Connected

It’s funny how I complain about “not  having the internet”  We recently moved, and it was a few days before we got the internet set up at home again.  I go crazy without internet access.  Luckily it was only for three or four days.

 Even though I didn’t have the internet at home, I had it at work, on my phone, and there are several free hotspots I know of… I guess my definition of having the internet, is having it all the time.  I’m very impatient these days, if I don’t have what I want at my fingertips (literally, I’m lazy too–if it isn’t in reach, its to far away) I get frustrated.

 Now that I have it, I feel better.  I don’t really use it much.   I still haven’t checked all of my email accounts.  but I just feel better knowing that it’s there.

Your Next TV–Component vs HDMI

The obvious choice is that you will run whatever connectors you have.  You can’t easily convert one to the other.   But, if you have a choice here are some guidelines. 

Over short runs in your entertainment center, you probably will not be able to see much of a difference (at least I can’t) Both are high definition connections, capable of 480i, 480p, 720p, 1080i, or 1080p. HDMI however is much cleaner, sending HD video and audio over a single cable with a USB sized connector.  Component uses three video connectors for video only, and audio is run separately as stereo (red and white RCA) or surround sound audio with a digital coaxial or toslink connection.

For the boring details about the differences, keep reading… 

This goes back to the digital VS analog battle.  Component is analog, and HDMI is digital. 

Since most devices process HD video as a digital signal, HDMI doesn’t need to convert to analog and back for the cable.  Any digital to analog conversion will introduce some loss, so this can maintain a better quality.

Second, besides sending an amazing video signal, it can also send up to 8 channels of digital audio (perfect for a 7.1 surround sound)–All that over a single, small connector. 

HDCPis supported on all HDMI connections, which can be a blessing and a curse.  HDCP is technically a content protectionmeasure.  It will check that every frame sent is a perfect signal transfer, ensuring that there is no loss over the cables, connectors, or interface.  However, in order to get an HDCP license, the product has to meet some copy protectionrequirements.   For most situations, it won’t interfere, but it can have its drawbacks–for instance HDMI and DVI-D use identical video signals (DVI doesn’t support audio)(And yet, the connector is like 4 times the size)  So you should be able to connect an HDMI source to say a digital widescreen monitor, but many DVI displays don’t support HDCP, so it will not play copy protected content.  Some legitimate video splitting or switching functions are disabled as well.

The HDMI specification states that a repeater is required for cable runs over 15 feet.  In practice I haven’t seen that always necessary.  HDMI was originally designed to run longer distances (45 feet) but was changed just before release.  Under 50 feet, there is rarely need for a booster, especially if you are using a high quality cable.  However if you are pushing a high resolution, (Like 1080p) you might notice some sparkling.  You can get an HDMI booster, which will clean up any sparkling or loss you might find.

Component doesn’t necessarily have it’s own features, but it doesn’t have some of the drawbacks of HDMI.  (I guess it does have some drawbacks of its own)

Since component is an analog signal, it handles long distances much better.  Over long or low quality cables, there might be some loss, but it will generally just be a slight loss of clarity or signal intensity, often unnoticeable.

Component video doesn’t support/require HDCP.  You can run full HD content without restrictions (Assuming your source will feed it to you)

Your Next TV–HDTV vs HD Ready TV

Most places in America now have access to over-the-air HD programming.  The same way you can pick up local network channels with an antenna, you can pick them up now in HD.   But you have to have an HD tuner in your TV. 

A true HDTV will have an ATSC tuner, which is able to pick up, decode and maintain the HD channels available over the air.  Some HDTVs will have both and ATSC and an NTSC (standard TV) tuner, to accommodate either signal, or picture in picture support.

An HD ready TV can display HD resolutions, (through Component, DVI, or HDMI) but not from an antenna.   You will have to have an HD receiver (which are still hard to find) or order HD programming through your cable/satellite TV provider and use a set top box.

Of course, if you want any of the ‘cable’ or premium channels in HD, you will have to get them from your provider, regardless of the tuner you have.

