Buying advice : HD display, plasma screen...

[FrenchPB]

Hey guys, I need your expertise regarding displays and TV screen. Here's my situation :

I have a MacBook and an hp Compaq nc6220 on which I like to download football and hockey games (TV rip, HD quality, filesize around 2Gig). Since I live in France, that's my only way of watching my teams play regularly.

The quality of the games I download is great, so I'd like to enjoy them on a bigger screen than on my Compaq nc6220 screen. Besides, I like to watch DVDs on my MacBook, but the 13" is small especially when you want to watch something with your friends.

As a consequence, I'd like to get either an HD display, or a new HD TV. What do you advise me to do?

I'm in no hurry to buy, I could wait until the end of the year. Since I don't think I can connect my compaq on the cinema display, I thought about buying an external HD to put on the files, but the data files aren't the same on Macs and PCs, so I don't think I can share an ext. HD between the two computers...

I'm kinda lost, thanks for your help.

 

[Cromulent]

Hey guys, I need your expertise regarding displays and TV screen. Here's my situation :

I have a MacBook and an hp Compaq nc6220 on which I like to download football and hockey games (TV rip, HD quality, filesize around 2Gig). Since I live in France, that's my only way of watching my teams play regularly.

The quality of the games I download is great, so I'd like to enjoy them on a bigger screen than on my Compaq nc6220 screen. Besides, I like to watch DVDs on my MacBook, but the 13" is small especially when you want to watch something with your friends.

As a consequence, I'd like to get either an HD display, or a new HD TV. What do you advise me to do?

If you are going to be using it just to watch TV and DVDs then get an HDTV as the resolution will be lower and thus your videos will look better.

Even 1080p HD video is going to look a bit pixelated if you watch it on a 30 inch LCD display simply because of the extremely high resolution.

If on the other hand you want it because you need the desktop space, get the LCD and watch videos in a window rather than full screen.

I'm in no hurry to buy, I could wait until the end of the year. Since I don't think I can connect my compaq on the cinema display, I thought about buying an external HD to put on the files, but the data files aren't the same on Macs and PCs, so I don't think I can share an ext. HD between the two computers...

I'm kinda lost, thanks for your help.

Of course you can. Format the external drive in FAT32 and then either install Flip4Mac on your Mac or install Quicktime on the PC depending which format the videos are in.

Edit : It would be much easier just to network the computers together via Ethernet though.

What format are your videos in by the way?

 

[FrenchPB]

One example :

Video: 1500 kbps x264 HD
Audio: AAC VBR
Resolution: 816x464 <16:9>
Size: 1200mb

Most files are .avi or .mp4. I use VLC to watch all my files and it works great. I use wifi in my apartment and I have never tried to access the files from one computer to the other.

I basically hesitate between the ACD 23" HD, the Dell equivalent (dunno what it is), or an HD TV which I could connect to my computer and watch the files. Is that possible, won't there be problems such as resolution conflicts ?

Besides, if I get an HD TV, that'd be great for gaming with a new gen console.

 

[FrenchPB]

Of course you can. Format the external drive in FAT32 and then either install Flip4Mac on your Mac or install Quicktime on the PC depending which format the videos are in.

If I format one partition of my ext. HD in FAT32, can I read and write on both my Mac and PC ? Baiscally, I always download files on my PC, so I'd just need to be able to read the file on my Mac if it was connected to a bigger display.

 

[seany916]

How much time do you spend on your computer vs. your television?

How acceptable is your current computer monitor and your television to you?

I watch movies on 30" sometimes (looks fine). Usually use our little 42" plasma for movies though. Upgrade the one that needs upgrading more.

I don't like computers on tv screens, though movies are pretty good on computer screens.

tvs are a pretty damn good deal right now. try not to get anything smaller than 42" if 46" or larger, make sure you get 1080. our 42" has 768 and looks great, but the 50" with the same resolution looks bad.

 

[FrenchPB]

I just would like to know what is the best thing to do based on what I want to do, which is watch computer video files on a big screen.

I don't watch much TV, but I'd get one if I could watch all my games on it. I could also get a display, but could i connect two computers to it and switch to the one I want to use easily ?

I don't know how to connect these things together, that's why I need ur help

 

[DZL]

this is an interesting question - i just bought a mac pro, but blew everything on the computer itself. I have a 42" HDTV plasma; and I plan on running a DVI to HDMI out to the plasma, until I can buy (most likely) a Dell 30".

can i ask what program you're using to get you're tv and sports vids from?

 

[FrenchPB]

I don't want to break the rules of this forum, but I can tell you that I get the files using torrents. It's perfect for me to watch American sports abroad.

Question : is it possible to connect a compaqnc6220 to an HD TV ? The only video output seems to be a VGA plug, so wouldn't the quality look terrible on the big screen ?