DVI

• Most computers have a DVI port, or digital video interface connection. This is the standard for digital video; it is used to connect a computer's video card to an LCD monitor. Even laptop computers, which have a built-in LCD display, use DVI as a secondary output method. There are three kinds of DVI outputs: DVI-D (digital), DVI-A (analog) and DVI-I (integrated).
  
  

DVI-Digital

• DVI-digital is an interface specifically designed for direct digital video connections between a digital-ready video card and a digital-ready LCD screen. Video cards create a digital video signal, but older monitors could only receive analog signals. LCD monitors read digital signals directly, however, and DVI-D cables transmit that signal from computer to monitor without conversion, which creates a higher-quality image and a faster signal.
  
  

Why DVI-D?

• All computers create a digital video signal, but not every monitor displays digital. Analog video monitors -- like older TVs -- read analog signals, like the over-the-air TV signals that you could use bunny ears to receive. But think of the quality difference between an old floor-model TV and a high-definition LCD screen. Older CRT monitors used DVI-A cables to connect a video card to a VGA screen, which meant that the digital signal produced by the video card was converted to analog to be displayed. LCD monitors can take that digital signal directly.
  
  

DVI-D Cables

• DVI-D cables are easily recognizable by the number of and types of pins on the cable. There are two types of DVI-D cables, one of which has two groups of nine diagonal pins beside a single larger, flatter pin and the other of which has a group of 24 pins beside that same single larger, flatter pin. DVI-A and DVI-I cables have different pin structures, with the flat pin surrounded by the small pins in both cases. You can run a DVI-D cable up to about 15 feet before losing signal strength, which -- with digital video signals -- causes the video to stammer and cut out.