Will video card improve picture

[mike13]

I have a new Dell Inspiron 580 service tag HYZFNL1. It is running Windows 7 Home. It has 4 gig memory, and built in (on board) video, which only has the regular VGA out, and also the HDMI out. It does NOT have the DVI out. I was going to purchase a cheap stand alone video card from Newegg, or maybe Tigerdirect for under $50 that would have the DVI out to plug into my Dell 20 " flat screen. I am NOT into gaming etc, I only want the best clear picture for these old eyes. Would getting a video card improve the picture, or would it be so small that i would not see any difference. My power supply is only 300 watt, so I guess that needs to be taken into account also. Many thanks, Mike

[puntoMX]

Hello Mike, there will be a margenal improment when you use DVI over a good VGA cable, however, in most cases the image looks clearer with DVI indeed. There is no need to go directly to an add-on video card, you can try first a HDMI to DVI cable (should work with 95% of the portables and desktop PCs). Take a look at this cable.

EDIT: I see that the one I linked to earlier is 3m in length so here is one of 1.8m.

[mike13]

puntoMX-----Thanks so much !!! That is a great idea, I just ordered the cable. Mike

[Zenskas]

I can always tell if a monitor is being run off VGA before even looking at the cable. For me DVI is so much clearer. I can use VGA and it doesn't make my eyes hurt or anything but I can just easily tell the differences....DVI is great!

[wajed]

I think getting a better monitor is what you should do.

A screen can be very glossy that would really hurt your eyes after long time of use (specially reading.) There are many factors to when it comes to which screen is best for reading, but I'm not a monitor/screen expert.