Tuesday, April 22, 2008
my tv dream
As I begin to think about moving into a new house, I find myself thinking a lot about my entertainment center.
You're seeing more and more high-level nerds using computers and XBox 360's as one-stop media centers.
The basic idea is that you have a computer attached to your TV (like a Mac Mini)that you wirelessly stream your iTunes library to (after ripping your movies off of DVD and storing them to iTunes naturally). Then you hook up a TV tuner to said computer and use it as a DVR. That way you've got immediate access to non-cable channels, your music and movie collection, and rentals (via iTunes) - all playable through Apple's Front Row software (free on most Macs these days). The only missing piece of the puzzle then would be cable shows not offered on iTunes (like anything on the Food Network or E!). The whole process is explained much more technically (but much more clearly) here.
One option is downloading the shows you like via bit torrents, but I've always found torrents to be kind of a pain to mess with. Plus you then have to make sure you have software that'll play varying video formats on your TV. Too much hassle.
I suppose I could just learn to live without the Food Network and The Soup, but what fun is that?
The other big kink in my tv dream is cost. Basically you'd be talking about an $800 tv, an $800 Mac Mini, and a $200 TV tuner. That's a lot of scratch up front - especially considering you're having tie these machines together to make them do what you want. I have no doubt that Apple has already noticed the media center trend and has their denizens hard at work creating a one-machine option. I just want it all now, dammit!
from what i know, itunes is not in HD. most likely, you will be buying a tv that is. and with all the networks being forced to start broadcasting entirely in HD, it would be almost illogical to waste money on a mac mini and mac tv tuner. throw that money to a better tv. or for paying your sweet cable bill with an HD package. it's only a matter of time before DVR takes over the VCR and DVD burner and becomes an all one machine that saves a hard copy. my two cents.
The TV tuner I was looking at is called Eye TV and I'm pretty sure it receives in HD. So the only content I'd be pulling off of iTunes is my pre-HD movie collection, which wouldn't be in HD no matter what I decided to do. And any movies I rented from iTunes obviously.
The format war needed to come to an end before Apple could really make a move on an all-in-one media center. Now that it looks like it's going to be a Blue-Ray world, I'm hoping against hope they've got something in the works. Another big strike against the Mac Mini in my plan was that it didn't have a Blue-Ray or HD drive.
Patch, Adobe recently released a new media player that can play raw .flv files and pretty much about any media file you can throw at it, so try that for the files you seem to have a hard time finding a player for.
I also use WinAmp for most things and have used it for millions of years. It plays a large library of media types.
http://www.adobe.com/products/mediaplayer/
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You're seeing more and more high-level nerds using computers and XBox 360's as one-stop media centers.
The basic idea is that you have a computer attached to your TV (like a Mac Mini)that you wirelessly stream your iTunes library to (after ripping your movies off of DVD and storing them to iTunes naturally). Then you hook up a TV tuner to said computer and use it as a DVR. That way you've got immediate access to non-cable channels, your music and movie collection, and rentals (via iTunes) - all playable through Apple's Front Row software (free on most Macs these days). The only missing piece of the puzzle then would be cable shows not offered on iTunes (like anything on the Food Network or E!). The whole process is explained much more technically (but much more clearly) here.
One option is downloading the shows you like via bit torrents, but I've always found torrents to be kind of a pain to mess with. Plus you then have to make sure you have software that'll play varying video formats on your TV. Too much hassle.
I suppose I could just learn to live without the Food Network and The Soup, but what fun is that?
The other big kink in my tv dream is cost. Basically you'd be talking about an $800 tv, an $800 Mac Mini, and a $200 TV tuner. That's a lot of scratch up front - especially considering you're having tie these machines together to make them do what you want. I have no doubt that Apple has already noticed the media center trend and has their denizens hard at work creating a one-machine option. I just want it all now, dammit!
Labels: nerd
from what i know, itunes is not in HD. most likely, you will be buying a tv that is. and with all the networks being forced to start broadcasting entirely in HD, it would be almost illogical to waste money on a mac mini and mac tv tuner. throw that money to a better tv. or for paying your sweet cable bill with an HD package. it's only a matter of time before DVR takes over the VCR and DVD burner and becomes an all one machine that saves a hard copy. my two cents.
The TV tuner I was looking at is called Eye TV and I'm pretty sure it receives in HD. So the only content I'd be pulling off of iTunes is my pre-HD movie collection, which wouldn't be in HD no matter what I decided to do. And any movies I rented from iTunes obviously.
The format war needed to come to an end before Apple could really make a move on an all-in-one media center. Now that it looks like it's going to be a Blue-Ray world, I'm hoping against hope they've got something in the works. Another big strike against the Mac Mini in my plan was that it didn't have a Blue-Ray or HD drive.
Patch, Adobe recently released a new media player that can play raw .flv files and pretty much about any media file you can throw at it, so try that for the files you seem to have a hard time finding a player for.
I also use WinAmp for most things and have used it for millions of years. It plays a large library of media types.
http://www.adobe.com/products/mediaplayer/
Post a Comment
