Can a VGA monitor be used with a DVI/HDMI graphics card

displaydvigraphics cardhdmivga

I have Acer V193HQV monitor which has a 15-pin VGA male input as shown in the image below:

Acer

I just bought a Zotac Geforce GTX 1050 card. It has the following output ports:

GTX

I've heard about VGA to DVI/HDMI converters but have also seen people complain that most adapters don't work. I've very little knowledge about this VGA/HDMI/DIV modes.

Would it be better to go for VGA to DVI adapter or VGA to HDMI one?

Update

I borrowed a converter from my office to try it out. It worked. Not sure if it's an active adapter or a passive one. Is it possible to tell just by looking at it?
HDMI adapter

Best Answer

As per the Wiki article on DVI:

A passive DVI-to-VGA adapter. This adapter will not work with a DVI-D output. It requires a DVI-I or DVI-A output to get the analog signal to a VGA input (even if the adapter looks like a DVI-D). A more expensive active adapter (or converter) is required to connect DVI-D to VGA.

As such you would need an active adapter in either case and it shouldn't really matter whenever you get an active DVI to VGA or active HDMI to VGA adapter. They're both available in a variety of qualities.

An advantage of using DisplayPort to VGA could possibly a simpler adapter as there supposedly is some form of backwards compatibility available. At one point I read that there was actual electrical compatibility as the adapter indicates to the card that a VGA display is attached but I'm not able to remember where I read it. Hence I might be remembering it wrong or it might simply be false.

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