HDTV as Monitor for Mac

[Lord MJ]

So last week I got myself a new 24'' 1080p LED tv. I was looking to get something that would a. Let me watch good TV b. Let me hook up my HDMI devices (such as my Asus tablet), c. let me use it as a monitor for my macbook pro.

So I hooked my mac book pro via a displayport to hdmi adapter. But the display for my monitor is crap. It's noticably bad, and I can't seem to be able to tweak either the mac or the TV to make it better. I'm thinking of taking the TV back to get another one.

It's an Insignia 24"

But I wanted to know, is there a brand of TV out there that is optimum for monitors? If I used the VGA cable, would I get a better display? Would ANY TV work well as a monitor for a mac. Is there something I'm doing wrong with my calibration?

[Dominus Atheos]

What connection are you using to watch tv with? If it's all hdmi, you should just get a real monitor and an hdmi splitter/joiner.

Insignia is best buy's store brand, and are just rebranded from premium brands. What does your macbook say it's connected to?

[Netko]

What is your Mac model? What is the graphics card in the Mac? On Windows, ATI cards have an issue of doing underscan and weird refresh rates by default over HDMI when they detect that a TV is connected so you have to tweak display settings (digital display or some such section) in order to get a normal picture. Fuzzyness is a symptom of that. Why anyone would want those settings that seem targeted at analog/plasma TVs by default I don't know, but they are the default. If its the same problem, just with Mac drivers, changing TVs won't help.

In any event, don't use VGA - its analog and as such prone to noise, and it doesn't have the bandwidth to properly support 1080p.

[Lord MJ]

I have a 2011 13 inch mac book pro.

The screen I had was so bad that I ended up putting back my old monitor.

Whether I just keep my monitor and just use the tv as a tv, or I decide to get a monitor with hdmi inputs, not sure yet.