Video Card and TV setup to get rid of monitor

[CrawfishFiesta]

I'm new to this forum and pretty ignorant about TVs and video cards so I'd love some help. The next paragraph sets up my situation...skip it if you're in a hurry.

I live in a crowded Manhattan apartment and my desk and surrounding area is entirely consumed by my desktop PC setup (large monitor, keyboard, printer, external speakers, etc). I've decided I absolutely need the space back for actual work (for which I use a laptop and a lot of paper). I'd still like to be able to play some games, however, and unfortunately my laptop isn't zippy enough to suffice. I've been thinking about just throwing out my desktop PC and quitting my gaming hobby, but that's a tough pill to swallow.

What I'd like to do, if possible, is clear my desk of all my PC equipment, get rid of my large monitor entirely, connect my PC to my already existing (and space-consuming) TV and sound system, and store a wireless keyboard underneath my coffee table. I figure that with this set up, my PC won't take up any extra real estate. When I feel like cruising the web or playing a game, I can just pull out my wireless keyboard and play from my couch.

My questions are:

1. From my brief research, it looks like wireless keyboards and mice only have a range of 6 feet. Does anyone know how badly they degrade beyond that range? Does a keyboard used from 8' away just not work?

2. Do the wireless peripherals perform OK? I've never tried them.

3. I've got a widescreen Mitsubishi HDTV-capable TV. I know some people on this forum use TV-Out from their video cards to watch DivX movies on their TVs, but is it actually possible to get rid of the monitor entirely and just use a TV for web cruising, playing games, etc. I know that TV resolution isn't as good as monitor resolution, but I can live with a slightly lower resolution to free up some space. I also am hoping that with HDTV I ought to be able to get a tolerable resolution.

4. What video card should I purchase for this, and what type of interface do the cards use for their TV-Out feeds?

5. Will everything look distorted since I have a widescreen TV or are there options/techniques to address this?

6. Will I need any additional hardware to make this work?

Thank you very much for your help.

<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by CrawfishFiesta on 07/03/02 04:40 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[Tiberius13]

1) They have a range around 6 feet. I use a Logitech wireless keyboard and mouse and am happy with them.. however, you can get strange 'dead spots' perhaps caused by objects deflecting the signal or whatever? If you get out of range, it just doesn't work... The reciever is on a cable about 5' long though, so you could have that stretched towards where you'll be sitting... then you just need the keyboard on mouse within a 5 or so feet of the reciever.. not the computer.

2) They work ok. The further you are from the reciever, (and possibly based on other factors in the room), you may get intermitant frustrations where it works or doesn't work. Experimenting with the position of the reciever, etc. can usually fix the issues. (if you even have any)

3) TV Out can be great... but the limitation truly is the TV itself. It can be very eye straining to read text, etc. on a tv screen. Windows XP has True Type fonts that are supposed to improve text greatly... definitely worth using. I don't know if HDTV will improve the picture quality, but hopefully it does... otherwise it can be annoying for you to look at the tv for long periods of time.

4) I recommend an ATI All In Wonder card (Radeon 7500 or 8500). I recommend those because they are known to have the best tv out quality, and they both come with a REMOTE!!! The remote literally works from another room and works through walls! I have a hunch you would rely on the remote more than your keyboard and mouse for many things. For the TV Out, I use s-video with my ATI AIW...

5) Usually things don't get distorted, but this is a driver / program issue. For instance, I have run widescreen divx movies in one program and they were distorted on the tv, and in another program it maintained their aspect ratio. In general, I don't think it would distort on an hdtv.. but I honestly don't know. Look into that more if you are really worried about it.

6) A computer and a graphics card that does TV Out... as mentioned before.. the ATI AIW cards may be what you are looking for (the remote could be a Godsend for you)

<font color=green><b>More salt than just a grain you will need with posts of mine. - Yoda</b></font color=green>

 

[endless_n00b]

Hello fellow New Yorker! I feel your pain, I am in the same boat (or crounded manhatten apartment for that matter).

I went through the same thing. Looked at wireless keyboard (already had a mouse), TV Out etc. Utimately I abandoned the idea for the following reasons:

1. range of my wireless mouse was about 6 feet or so. Past that you get nothing. This wasn't enough for me. Oh and, yes thats from the receiver which you can stretch from your box into your living/tv area, but that still wasn't enough distance for me. Plus I would've been tripping over it all the time. Kinda defeats the purpose of wireless.

2. Wireless mice give spotty performance in general. In normal windows use its not noticable and the wireless is awesome. But are you a hardcore gamer? The performance is unacceptable in that case, especially in FPS games like UT. Corded optical mouse is the only way to go, except for maybe a Boomslang which I have heard amazing things about. I eventually dumped the cordless mouse, especially after the batteries died on me mid game one time.

So since I didn't want cables stretching all over the place, I gave up the idea, but I hope you try it out. Maybe your apt is set up better for something like this. Plus you have an HDTV, which I don't, and I'd be interested in how that looks. Good luck in whatever you do.

-
Cheap memory: $26
Unstable OS: $95
Your boss getting the BSOD late on a Friday: Priceless

 

[bradb0286]

to answer your question on the keys and mice, intel used to make a 900mhz wireless mouse and keyboard and also game controller setup. i think you can still find them. Probally for dirt cheap since they are old. but those should give you enough room for your setup. Also many HDTV's have an HD component imput that you can plug directly from your pc to that. otherwise i would go with ATI and the radeon AIW 8500 with its remote wonder and optional component video out. should give you great resoulution. hope this helps

 

[NVulture]

I recommend getting one of these instead of dishing out the cash on a new video card (which you probably dont need anyways)..

http://www.antec-inc.com/tvexe.html