Using HD tv as monitor ?

Mr Blobby

Hi everyone . In a few weeks time I'll be gathering some funds together to start specing out my first Gaming PC . But before I start I was wondering if I could use my 32" sharp HD tv as a monitor ? It has a VGA port and 3 HDMI slots so I'm wondering will it work with my pc . I don't really care about Internet browsing because it's just for gaming and I'll have a new monitor after I gather some more funds so it's only part time . Any help you could i would appreciate . Thanks

Fluffy88

You can use it no problems, many people do use their TV instead of a monitor.

The one thing you might want to do just to make things easy is get a Graphics card that has a HDMI or VGA out on it so you don't need adapters. For example this card(below) has VGA, HDMI and DVI. You can use either VGA or HDMI with your TV(HDMI recommended) and then when you get your monitor use the DVI connector.
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/72gb-palit-gtx-560-ti-40nm-4008mhz-gddr5-gpu-822mhz-shader-1645mhz-384-cores-2x-dvi-hdmi-vga

Mr Blobby

Fluffy88 wrote: »

You can use it no problems, many people do use their TV instead of a monitor.

The one thing you might want to do just to make things easy is get a Graphics card that has a HDMI or VGA out on it so you don't need adapters. For example this card(below) has VGA, HDMI and DVI. You can use either VGA or HDMI with your TV(HDMI recommended) and then when you get your monitor use the DVI connector.
http://www.scan.co.uk/products/72gb-palit-gtx-560-ti-40nm-4008mhz-gddr5-gpu-822mhz-shader-1645mhz-384-cores-2x-dvi-hdmi-vga

And when your setting this up what would it involve exactly ? Would it be as simple as plugging in the hdmi into the graphics card and then into the tv, or would it be harder ?

ShadowHearth

http://www.scan.co.uk/products/1gb-xfx-hd-6870-black-edition-4600mhz-gddr5-gpu-940mhz-1120-stream-processors-dvi-hdmi-mdp or this.

its a budget version, but still a great great card. has 2 dvi 1 hdmi 2 minihdmi.

still dont forget that you will need speekers if you use telly . or i guess there could be some audio cables that you can use to hook it up to tv and use its speekers?

ScumLord

I thought HDMI did sound. I'm sure there's a way of getting the sound down the HDMI cable with the picture.

HDMI is as easy as plugging a DVD player in the TV.

Serephucus

HDMI does do sound, yes. With older cards, you'll need to plug a two-pin audio cable into your graphics card. With newer NVIDIA (and possibly AMD) GPUs, audio is handled through the PCI-E bus, so nothing is required.

Something to note though: by design, HDMI has no scaling options. It's probably not a big deal, but if you play any older games that force 4:3 resolutions, you're stuck at a very stretched 16:9. Found this one out the hard way. For this reason, I'm using DVI.

ShadowHearth

my bad so

i remember now hooking up my pc to telly with VGA cabble. i think i still got 20m one in a closet lol.


btw i remmeber doing it on 40inc telly which could show only up to 1024x768 resolution on vga, but it looked so great thought... not pixelated at all... i wonder how it will look on my 42 inch telly with hdmi?

lol so tempted just to try it now

Mr Blobby

Serephucus wrote: »

HDMI does do sound, yes. With older cards, you'll need to plug a two-pin audio cable into your graphics card. With newer NVIDIA (and possibly AMD) GPUs, audio is handled through the PCI-E bus, so nothing is required.

Something to note though: by design, HDMI has no scaling options. It's probably not a big deal, but if you play any older games that force 4:3 resolutions, you're stuck at a very stretched 16:9. Found this one out the hard way. For this reason, I'm using DVI.

Well I'm just looking at the graphics card I'll be buying ( ATI radeon 6950 2gb ) and it doesn't seem to support HDMI . Is there any otherway of using that graphics card with my tv ?

johnmcdnl

blobby360 wrote: »

Well I'm just looking at the graphics card I'll be buying ( ATI radeon 6950 2gb ) and it doesn't seem to support HDMI . Is there any otherway of using that graphics card with my tv ?

it does support HDMI

indough

it also passes audio via hdmi without any extra cables

Tea_Bag

movies look great on my tv, but I found text (like boards) to be a little fuzzy or something. out of focus when using HDMI, but ok through VGA. I don't concider it a replacement for my monitor anyway.

Fluffy88

From time to time I plug my laptop into our Sony Bravia 720p TV to watch a movie and the windows desktop looks amazingly good on it. I don't actually use it when plugged in, I just switch on the movie, so I can't comment on what it's like for normal usage.

But it will do very well while your building up a bit of money for a monitor.

Rsaeire

blobby360 wrote: »

Well I'm just looking at the graphics card I'll be buying ( ATI radeon 6950 2gb ) and it doesn't seem to support HDMI . Is there any otherway of using that graphics card with my tv ?

I have a 6950 (MSI R6950 Twin Frozr II/OC) connected to my LCD TV over HDMI and game on it all the time at 1920 x 1080 without issue. I haven't bothered hooking up my gaming PC to my surround sound setup, so I just use the TV's speakers.

Serephucus

Rsaeire wrote: »

I haven't bothered hooking up my gaming PC to my surround sound setup, so I just use the TV's speakers.

Thou shalt be smote down, sir!

TV speakers? Seriously? You do know that barring extremely high-end Bose TVs (and the like), integrated TV audio is the pretty much the worst audio there is?

Rsaeire

Serephucus wrote: »

Thou shalt be smote down, sir!

TV speakers? Seriously? You do know that barring extremely high-end Bose TVs (and the like), integrated TV audio is the pretty much the worst audio there is?

