Connecting my TV to my computer

[txtxyeha]

Want to watch stuff from the Internet (e.g., Hulu) on my TV. The iMac connects wirelessly to my router, and I have a cat5 cable running from the router to wall where the TV is. Any possibility of using the ethernet cable to bring a picture to my TV?

 

[texascoder]

I don't know of any way to do that with an ethernet cable, but if your TV has the proper input port, you should be able to just hook up the TV to your iMac as a secondary display with a display cable, sort of like if you wanted to hook up a computer monitor to it. For example, I have a 50" Samsung plasma TV and I can hook it up to my laptop as a secondary display with a normal computer display-type cable.

 

[wherzwaldo]

You can send audio and video over Cat5. However, you will need a device at each end to convert the signal so that it maintains 75ohm impedance. It also has to be a dedicated cable and cannot go through your wireless router. Something like this device would do the job, but I have not had any personal experience with it. We have used similar devices at work ("professional" quality, i.e. more expensive) for video only on projectors and 42" plasmas and they look pretty good on VGA.

Based on your description of your setup I'm having a hard time understanding it.

In reply to:

---

---

 

[txtxyeha]

When doing some remodeling I ran some cat5 from the living room to my home office for the purpose of hooking up a slingbox as well as connecting my DirecTV receiver to the Internet. In my home office I plug those cables into the router.

DirecTV "On Demand" uses the Internet connection to download both PPV movies as well as free content. That works ok, but searchability of the content is clumsy (e.g., I'm tired of scolling through "Call Girl Diaries, Episode 1 - 13" when searching for movies) and would rather use Hulu, etc. for that episode we missed.

It might be that the cheapest, easiest, yet clumsiest solution might be getting out a 25 ft. cable each time we want to do this running it on the floor from the computer to the TV. Don't even know if I can connect another monitor to my iMac in that way, but I'm sure it will be easy to find out.

Thanks for the input.

 

[brntorng]

An AppleTV is an option. May not be as versatile as you're wanting, but is worth considering.

 

[WooHorn]

I may be lost, but can't you use DTV Media Sharing?

Here is a 3rd party link on setting it up:
Invert Blog on Setting up DTV Media Sharing

 

[210-816-Horn]

15 pin VGA cable works awesome on 52" Sony HD (1080p)

 

[txtxyeha]

Anyone use AppleTV?

 

[HoustonHorn93]

In reply to:

---

---

 

[txtxyeha]

HH93 - Can I watch movies that I've ripped to my iTunes on iMac?

 

[Rayug]

About to task an old computer and try this out:

Boxee

It can also be installed on a Apple TV. I currently use XBMC on an old Xbox but I want to move that to the bedroom and use the Boxee system in the living room.

 

[HoustonHorn93]

In reply to:

---

---

 

[LAktownhorn]

if your computer is somewhat new do it this way:

buy this.

and then buy a headphone jack to rca adapter.

plug it in and your done.

i did this with a computer mac powerbook that is about a year old. very simple to do.

 

[dxspaz]

i use my xbox360 to stream video files to my tv as well as music. setup is pretty easy if you have windows running and if you have a mac you just need to get a program called connect 360. the divx videos look as good as standard DVD's

 

[txtxyeha]

Purchased an Apple TV and like all things from Mr. Jobs it feels like I'm paying twice as much as I should but the product does exactly what I want and I always find myself saying, "Why didn't I do this sooner?"

For those of you with an iPhone the Apple TV shows up as another device right next to your phone in iTunes. Same sync methodology, but the added benefit is you can stream video/music from iTunes to the ATV (i.e., you don't have to wait 3 or 30 minutes for the sync to occur before you start watching your movie).

Parental controls are great. Tried to use DirecTV's on-demand service but the interface was a little clunky, and I got tired of seeing ALL offerings (e.g., "Call Girl Diaries 3") even though parental controls prevented my 13 yo from going any further than the title. The movie listings on ATV are like a Blockbuster store w/o soft core porn offerings.

Main thing I already love is the ability to watch movies I have on my iMac (thank you Handbrake). Instead of choosing between two movies from NetFlix/BB, now we have four or five movies in the library from which to choose. Even at $3 or $4 a pop from iTunes that's a movie a week for what we're paying NetFlix/BB. Only negative with those downloads from iTunes is a 24-hour expiration date.

I think I just walked into a Blockbuster for the last time.

 

[txtxyeha]

Anyway to assign a MPA rating (e.g., PG, R) to a movie ripped with Handbrake? Otherwise any movies I sync to the Apple TV can be watched by anyone smart enough to change the input on the TV and press menu on the AppleTV remote.

 

[txtxyeha]

Just giving a progress report on my efforts to give the kids and family something decent to watch:Common Sense Media gives age-appropiate ratings for TV shows and movies.Handbrake allows for the ripping of DVDs into a format suitable for Apple TV, iPhone, and iPod. While it takes less than 5" to queue up Handbrake to do the three rips, it takes about 3' to complete the ripping.

MetaZ is also a free program to tag the .mp4 files with information such as MPAA rating, season number (if TV show), movie poster.

TagChimp is a web site that already has tagging information for TV shows, movies. MetaZ reaches out to TagChimp to fill out the tag fields, and any changes you make can be uploaded back to TagChimp (it's nice to give back).

iTunes is how I manage my library of videos.

Apple TV is a set-top box that is hardwired to your TV with component or HDMI cables that can communicate either wirelessly or via cat5 cable with the computer that has iTunes. The Apple TV box shows up as a device just like an iPhone or iPod where you can manage the sync'ing.

Finally the iomega desktop harddrive gives me 1TB of storage for both archieving movies (not sure why I'm holding onto "Mr. Holland's Opus") and backing up my iMac's harddrive via Time Machine.

This ends up being quite a bit of work than just ripping and watching with Handbrake; however, you need the tags for the parental controls to work in Apple TV (as well as the other devices). Also it's nice to have more of a library of things to watch than just the three DVDs that Netflix mailed earlier in the week. Finally, looking forward to loading some kid shows on my son's iPod and my iPhone for when we do the summer vacation road trip. Not going to miss having the mess of cables and portable DVD players in the backseat.