Your Next TV–HD vs ED vs SD

HDTV High Definition is becoming the “craze,” and I have to admit, I’m becoming enamored.  I think you’d be happy if you switched over, but I might be wrong.  I suggested it to my dad, and he brought up a valid point.  His eyes “aren’t what they used to be”–some people really might not be able to see a difference. 

The difference is, the resolution.  they pack more pixels, more lines, more picture, into the TV.  That means sharper clearer image.  Less blur, and usually more colors.  It just looks better.

EDTV Enhanced Definition TV is essentially a digital, widescreen version of traditional TV  It is not high enough resolution to be called HD, but it will probably for most people be noticeably better.  I have actually seen in store displays EDTVs that looked better than HDTVs.  They are usually cheaper, but make sure that you are getting what you pay for.

SDTV Standard Definition TV is the good old (square) TV that we all know and love.  It’s what we grew up with. Not much to write home about on this one.

Your Next TV–Flat Screen vs Flat Panel

Watch out for a flat “screen” TV.  That just means that the glass in front of the TV is…flat (not curved).  It does have some advantages: you maintain a better picture from a wider viewing angle, and it supposedly puts less strain on your eyes if you are sitting close.  But most people want a flat “panel” TV though, and might not notice the distinction. 

Flat panel TV’s are the kind that you can hang on a wall.  They are generally lighter and of course thinner than a standard tube TV.  (oh, and the glass in front is flat too)  

Tube TV’s still have (arguably) some advantages picture wise.  Without getting to gory, they can show more colors more easily, and in some cases (for example HD 1080i) they can show a crisper image.  I personally don’t think that the size warrants the difference however.  I don’t think I will ever buy another tube (CRT) TV again, just because of the space issue.

Your Next TV–Digital vs Analog

In general, I would say go digital.  By about this time next year, all analog TV channels will be shut down, and force over-the-air viewers to get a digital TV, or a digital to analog conversion set top box.  If you are in the market for a new TV, you will be spending a significant chunk of change anyway, you might as well buy a TV that won’t be obsolete so quickly.

The flip side is that analog TV’s will be getting a lot cheaper–because they are going obsolete.  If you are getting cable, satellite TV, or only watching movies, the broadcast change won’t really affect you.  If you aren’t going to go HD, then you might be able to find a great deal on a standard TV.  (but if you regret it in a year or two… don’t say I didn’t warn you)

Your Next TV–Opener

I’ve been thinking a lot about TV’s lately.  (I know, I’m a nerd)  Part of it is because of my work.  There I have to think about it because we sell a lot of AV equipment.  I have a friend who upgraded his Hybrid TV/Monitor, and I bought his old one from him.  My parent’s TV is going out in their bedroom, so my dad was asking what he should look for.  There are a lot of factors to consider in what to get for your next TV.  I was going to put it all into one behemoth post, but I decided to break it down into bite sized pieces and present it as a series.

 So here is a breakdown of the features, options, and my humble assessment of the new TV technology.

Xbox 360: Media Center Extender

I always thought one of the best features for Windows Media Center was the idea of having a media center extender.  This would let you stream all of your media from your computer to a TV in another room of the house.  Either as a standalone box, through an Xbox (with optional add-on) or through an Xbox 360.  The idea has real promise.

Unfortunately I haven’t really been impressed with media center, The program itself is pretty weak, poor codec support, it is slow, it crashes a lot, and has a lot of annoyances (for instance it is one of the most aggravating applications to run in a dual screen setup) Without a tv tuner, it isn’t worth it, and there are only a few tuners that are compatible with MCE, so it narrows the small list of tuners that have the reliability vs price ratio I look for. So I never really did anything with it.  Obviously I wasn’t big on running out and spending a lot of money on an extender (Ok so the xbox version is only like $30 I think, but I’d still rather buy a game)

I did get an Xbox 360 recently, which has the extender built in.  Plus the allure of an extender is back because of the apartment I’m in.  It isn’t a bad setup, we have iProvo internet (which is amazing) and their digital TV (which isn’t) included in our rent.  The problem is that we have one cable jack, and one ethernet jack, side by side in the living room.  Since it is a rental, it isn’t really my place to tear up the walls and install a bunch of wiring (as much as I would like to).  I thought I might be able to get away with running one wire across the floor, over the door frame, across the hall ceiling and down into the bedroom somehow… but two cables would be to much (even for someone as lacking in aesthetics as me).  So I was debating…Do I run an internet line, and stream video through a computer to the tv, or do I run the cable, and leave out the computer all together  

