I'm using a ThinkPad T21 notebook with the following specs:
* PIII 800 MHz
* 512 MB RAM
* S3 Savage 8 MB
* 14.1" XGA (1024x768) 

The video card is dual monitor capable and I know how to enable dual
monitor support in Win XP. I use the PC mainly for internet and word
processing, I do not play games.

I want to hook up my ThinkPad to a Sony 17" X series LCD monitor
(haven?t bought it yet). The Sony is a SXGA (1280x1024), will my video
card be able to drive the monitor? FYI most LCD monitors are SXGA.

Please give suggestions on what LCD (not interested in CRT) monitor is
suitable (must be *new* 17"). Thank you.

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Request for Question Clarification by alienintelligence-ga on 26 Dec 2003 04:08 PST

Hi webmal,

For accuracy, could you please give
the specific model Sony you had in
mind?

The one I have found specs for is
the SDMX72.

thanks,
-AI

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Clarification of Question by webmal-ga on 26 Dec 2003 05:08 PST

The Sony (Australia) model # is SDMX73B (identical to SDMX73 except for color). 

FYI the original OS for the ThinkPad T21 was Windows 98/2000.
Therefore, please bear in mind that Windows XP would use up the 8 MB
video memory.

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Request for Question Clarification by alienintelligence-ga on 26 Dec 2003 05:37 PST

Hi again webmal,

In my many years of being 
'silently tortured' by the
invisible gremlins eating
at my computer's innards,
I will never give anything
with a microchip 100% chance
of doing or not doing anything.
Even with repeated testing ;-)

With that in mind, how much
certification do you require
for the answer? Will pairing
specs together from company
sources work, or would you
prefer, I have physically 
plugged Unit A into Unit B,
and gotten Result C?

Yes, I was considering
the 8M of video memory,
which leads to another 
question... 

How much functionality 
do you require? Is there
a limit to resolution,
color depth or refresh
rate that you desire?


thanks,
-AI

---

Clarification of Question by webmal-ga on 26 Dec 2003 06:08 PST

I only need to know in theory if it will work - the answer must be
backed up by hard facts and preferably with ThinkPad T20/T21 (the T20
has the same video card) user experiences with (external) SXGA LCD
monitors.

I only require minimum functionality - as I said: "I use the PC mainly
for internet and word processing". BTW you can't adjust screen
resolution on LCDs!

webmal-ga:

Please note the following excerpt from the IBM tech note found at:

http://www-1.ibm.com/support/docview.wss?rs=0&uid=psg1MIGR-40060&loc=en_US#video

"Symptom
The screen can not change to both LCD and CRT when using SXGA
(1280x1024) or SXGA+ (1400x1050) mode or more than high resolution.

Affected configurations
All ThinkPad T20, T21, and T22 systems

Solution
Use a different screen resolution.

Additional information
This is a limitation of the video driver built-in to Windows XP 


Symptom
When the dual display is enabled, only SVGA 16bit color can be supported.

Affected configurations
All ThinkPad T20, T21, and T22 systems

Solution
Nothing

Additional information
This is a limitation of the Windows XP built-in S3 video driver." 

This would appear to imply that the T21 will not support operating the
external display at any resolution greater than SVGA (800x600) @
16-bit color depth.

Unfortunately, the T21's and T22's that I have been using over the
last few years have all been running W2K, which does not support the
dual-display capabilities of the video hardware. Therefore, I can
neither validate nor invalidate the IBM tech note.


aht-ga
Google Answers Researcher