What are the prerequisites for using a TV as a monitor?

[nips]

If I have a laptop with S-Video out on it,what do I need to connect it up to the TV? Just plug it in, Fn + F6 to output on the TV and away... or am I missing something?

Does it need to be a progrssive scan TV, or do I need to change the resolution on the monitor to something around 640...? Urgh, I'm stuck, I've got a laptop infront of my and I see no reason for it not to work... beyond the fact that I'm missing something blindingly obvious...

Thanks for any help

[yashiro]

It will be very fuzzy and look like arse. You can only get away with 640x480 really.
Waste of time for anything other than movie playback and perhaps emulation.

[nips]

It's for this woman in work, she wants it for film playback... I don't know why exactly, but I don't ask questions... and now I'm totally perplexed... I tried it on everything from a 14" portable to a top of the range LCD TV, and none worked.

WTF is going on?

[charlaph]

My Ati drivers allow me to select the second monitor as a TV on the S-Video and adjusts it's settings accordingly. You wouldn't need dual-monitor support would you? I know I've done it but it was just a case of plugging it in, going to the monitor tab on the Display Properties|Advanced and telling it monitor 2 was a TV then away it went.