I was reading an interview on the internet, where someone asked the perplexing question:  what is the point of a “core” xbox360.  I still think it is mostly a sucker punch, because the customer will most likely have to pay more than the difference before they can play a game, but the interviewee (someone from “The Xbox team”) mentioned the media player possibilities.  And I started thinking about it.

 

Assuming everything worked (which it really doesn’t) that would be a perfect solution.  I could connect the xbox to the TV, have a built in DVD/CD player, plus access to all the music movies, pictures and TV programming on my computer in the living room–besides the gaming possibilities.  I could use the xbox interface to do everything!  It might even be worth springing for one of their remotes.  I could even feasibly run it all over a wireless connection (although I probably would get a wireless bridge rather than buying the $100 Xbox wifi adapter) So there would be no unsightly wires.

 

So, just to see how it worked, I set up my Xbox360 as a media center extender.  (Which is a little silly since right now both the xbox and the media center computer are connected to the same TV)  It took me longer than it should have, I got a bad download (the exe wouldn’t run) and I thought it was another glitch in the media center saga, I started reading around to see what if anything other people had done…No one had reported the same “bug” so I cleared my internet cache and downloaded again and it was pretty smooth from there on out.  (So I guess I am also culpable for blaming Microsoft anytime something electronic goes wrong)  The software runs essentially the same on the Xbox as on the computer (aside from “Play DVD” option) and again I was wishing that it worked as well as it ought to.

 

I was impatient and tried to play one of the old bmwfilms that I had formatted to play on my palm, but the media center was still finalizing the setup and I got a message I had been disconnected.  I tried later to play back a full lenth movie that I have stored on the media center HDD, but that was taking too long and I gave up. (I think my daughter was vying for some attention)

 

………………………………………………………………………

 

Its now a day or two later, and I went with the easy stuff first. Pictures come right up, music played without a problem.  I still haven’t set up a tuner so I don’t know how that works but the “My Videos”

 just isn’t going to cut it. Admittedly I have a lot of video files, I think somewhere around 150 or 200 gigs on a 250 gig hard drive, but the MCE extender takes WAY too long to play.  Right now I’ve been trying to play a downloaded episode of 24 (burger king for some reason gave a free download of a few episodes) it should be pretty straigt forward as far as encoding and format goes.   No Go.  I’ve waited longer probably than it would take to haul the VCR into the other room and get it set up on the other TV.   (Technology isn’t really convenient if it isn’t easier, faster, better, or at least two of the three)

 

Kind of a disappointment.  I was hoping that would be an excuse to buy one of the rumored next-gen xbox360 with integrated HDMI and HDDVD support.  But maybe not.

 

(Of course there is still hope… maybe Vista’s media center works)

 

UPDATE:  I have a laptop with MCE as well, so I connected the xbox extender to that machine.  (As a note, it looks like you can only extend one Media Center Computer at a time)  The laptop came with a sample HD video from National Geographic.  It is encoded as a WMV and about 120 MB.  That played fine.  It loaded quick and played well…. even with the laptop running wirelessly (802.11g)  it wouldn’t play any of my other video files, complaining about the codecs.  So that might have been a problem with the desktop–but even so, it should have told me.

Violent Video Games Contd.

 

I like a particular type of game…I like games to be more of an interactive movie. 

I like to get lost in the environment, in the world of the game, like you can with a good book or a (rare) exceptional movie.  And I come “back” with a better outlook on life. 

I get fed up with the people who fly past me on the freeway and squeeze between me and another car without signaling.  I get frustrated when I am accused of not helping my customers, then as a customer, don’t get a fraction of the service we give.  I get riled up when I see the media portray their biases and agendas as news, and I get tired of competing in school with kids who have nothing better to do than to study for some unholy amount of time.

