Raspberry Pi fix for HDMI to DVI cable issue

less than 1 minute read

My "RPiText" After a little exploration from the command line, startx brought up the GUI. "RPiX" As well as the composite video output, the Raspberry Pi supports HDMI. My monitor (a Viewsonic VX2235WM-3) has VGA and DVI inputs, so I ordered the AmazonBasics HDMI to DVI Cable. Connecting up to my monitor, I was disappointed to see no video signal whatsover - the monitor wasn’t seeing the Raspberry Pi at all. Googling around, I discovered that you can set various configuration options that are read before the Raspberry Pi even boots. With a little experimentation, I found that setting

hdmi_force_hotplug=1

in config.txt solves the problem - I see video output from the moment I power up the Raspberry Pi! This makes sense - the description of hdmi_force_hotplug is “Use HDMI mode even if no HDMI monitor is detected” - I’m guessing the cable is not signalling the presence of a monitor to the Raspberry Pi, so it decides that it doesn’t need to send HDMI output. Watch this space for more Raspberry Pi fun!

Updated:

Comments

Chris Swan

I was hoping that this tip would sort out the issues I’ve been having with one of my monitors at home (as I’d somehow missed that option when scanning the list). Sadly not in my case. It seems that the Raspberry Pi is very fussy about DVI converters and DVI monitors (just like it is with SD cards).

Arnaud Desbordes

Actually, I went a bit further on my research and I found the following information: “Couple of small things to note: DVI can carry both analogue and digital video; your HDMI cable will only carry digital. So although most DVI-capable monitors support digital, I believe a very few are analogue only, and it may be worth checking to be sure. Secondly, HDMI carries both video and audio, but DVI is video only. You”ll therefore need to use the separate audio output from the RPi board.”

Which would explain why some monitors stay dark, they’re not capable of running from digital signals.

Source : http://www.frambozenbier.org/index.php/raspi-community-news/7877-theeponymousbob-on-hdmi-to-dvi-adapter-cable

Joonas Pihlajamaa

I have the same issue, my monitor only has DVI and DisplayPort, but RaspPi won’t even boot properly with the monitor connected via HDMI-DVI -adapter.

Hard to say whether it’s an adapter, RaspPi or incompatibility problem. I know that my fairly recent 30” supports digital signal, actually it explicitly doesn’t support analog at all. But it does require Dual-Link DVI cable, so maybe that’s the issue. More investigation needed…

DavidT

I sympathise with all those having RPi to monitor connection problems. I thought that connecting the RS Comp. supplied HDMI-HDMI cable through an HDMI-DVI convertor to the DVI slot on my Dell 1907FP monitor would be easy. The monitor displayed nothing except the “digital test card” flashing. I tried all solutions including adding a “home made” config file to the SD card with all possible combinations of set up. In the end I found a good web site - “www.pinout.ru” which shows the HDMI to DVI cable scheme connections in tabular form. With a circuit tester I found that the the HDMI pin to DVI pin contacts on my set up did not match what they should be. Today I received my “World of Data® - 3m HDMI to DVI Cable - Premium Quality / 1080p (Full HD) / v1.3 / Video / DVI-D (Dual Link) 24+1 Pins / 24k Gold Plated” from Amazon. Doing the circuit test again - all pins were as they should be! Raspberry Pi now fully working on my Dell monitor. Moral of the story - ensure that you get the right HDMI to DVI cable / adaptor! Regards, David.