When playing games, I don't mind too much. I play my Xbox 360 with surround sound but PC games I tend to just use the TV's speakers. I tend to sit closer to the TV when playing PC games too and since I play RPGs mainly, it's not as if I'm missing much.

Also, I'm well aware the quality of TV speakers compared to dedicated speakers/surround sound setups as, after all, I do have a 7.1 surround setup.

Mr Blobby

Well I'm glad all I need is a HDMI lead to be able to play on my tv . I guess it's time to start saving .

vibe666

blobby360 wrote: »

Well I'm glad all I need is a HDMI lead to be able to play on my tv . I guess it's time to start saving .

make sure you save all the money for your PC though and don't waste it on an expensive HDMI lead, as ANY hdmi cable will give you the exact same picture quality regardless of if it's €2.83 off ebay or £1000 one off amazon.

Also, I have a Radeon 6870 and it does say that it does sound over HDMI to a TV although I haven't ever tried it to confirm.

Mr Blobby

vibe666 wrote: »

blobby360 wrote: »

Well I'm glad all I need is a HDMI lead to be able to play on my tv . I guess it's time to start saving .

make sure you save all the money for your PC though and don't waste it on an expensive HDMI lead, as ANY hdmi cable will give you the exact same picture quality regardless of if it's €2.83 off ebay or £1000 one off amazon.

Also, I have a Radeon 6870 and it does say that it does sound over HDMI to a TV although I haven't ever tried it to confirm.

Yeah I wasn't to sure if needed a cheap or expensive hdmi lead . I'm glad you clarified . Thanks

vibe666

blobby360 wrote: »

Yeah I wasn't to sure if needed a cheap or expensive hdmi lead . I'm glad you clarified . Thanks

the likes of monster cables etc. have been making a bomb off them unfortunately back since the old days of analogue cables.

there's definitely a good case to be made for expensive analogue cables if you have high end A/V equipment, but HDMI is purely digital, all just ones and zero's so either a cable will work or it won't and there's not going to be any appreciable difference at all between a €3 HDMI cable and a €1200 one IMHO, although i'/m sure someone will be along shortly to correct me.

Tea_Bag

my most expensive HDMI cable that i bought when i was foolish, gold plated blah blah for €30 odd euro is the only one to date that has failed on me, and ive bought many $1 cables from china.

M00lers

vibe666 wrote: »

i'/m sure someone will be along shortly to correct me.

They wouldn't dare. Pitchforks at the ready!!!

Kadongy

My very cheap hdmi cable did break within a few months...

I have a plasma tv. It is great for playing games and watching movies on while connected to a computer. However it is not really suitable for anything involving reading normal text because the font is slightly blurry. I dont think this would be the case with an lcd tv though.

Mr Blobby

Also just wondering would I be able to boot My pc up for the first while it's plugged into the tv

Fluffy88

Yeah.

Using a TV is the same as using a monitor. The only difference is one is made for watching tv the other is made for looking at up close and computer stuff that's why people say the TV isn't as good as a monitor.
Sorry for the very technical post :P

Mr Blobby

Fluffy88 wrote: »

Yeah.

Using a TV is the same as using a monitor. The only difference is one is made for watching tv the other is made for looking at up close and computer stuff that's why people say the TV isn't as good as a monitor.
Sorry for the very technical post :P

I always carry a dictionary with me anyways so it didn't take me to long to solve it

ShadowHearth

I am sooooo tempted to connect my pc to telly now...

Need to buy some cheap wireless keyboard and mouse first.

Mr Blobby

ShadowHearth wrote: »

I am sooooo tempted to connect my pc to telly now...

Need to buy some cheap wireless keyboard and mouse first.

Please do ..... I would like to know how it turns out

vibe666

if anyone is interested, I've currently got an Acer Revo R3610 set up as a HTPC under my TV via it's built in HDMI port using a Rii mini keyboard to control it.



it's a little dual core atom net top which i upgraded with 3gb of ram and am about to put a 60gb SSD in to replace the 160gb HDD that's in it, to hopefully give it a little more poke.

all my media is on a NAS connected to the Revo via gigabit ethernet and happily streams (and plays) 720p video on windows 7 without skipping, and i'm told will play 1080p video if you install XMBC live on it instead of windows, although i've never tried as my TV is only a cheap Aldi one that just does 1080i.

having said that, it all works fine for my needs.

ScumLord

vibe666 wrote: »

make sure you save all the money for your PC though and don't waste it on an expensive HDMI lead, as ANY hdmi cable will give you the exact same picture quality regardless of if it's €2.83 off ebay or £1000 one off amazon.

Also, I have a Radeon 6870 and it does say that it does sound over HDMI to a TV although I haven't ever tried it to confirm.

Surely that price of £1000 is a joke, there's no way they could legitimately go up to that price on a cable. I thought the ones being sold in Currys for €80 where taking the piss. Even if the cable was made out of nothing but gold it couldn't reach that price.

vibe666

you'd be surprised. back in the days of high end analogue systems, people would pay a small fortune for cables, with it not being at all unusual for a purist to budget 10% or more of the overall cost of their AV set up to high end cabling.

they do all sorts of fancy stuff with them, using 99.9999% pure metals, making them in a near vacuum, filling the air spaces inside the cables with fancy gases to prevent corrosion and all those kinds of tricks.

at the end of the day though, it's digital, not analogue and you're not going to see any appreciable difference between that and a cheap HDMI cable, once they both work.

Serephucus

In the days of analogue cables, yes, there definitely was cause for doing all those fancy things - whether or not they were worth it, and if there was actually any appreciable differences is another story entirely - because they actually did have a use. With digital cables though, they either work or they don't. Simple as.