I work for a digital signage company as the product engineer. I have been put in charge of handling the "image" for our platform. We run our software application on Windows 7 Professional 64-bit, and use Microsoft Deployment Tools to handle our image builds.
In the past we have used VGA cables to run all of our displays. It allows for very long runs ~100ft, for very little cost, and has always been reliable. As we move into digital, we are having to deal with EDID issues more and more, especially with Ultra-wide monitors.
I am looking for a way, either programatically or automatically, to add needed resolutions to a monitor when it is plugged into the system. I have a bit of background in programming, but it is more script based (powershell, javascript, etc.)
Some of our legacy products use a 1360x768 resolution. In the past this has not been an issue as Windows will usually have this as a default resolution when using VGA. The problem now is that when EDID does not specifically have 1360 as a detailed timing. I would like to be able to add an additional EDID block for extra resolutions that we need.
We use a lot of signal extenders, and a LOT of them do not handle EDID very well. This would eliminate this problem as well.
We are going from VGA to HDMI, and one thing I would LOVE to do is put in an EDID block from HDMI that tells the system that the monitor does not support overscan. Not only is it an issue when using AMD video cards, but a lot of monitors will automatically adjust their displays to overscan automatically. It's just a support nightmare I am trying to avoid. Even if it is just from one end, it would eliminate that much more troubleshooting.
For the past two weeks I have been doing a LOT of research about EDID spoofing, .inf files, how Windows handles drivers... etc. I have tried to edit the default windows "monitor.inf" file with no real luck.
One of the issues is how windows deals with monitors that don't send an EDID packet. They're listed as a NonPNP-Monitor, and because of this do not have an EDID to override.
Does anyone know where these settings can be changed?
We are currently using older AMD 6350 video cards as well as newer W4100 and W4300 FirePro cards.
We are looking at moving to Intel, and I wanted to know if there were any caveats to this move as well. How well does intel handle EDID management, and can you emulate the EDID like you can with nVidia, and AMD?
Any help would be appreciated.