Akshob

Hello Pat,

I am not getting output in my Dell monitor, model number is ‘IN 2020M’. When I boot my monitor detects, but later goes to sleep mode, saying no DVI-D cable.

the edidparser’s output is as follows

Parsing edid.dat… HDMI:EDID version 1.3, 0 extensions, screen size 44x25 cm HDMI:EDID features - videodef 0x80 standby suspend active off; colour encoding:RGB444|YCbCr422; sRGB is not default colourspace; preferred format is native; does not support GTF HDMI:EDID found monitor S/N descriptor tag 0xff HDMI:EDID found monitor name descriptor tag 0xfc HDMI:EDID monitor name is DELL_IN2020M HDMI:EDID found monitor range descriptor tag 0xfd HDMI:EDID monitor range offsets: V min=0, V max=0, H min=0, H max=0 HDMI:EDID monitor range: vertical is 50-76 Hz, horizontal is 30-83 kHz, max pixel clock is 170 MHz HDMI:EDID monitor range does not support GTF HDMI:EDID found unknown detail timing format: 1600x900p hfp:48 hs:32 hbp:80 vfp:3 vs:5 vbp:18 pixel clock:97 MHz HDMI:EDID established timing I/II bytes are A5 4B 00 HDMI:EDID found DMT format: code 4, 640x480p @ 60 Hz in established timing I/II HDMI:EDID found DMT format: code 6, 640x480p @ 75 Hz in established timing I/II HDMI:EDID found DMT format: code 9, 800x600p @ 60 Hz in established timing I/II HDMI:EDID found DMT format: code 11, 800x600p @ 75 Hz in established timing I/II HDMI:EDID found DMT format: code 16, 1024x768p @ 60 Hz in established timing I/II HDMI:EDID found DMT format: code 18, 1024x768p @ 75 Hz in established timing I/II HDMI:EDID found DMT format: code 36, 1280x1024p @ 75 Hz in established timing I/II HDMI:EDID standard timings block x 8: 0x714F 8180 A9C0 0101 0101 0101 0101 0101 HDMI:EDID found DMT format: code 21, 1152x864p @ 75 Hz (4:3) in standard timing 0 HDMI:EDID found DMT format: code 35, 1280x1024p @ 60 Hz (5:4) in standard timing 1 HDMI:EDID found DMT format: code 83, 1600x900p @ 60 Hz (16:9) in standard timing 2 HDMI:EDID filtering formats with pixel clock > 162 MHz or h. blanking > 1023 HDMI:EDID no known preferred format has been set HDMI:EDID filtering preferred group has been changed from Invalid to DMT HDMI:EDID best score mode initialised to DMT (4) 640x480p @ 60 Hz with pixel clock 25 MHz (score 18432) HDMI:EDID best score mode is now DMT (4) 640x480 @ 60 MHz with pixel clock 25 Hz (score 36864) HDMI:EDID best score mode is now DMT (6) 640x480 @ 75 MHz with pixel clock 31 Hz (score 46080) HDMI:EDID best score mode is now DMT (9) 800x600 @ 60 MHz with pixel clock 40 Hz (score 57600) HDMI:EDID best score mode is now DMT (11) 800x600 @ 75 MHz with pixel clock 49 Hz (score 72000) HDMI:EDID best score mode is now DMT (16) 1024x768 @ 60 MHz with pixel clock 65 Hz (score 94370) HDMI:EDID best score mode is now DMT (18) 1024x768 @ 75 MHz with pixel clock 78 Hz (score 117964) HDMI:EDID best score mode is now DMT (21) 1152x864 @ 75 MHz with pixel clock 108 Hz (score 174298) HDMI:EDID best score mode is now DMT (35) 1280x1024 @ 60 MHz with pixel clock 108 Hz (score 182286) HDMI:EDID best score mode is now DMT (36) 1280x1024 @ 75 MHz with pixel clock 135 Hz (score 196608) HDMI:EDID best score mode is now DMT (83) 1600x900 @ 60 MHz with pixel clock 108 Hz (score 197800) HDMI:EDID preferred mode is updated to DMT (83) 1600x900p @ 60 Hz with pixel clock 108000000 Hz HDMI:EDID has only DVI support and no audio support edid_parser exited with code 0

my settings in config.txt hdmi_force_hotplug=1 hdmi_group=2 hdmi_mode=83 hdmi_drive=1

I also tried with only hdmi_force_hotplug=1 but no luck.

Please help me out.