Now I know none of these things are really worth getting angry about, but blowing up aliens, or driving in a digital demolition derby seems to dissolve the urge. I don’t wish I could shoot anyone in real life, nor do I imagine the red Jetta with the punk on the cell phone when I smash a car into a million 1s and 0s.  It’s all very abstract. 

I think the escape is the relief

I know it’s possible that violent games aren’t good for me.  My mom struggled while raising 4 boys to try to decide what games were appropriate (My dad just hated them all together—till he got hooked on Cabelas Deer Hunt that is).  For a while my mom was really restrictive on what she wanted us to play, and we were really upset at first.  We thought our games were fine.  I remember explaining why we chose the games that we played, and what we avoided.  I’m not sure if that changed her mind, or how much that affected her, but she let us make our own decisions.

Having said that, I want to emphasize that there are many games that I will not play as a matter of principle.  Some games I think are enjoyable but have offensive subject matter, others I think the entire premise is wrong.   And I think that any more than “a little” video games is way too much. 

Of course everyone has their own definitions of what is offensive and how much, is too much. (And that is as it should be)

I think a lot about being a parent, so this is how I want to approach the subject with my children.  I think we should be part of their lives.  I think we should know what our kids are playing.  Not that we need to check up on them or intrude on their privacy, but we should find out what interests them.  “So what do you do in this game?”  Listen to the response, the strategy they have developed, and what they like and dislike about the game.  If there is a problem, address it.  For example if my child at 10 years old said “Well I’m supposed to strangle a street girl, but if I have to cap her client first, then I lose the clean job bonus” –I’d be a little concerned.  And I would probably see if they could pause the game while we evaluated the lessons that this game was teaching. 

Seriously though, help children set the criteria for what games they buy or play.  Make sure it is based mostly on their criteria, even if it’s hard for you.  My mom, bless her heart, would try to be as accepting as she could.  The music in racing games drove her crazy, she let us play, but would ask that we turned it down.  There was a snowboarding game we had, that the character bled if he landed on his head—that made her physically ill  (queasy, gag reflex etc.) but she tried to appreciate the moves, and we tried hard not to land on our heads. She even tried to play some of the games with us (she said it was like having a disobedient child—she told the character to do one thing, but they did whatever they wanted to)  I think we were more sensitive to the content of games, and it meant a lot to us that she tried, and I’m sure it meant a lot to her to know what we were in to.  I want to have that kind of an approach with my kids.

Violent Video Games

I’m not a gamer.  I enjoy video games, and I’ve spent quite a bit of time playing them, but I could probably count on one hand the games that I’ve played through to the end, and I don’t play regularly.  I play everything on “easy” (which would mortify some of my gamer friends), and I will often bore of a game in less than an hour.

 

But let me tell you something about video games…

 

They make me nicer.

 

I usually handle stress pretty well, but with work, school, a family, (and I seem to always be sick lately) it can build up.  And I can get a little ornery—not so much ornery, but less patient with people, more critical, and more opinionated.  I’m sure that there are a lot of things I could do to relieve the stress, but xbox is one of them.

 

I first noticed it about a year ago.  I took my x-box with me on the holiday vacation to play with my family.  The next two or three months were really busy, and I hadn’t even unpacked the console.   One day I had some free time, and wanted to play for a while.  (I think we had been talking about a game at work)  I pulled it all out, and spent maybe an hour or two playing that night.  The next day I was driving and realized that I felt good, I was relaxed, some of the tension in my neck and scalp were gone (I lose hair when I get stressed) and I was spontaneously smiling.  I tried to think what was different that day, and the thing that popped into my head was the video game.  I’ve tried to pay attention since, and when I play more often, stress doesn’t build up as much.  When stress does build up, playing will help release it.

 

Now, don’t try to read too much into this.  I know that it all really is just a waste of time, there are lots of better things I could be doing, and there could be a million reasons why it works.  Maybe it is just because I enjoy games, and any diversion is a stress release.  Maybe a lot of things.  I know there are a lot of studies, and a lot more talk, that try to correlate violent media to violence in people.  And I’m not necessarily trying to prove or disprove anything.  I am simply stating my experience.