New TV - long thread

[venney]

[liljim]

wow, ok. Let me first admit that i will have to read over all of it again but heres a brief comment.

None of the component connections i saw were ever above 720p

vga will not carry hd signal and dvi wont carry sound

which leads me to this
if the tv will be a monitor for pc you really need to look into vid cards that support true hd, that x1950 doesnt support the res to make the new tv worth buying. ATI has some inexpensive cards that support up to 1080p with hdmi, check out some radeon 3850 hd and up cards. This will put you in a way better position for sound also. Most hd vid cards have their own hd sound processor so both vid and sound carry through hdmi to tv then connect tv to speakers and alot of your problem is solved. As long as 1 connection is made from tv to speakers, all devices going through tv audio in should automatically be sent to your speaker system.

What is Sky HD? Satellite tv?

[venney]

Yea its satellite TV. You get normal SKY which just broadcasts digital through the sky dish, but the hd package gives you about 30 channels of HD content (I’m mainly looking forward to discovery + 2 HD movie channels).

Thanks for your reply liljim, so you don’t think that the ps3 component cable will give me full hd? on the advert it does say 'HD support of 480p/720p/1080i/1080p screen resolutions.'

As for a new gpu, I’m all in favour but... I have a limit amount of cash and the tv is quite expensive.

Would a cheap card be better for gaming than my x1950? I suppose it is getting on a few years since I’ve had it.

Within the next couple month i will be getting a full time job (hopefully with a nice salary) so I could buy whatever card after that. Would you recommend a slightly better gpu?

[venney]

sorry i should make it clear quickly as well, im not using the tv as my main monitor, im having it mainly for tv and ps3, but i have a hell of a lot of movies on my pc so i would only be using the tv for them.

[Psymon]

In terms of getting HD from PC to TV, you can use something like or .
Like liljim said, you won't get any audio down it like this unless you get a GPU that can do that.
Even so, you'll have a cable sticking out the side of your TV which won't be so pretty.
If you can do the red blue green cable thing for one of them then problem solved.
Or you could move up a model or 2 and get one with 4 HDMI inputs eg

My bro's HDTV apparently took a 1080p signal from his 360 via VGA, but the image wasn't crisp (probably at the limit of its bandwidth). Most TVs won't allow a 1080 picture down VGA because it's analogue and there's no sensible way of encrypting that so instead of fearing people would use that to make illegal copies they just disabled it.

with your audio, I think option 4 is your best bet. I wouldn't expect the movies on your PC to have dolby digital anyway, they're usually compressed with a more reasonable codec (not certain about this though). Any movies you get on disk you'll put in the PS3 anyway. Using the 3 stereo jacks from your PC should sound the same as using optical only you may notice a slight hiss when you turn it up but not actually playing anything :P

[venney]

Im not fussed about audio coming from the gpu, the sound quality from my sound card i assume would be far superior. Going up a model... not happening. I don’t want to spend more than 800 (and believe me, i started looking around the 500 mark).

i already have a HDMI to DVI-D cable that is in use with my ps3 at current (being displayed on my pc monitor). When i go home, the ps3 can go on a tv, leaving a spare HDMI to DVI cable. I think my best shot might be to try one of those RGB leads, like the one in the link, and actually see what it looks like. It says it supports 1080p, but lets face it, im sure its not the first product to lie.

I think my brother has a set on his xbox360, but he doesn’t have a full hd tv, nether the less it still looks sharp on his tv.

i have just realised i missed out an option, sky hd might be able to output via HD Component Cable.

Also, i might try a cable like this

If i could bend that round to the back of the tv without stressing the wire, that seems the easiest option. or even better would be if I could get an angled version of that.

Something like this

I think that would hide the cable round the back

[liljim]

[venney]

ha ha, naa liljim this is precisely the sort of thing i wanted, just ideas flying about.

I think I’m going to go down to the local Sony shop and have a look at the tv, and maybe take a sneaky measurement of how far the side panel pokes out.

And that’s great to hear about that ati card, i may just invest in one to try it out, after all it would be easy if the audio went through the hdmi cable.

