[Galaxy Note 3 Accessories] CellPC:
Note 3 with Smart Dock at 1080p

I finally got my new Note 3 to work with my Galaxy Smart Dock Multimedia Hub in 1080p mode with external monitor, with mouse + keyboard.

My goal is to use my smart phone to replace my aging laptop for most of my work. In particular, I want to come into my home office, or workplace, or while traveling, and drop my phone into a dock, and continue where I left off. I'm OK with doing much of my work on a browser, maybe with Google Sheets and Docs, but I want a real keyboard and mouse, and I want to have at least some local storage so if I have no internet connectivity, I can still get some work done. I always have my phone with me anyway, so if I can lose my laptop, so much the better. And I've found in the past that having my phone in a dock on my desk is handy for making phone calls, and helps keep my phone adequately charged for when I need to take it and go.

I started with a Galaxy S3 with its 720p display, but I found that I really missed the extra pixels on the monitor (my aging laptop has1600 x 1200 resolution). So I bought the Note 3, with its 1080p display, thinking that it would solve all my docking problems. Here's the hardware solution so far:

Hardware:

Phone: T-Mobile Note 3, SM-N900T. Android 4.4.2 "KitKat". Not rooted, not unlocked.

Dock: Smart Dock EDD-S20JWEGSTA, with its 2 amp charger

HDMI cable to monitor

Monitor: desktop HDTV (Polaroid 24GSR3000)

Keyboard: USB keyboard (Microsoft "Wired 600")

Mouse: Logitech "Anywhere X", as well as no-name USB optical mouse

Getting the Note 3 to work with the dock:

This started as a really frustrating experience, because I would plug in the phone, and sometimes the HDMI connection would work, but the mouse/keyboard wouldn't be recognized. Or sometimes neither the dock, nor the USB devices would not be recognized. I realize that the Note 3 is not "officially" supported by the Smart Dock, but it's the only phone I could find with a bigger screen, with 1080p resolution, and that had a hope of working with a dock.

After much trial and error, I discovered that by inserting the phone, and then power cycling the dock, the phone would then recognize the HDMI monitor and the USB devices properly. Power cycling consists of temporarily (a few seconds) disconnecting the power cable from the charger to the dock, or just temporarily unplugging the charger from the wall.

Having a mouse plugged into the dock seems to inform the phone to display in landscape mode on the external monitor. With no mouse plugged in, the monitor will display the phone's screen in portrait mode, which means there are huge black "bars" on either side of the displayed image on the screen.

Getting the monitor to display in 1080p mode:

Thanks to KNIGHTNZ (see post #15 in "Note 3 HDMI Resolution" thread: http://xdaforums.com/showthread.php?t=2600013&page=2): the Smart Dock has the Silicon Image SIL9292 MHL-to-HDMI converter chip in it, and it is physically limited to generating at most 1920x1080 at 30 frames a second. As far as I know, it cannot generate 1080p at 60 frames a second.

As I discovered, every low-cost 24-inch 1080p computer monitor that I tried does not work with 30 frames a second refresh rate. I will try some more monitors, but so far no joy. When I plug in one of these monitors, it apparently negotiates with the dock to the best resolution it can get at 60 frames a second, which is invariably 720p. For me, that is not sufficient.

Just for fun, I tried it with my HDTV in the family room: 1080p success! I guess since HDTVs have to work with a vast array of video sources, they are more tolerant of less-than-60-frames-a-second refresh rates.

Since my HDTV worked, I went over to the local electronics store and discovered they have several 24-inch 1080p HDTVs that are priced similarly to computer monitors of the same size. I picked up a Polaroid (really? Polaroid?) model, and plugged it in, and it displays the full 1080P from the phone. It claims it is displaying at 24 frames a second, but I see no flicker, so I guess it's doing the HDTV thing of repeating the missing frames. It's possible this may result in some lag, but if so, I have not noticed it, or at least it is not objectionable.