HDMI on Laptops

Hi,

I plan to get a new laptop soon and take it with me to the UK when we move. The laptop I am getting will have HDMI port on it that I can plug directly into an HDMI port on a TV.

In the past, there were issues with analog signals (PAL vs NTSC) but I am not sure if there are still issues between HDMI in the US vs in the UK. I think either there might be differences in resolution or something else. This is why I am here.

Could any of the HDMI expoerts out there know for sure if my laptop will work propely plugged into HDMI port in a UK LCD TV?

Thank you.

Although HDMI bypasses all the color-encoding issues of NTSC vs. PAL, there are still format differences in terms of the number of lines and the frame rate.   For example, the format corresponding to a regular (standard definition) American TV signal is 480i/60, while that for a regular British TV signal is 576i/50.    (These are the normal 525 and 625-line broadcast systems, but as several lines in each frame are blank or used for other purposes, 480 and 576 are the number of lines which carry actual picture information.)  There are similar differences when it comes to high-definition resolutions, such as the 720p/60 and 1080i/60 used for HD digital broadcasts in the U.S.

Quite a number of HDMI-equipped TV's on the British market will accept the American formats, but you would need to check the specifications to be certain.  Of course, depending upon the software and hardware combination you are using on the computer, you may also be able to configure the HDMI output for a British/European format.

Thank you Paul. This helps a lot. I guess now I will look for a laptop that has a decent video card capable of custom resolutions. 

Just be aware of any conversion vs. quality issues.  If you intend to play back any source material which is encoded to one standard but convert it to another for HDMI output, there is bound be a certain loss of quality, however slight.  That's the nature of format conversions, I'm afraid (just as British viewers of Dallas discovered over 20 years ago when the show went from film to video tape and the BBC used some very poor standards converters). 

With all the conversion being done digitally in the laptop, processing speed is a key factor too.  If the system can't keep up with conversion, you'll start to get frames dropped and that tell-tale jerkiness in the playback, or other problems such as audio and video unsynchronized.   

Thank you Paul. I have defo had that conversion and reduced quality experience when converting home videos between PAL and NTSC system or changing resolutions.

Thank you.