Everything ran fine.  I  installed the computer in the cabinet, planning to use the HDMI input on the TV as the input for the computer.  I know the HDMI sends the audio over the same cable, but I thought I would be able to output the audio through the on-board 3.5 mm audio jack.  Apparently, I was wrong.

Long story short, the HDMI connection works, but there's no sound.  Also, for whatever reason that I haven't yet figured out, the video quality is lousy - tiny lines criss-crossing the Windows desktop, even before entering Atomic FE or Hyperspin.  The screen is legible, but it's not clear.  So I have two questions I'm hoping someone might be able to offer some advice with:

1)  How to best connect the monitor so there's also sound to the speakers?  I found a thread on a MS forum on how to out simultaneously over the HDMI output and the audio jack, but the method is for those running Windows 7.  I already tried a VGA/HDMI cable from the PC to the TV, but there was no video.  I'm thinking of trying a DVI to HDMI next.  I'm assuming this would leave the on-board audio output intact, since the DVI from the PC would only carry a video signal.  Any other suggestions?

2)  Any explanations for the crappy video signal when outputting from the PC to the TV over HDMI?  I know the MAME resolutions are low, but it would be nice to have a better picture outside of MAME.

Any help would be greatly appreciated.  Thanks!

[yman]

Update - I got the sound working to my 2.1 speakers by disabling the ATI HD audio and using the onboard as the default - can't believe I didn't try that to begin with.

Any suggestions on the best way to connect the video?  I have HDMI connected now, but the picture quality in Windows is pretty bad.  I have DVI (with audio, apparently), HDMI and VGA out from my video card, and component, HDMI, S-video and RCA inputs on the TV.  I know the old arcade games are low-res, but I'd also like to be able to use the cab monitor as a jukebox, and possibly to stream movies from my HTPC for the kids.

[newmanfamilyvlogs]

Picture quality will probably be best HDMI once it's setup correctly.

What resolution are you sending it? I'm going to guess windows is sensing that it's 1080i capable and sending it 1920x1080. Since your screen is only capable of 1080i, that means it's displaying it interlaced, from the looks of the spec, using only 480 lines, which probably doesn't look that great.

Try switching it to the highest supported p resolution. According to the manual for your set:
http://service.us.panasonic.com/OPERMANPDF/CT27HC15N.PDF
That would be 480p, so the resolution you should use is 720x480.

Mame will probably be best set up by telling it to NOT switch resolutions. Filtering the image for crisp pixels or smooth interpolation is a personal choice.

Going with non-filtered will mean you will need a build of mame which supports "cleanstretch", that is the scaling of the pixels in exact integer multiples (eg a 320x240 game is displayed at 640x480). However doing this means that you will have both letterbox and pillarbox borders of various sizes as games that use less than 240 lines will be doubled up to less than your total number of available lines.

Going filtered means that it will stretch game resolutions to fill your total number of available lines and then do some form of interpolation to make up the difference. To me, this always looks blurry, but some of the more exotic stretch modes like "HQ3x" will give you a crisper image, at the sake of authenticity.

[yman]

Picture quality will probably be best HDMI once it's setup correctly.

What resolution are you sending it? I'm going to guess windows is sensing that it's 1080i capable and sending it 1920x1080. Since your screen is only capable of 1080i, that means it's displaying it interlaced, from the looks of the spec, using only 480 lines, which probably doesn't look that great.

Try switching it to the highest supported p resolution. According to the manual for your set:
http://service.us.panasonic.com/OPERMANPDF/CT27HC15N.PDF
That would be 480p, so the resolution you should use is 720x480.

Mame will probably be best set up by telling it to NOT switch resolutions. Filtering the image for crisp pixels or smooth interpolation is a personal choice.

Going with non-filtered will mean you will need a build of mame which supports "cleanstretch", that is the scaling of the pixels in exact integer multiples (eg a 320x240 game is displayed at 640x480). However doing this means that you will have both letterbox and pillarbox borders of various sizes as games that use less than 240 lines will be doubled up to less than your total number of available lines.

Going filtered means that it will stretch game resolutions to fill your total number of available lines and then do some form of interpolation to make up the difference. To me, this always looks blurry, but some of the more exotic stretch modes like "HQ3x" will give you a crisper image, at the sake of authenticity.

Thanks for the help.  I'm going to try turning off interlacing and/or setting the resolution to 480p in the ATI CCC (graphics cards controls) to see what that looks like.  I also managed to find a hacked version of Mame 1.41 UI that supports cleanstretch, so I'll give that a go.

Just curious, though ... if I set the resolution at 480 vs. 1080i, won't that picture look worse when streaming movies to the cab?  Or maybe there's a way to creae an easy shortcut to switch resolutions when using MAME vs. watching movies?  I'll have to give it a shot and see what it looks like.

Thanks again!

[newmanfamilyvlogs]

When it comes to movies, it's going to be pretty subjective.. Personally I find the look of a progressive screen more desirable to an interlaced on.. Running it at 1080i doesn't magically 'create' more resolution.. the phosphor on the screen is only so small and can only resolve detail so fine. However the rapid change of the interlace screen can sometimes create the perception of more detail at the expense of the flickering that you may or may not even notice.

Also: what is the source of the films you plan on streaming? If it's a DVD, the resolution isn't over 720x480 to begin with.

On a screen that size, at any reasonable viewing distance, the difference between 720x480, 1280x720, and 1920x1080 is probably marginal.

[yman]

The movies are digital files stored on my HTPC - most are standard DVD quality (compressed to h.264), but the newer movies are bluray (also compressed).  Hadn't thought about the viewing distance.  I guess the tiny lines that are visible when playing the arcade from a distance of a couple feet will be much less noticeable at 10 feet away.