Usually its a .mkv as apparently they can hold multiple audio tracks, as well as multiple subtitles. I do have a few DTS avis im sure.

I think the angled hdmi cable probably would be the easiest way to sort all this out. If it sticks out of the side then maybe i will consider a different TV.

[venney]

I was in a Waitrose today (supermarket) and they had a load of tv's, one of which was the tv i want (they were selling it for 1k!). I had a look at the side panel, and the side hdmi port is well out of view, i don’t even think i would need a right angled one, it was that far behind. So good news

[venney]

Great news as well, the time to buy the TV is getting closer and closer. I am back from university for the last time (almost) and Amazon has dropped the price of the TV. A seller through Amazon is selling it even cheaper, including delivers its £710, which I can afford nicely

I am waiting for Easter sales in the hope that the TV drops even further.

The other reason I am not buying it yet is I have one more piece of uni work I have to finish, my dissertation - yes I am having a great time writing it....

In all honesty I don’t mind it at all, 9-10 thousand words on A. J. Ayer's Language, Truth and Logic, a topic which I am very interested in (hence me choosing it).
I’m a bit shy from half way of the word count, but have tonnes left to go. The plan is to finish the work as soon as possible, and then kick back with a finished degree and enjoy some hard earned PS3 time

Psymon, you have this fun time to look forward to next year! he he!

Venney

[Psymon]

Not looking forward to that so much :(

[venney]

Hello again.
I’ve been busy at work on my dissertation but also using the time sat at the computer to rip (backup) some more of my DVDs trying to gain the best result (am ripping at 75% quality and they are coming out great, bigger than other people may be willing to have but I have the room and I want the quality).


Not bad if you ask me

I have also been busy ordering some stuff in preparation for the TV.

I have bought a optical to coax converter - just shy of £12, best deal I could find.
Ordered a second optical cable - 5m for £3.50 or so, I know insanely cheap but as its just transporting light I thought I would give it a go.
I have also stumbled across this..
Do you think something like that would let me plug my ps3+skyhd into my receiver via optical (assuming only one of the two was switched on at once).
That way I could have digital ps3 + sky (via optical) + pc (via optical to coax converter).

What do you recon?

[Psymon]

Nice find on the optical cable, I'd love to know how good that is for £3.50

That funny device you found, I think you want to use it backwards, which won't work.
That things for getting eg: 1 PS3 to display on 2 HDTVs.
It'd be good if you could find something to do what you want since I doubt you'll want to play PS3 and watch sky at the same time.
I'd have to have a switch for you to throw, so it'd be like swapping the optical cable in the TV yourself only somewhat easier.

[venney]

Fantastic news... I ordered the TV. No I haven’t finished my work but what they hey - I’m going to be sensible. My parents told me not to buy it until I’ve done my work, but they are on holiday for a week so they won’t even know – not that it really matters as it is my money I’ve spent.

Reason for buying today - I went on Amazon, and they have stopped selling the TV. I did a search on Google, and came across . Delivery was 45 pounds or so, should be hear by Tuesday. Before I purchased the TV, I did some sneaky goggling which took me to a page on the pixmania website with discount codes. The one I used was 'spend over 600 pounds and get 25 pounds off'. I thought fantastic even cheaper. The other thing I just realised is that pixmania offer a two year warranty with the TV, compared to Amazon who where only selling the one year manufactures warranty.

So in total I have spent £725 pounds with delivery in two working days for a TV that was originally £1200 –ish just over a year ago. I am over the moon.

I do not have a TV aerial or sky in my room, so for the next week or so I will only be using it for my ps3, which I currently use on the monitor. So win-win situation as I can’t sit there watching TV all day so I am forced to finish my work. If I can restrain myself (which I probably won’t) I may even not open the TV until I have done the work.

At least I have some incentive to get as much work done as possibly by Tuesday.

- pictures will be uploaded when it arrives.

[liljim]

congrads man, i hope you are satisfied with it. I think its going to be a nice unit.