Thank you.

james

Thanks for the info on the HDMI>DVI adapter, I modified my file and it works great. Why this isn’t up on the official RPi site, IDK…

Pat Patterson

John - you edit config.txt in the boot partition. If you’ve booted the RPi from the SD card, this is at /boot/config.txt, or you can pop the SD card into a reader on your desktop/laptop and you should see config.txt right there.

jim kessler

I went to Amazon and found the following part:

HDMI Input to VGA Adapter Converter For PC Laptop NoteBook HD DVD by BestDealUSA

and connected my Pi to an old VGA monitor laying around. Works great.

Wunderbar !!! less than $5

Sylvain

Thank you, It works fine for me.

What I did with SSH :

mount /flash -o remount,rw

vi /flash/config.txt

uncomment hdmi_force_hotplug=1

Save the config

mount /flash -o remount,ro

reboot

Thank’s

Fanys

Hi, i just got my new RP 2 B. I have formated micro SD (SD website), record the Ubuntu Snappy software. I put the SD card into slot, connect the mouse, connect the DMHI cable to RP2 and second end into TV. Than I connected the powder source and wait for connection with TV (screen). TV showed “Connecting” but after few seconds returned “no connection” …. please advise! I can type any commands without seeing what is on the screen… I dis more or less everything according to RP websites recommendations… Thanks!

David Pike

I bought a RPi-3 package deal from an ebay seller here in Australia. It came with a very thin HDMI cable, described as being light and flexible so as not to pull your RPi off the desk! I connected the RPi to my Polyview 19” monitor via the supplied HDMI cable and an HDMI-DVI-D adapter. No display on the monitor except warnings that the input was out of range. Several different warning messages flashed up at odd times, some saying that there was 0Hz horizontal scan, others saying there were various odd horizontal frequencies. I edited the config.txt file many times, trying every combination of settings. Sometimes the monitor would display OK after something had been changed, but next time I booted the RPi up back would come the old blank screen with the “out of range” warnings. Eventually I got suspicious of the thin HDMI cable and tried a “normal” thick one. Bingo! that got the monitor displaying reliably. I found that the thin cable had no continuity between any of the shield pins (2, 5, 8 or 11) or the DDC/CEC ground (pin 17) or the connector shells. The standard cable had continuity between each of these. Apparently the thin cable has been made thin by leaving out all the shields and other ground connections, probably resulting in severe crosstalk between the signal pairs. No wonder the poor monitor was confused! Hope this helps!

Fernando

mine is a raspberrypi zero i did everything on the config settings but nothing seams to work and my montiro keeps saying ENTERING POWER SAVING MODE

Bob White

hdmi_group=1 hdmi_mode=4

This worked for me. I tried config_hdmi_boost=4 and hdmi_force_hotplug=1 with no luck. The hdmi_group=1 and hdmi_mode=4 worked. I think I have a monitor that only does analog DVI. If you’re in that boat then give this a try.

John H

Hello all, just wanted to share my experience. First time RP user, recently purchase a RP-3. Attached an HP monitor with DVI and VGA outputs and using a HDMI to DVI cable from RP-3 to monitor and was getting nothing on the screen. Tried all the added configurations list here and still nothing. I happen to find another HDMI to DVI cable (https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B014I8UQJY/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o03_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1) plugged it in and it worked. I did go back into my config file and remove all the added configurations (back to original) and its still working. Just thought I share.

JE Carter II

Still seeking a solution. I bought a pi zero W with a TFT. After soldering on the 40 pin header, the TFT works great, albeit too small to show all of some dialogs and screens. Any HDMI - DVI or straight HMDI output I try, on two different monitors, just results in the test screen being displayed. I’ve tried a number of configurations in the config, every option listed for troubleshooting HDMI out and nothing works properly.

Has anyone got a pi zero w working with an external HDMI monitor?

I’ve also tried a 1.5 and 2 amp USB power supply… no difference.

Sarius

If you are using a Monitor with VDI and a VDI - HDMI cable the solution is just to uncomment “hdmi_drive=1” and change it to 2.

My monitor was flickering and it wouldn’t show me the raspi Desktop all the time, on random intervals. By changing this it worked 100%.

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