[Mark_a]

I've come across this problem with a colleague at work. A quick google explained the situation. The standard VGA port on a lot of laptops, meant for connecting to an external monitor, carries some pins that aren't used. So some enterprising board/chip maker came up with the idea of having a graphics chips that could output S-Vid, as well as RGB for the screen, but instead of bringing that out to a seperate s-vid socket, they saved some money by making use of the redundant pins on the VGA port. So now you can get pretty cheap specialist cables with a VGA plug on one end and an S-Vid plug on the other which just makes use of the s-vid and ignores the RGB pins.

Obviously this will only work if your lappy manufacturer has the right graphics chip, has wired the motherboard to output this non-standard s-vid to the VGA port, and has seen fit to enable it all at the BIOS or Windows driver level.

If none of the above is true then these VGA to S-Vid cables will not work, so it comes down to either, find out from the lappy manufacturer's literature, or borrow one and try it. Also don't forget that it won't carry any sound, only video.

It turned out my colleague's laptop had the right graphics chip but the maker had seen fit to not enable it as a way of differentiating between cheaper and more expensive models in its range. In the end he changed his TV to one with a VGA port on it to solve the problem.

Oh, and an alternative, if expensive, way to do it go to Maplins, or the like, who'll sell you an external VGA to composite/s-vid converter box.

Regards

Mark