Just bought an HDTV. Now what?

[nobody]

So I finally decided to join the new millennium and get an HDTV. What do I buy now? Right now I'm pretty much wasting it. I have a Wii hooked up via RCA, a DVD player hooked up RCA, my basic non-HD cable, and an antenna that sometimes pulls down the major networks in HD.

When I have an extra 100 bucks a month to blow I'm definitely going to get direct tv and enjoy 75+ HD channels. But that's not in the budget right now.

Obviously going to need a Blu Ray or HD-DVD player. Can't decide between picking up a PS3 or getting a media center PC. Obviously both have their own advantages.

Probably need to update my audio set up too, I have 5.1 surround, but I think I have it plugged in wrong :P

What do you cool kids with HDTV's do?

[Templarian]

which one you get? sony? samsung? size?

I plug my computer up to my friends HDTV with the HDMI port. Its nice for playing games and viewing the cool visualization effects at parties.

2 more years and my rents are thinking of getting a large thin HDTV for the living room (good old 2009 digital upgrade for all).

[nobody]

Almost got a Samsung, but at the last minute so a 37inch LCD LG which I ended up with. Very happy with it. Unfortunately my iMac is in my computer but my new tv is in the living room. Don't think my little tablet pc could really do anything if I hooked it up to it.

[grimdeath]

If you have an X360 I suggest you get the HD-DVD addon since HD-DVD is outselling and outperforming Blu-Ray and you also get 5 free HD-DVD movies when you purchase it and you can use it on your PC as well.

You can also get a standalone HD-DVD player I think Walmart has one for under 100 bucks oh and Transformers :love: is only on HD-DVD.

The best purchase would be a dual format player but I'm not sure if those are out yet and how much that would set you back.

Good luck and welcome to the HD era :lol:

[Noct]

You may want to consider getting the component cables for your Wii as well. Wii doesn't offer any HD options, but the cables will allow you to put it in progressive scan (480p) which does make a noticable difference. Nintendo brand wires can be tough to find, but the third party ones work just fine.

I would second the preference of HD-DVD over BD too. You'll hear a million different opinions on the format war, and most of them are just opinion, but there are a couple of blatent facts:

BD has a lot more releases, but the first batch of them is said to have some questionable quality, and BD does not offer as many features as HD does. (Like Picture in Picture special features for one).

Also, if you're going to buy a game system over a stand alone player, X360 has a much bigger and better game library then PS3 does by a huge margin. After buying the HD drive add-on the two systems will cost you about the same amount of money, and you're getting a lot more for your buck from the X. (Plus they offer that free movie deal that grimdeath mentioned, and they come with a pack in movie as well.)

[fester8542]

Speaking of HDTV's
(Figure I would jump onto this threat than start a new one.)

I am having delivered a 43in Samsung (2 HDMI three compunnet, yadda yadda yadda)

I have one of the original XBOX 360's that Has the cable with the Blue, Red Green, and Audio. - then the standard RCA on the other side.

How do I make the most out of that console. Can it use an HDMI cable? Can I get an HDDVD player with it?

I am lost about that stuff.

[Templarian]

For HDMI:
No

For HDDVD:
http://www.xbox.com/en-US/hardware/x/xbox360hddvdplayer/

[nobody]

Does PS3 have HDMI? I'm thinking about picking one up.

[Templarian]

2

[nobody]

Woo. Why does it have two though? Can it output to two TVs at once?

[fester8542]

They are both inputs for HD enabled Devices


*********
So....

Ho how lossy are the standard HD cables compared to HDMI

Please don't tell me to google it. Most AV stuff makes no sense to me.

[Templarian]

Woo. Why does it have two though? Can it output to two TVs at once?
I loled a little bit (should of said that). Festers right. The PS3 comes with its own cables and such.


Fester HDMI is just like the other cables it just converts them all into one super cable (with audio and the such). That way you don't have so many extra ends to plug in.

[project107]

From what I understand, HDMI doesn't compress signal (video+audio), as does the lesser (RCA, Component, Coax, etc.). I just recently bought a 42" LCD HDTV and had it hooked up to my DVR and Cable box (the same thing) via components cables. I was blown away at the quality...until I bought a HDMI cable. My wife and I both immediately noticed a large difference. HDMI all the way.
Linky: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HDMI

[fester8542]

That is comforting to know.

Thanks for the info Temp :thumb:

[CriTiCeRz]

My friends at school said that the show Planet Earth (http://dsc.discovery.com/convergence/planet-earth/planet-earth.html) looked freaking amazing on HDTV. So... go ahead and watch it. :)

[BoonDock]

:( I'm sad - I don't have HDTV ... Guess I better catch up ... I hate having to save up for the wedding in August. I'd much rather just blow money on my car and my home entertainment.

ARGH!

[nobody]

I loled a little bit (should of said that). Festers right. The PS3 comes with its own cables and such.

I'm lost. What's lolful? You said the PS3 had 2 HDMI ports, right? I don't see what the cables thing has to do with anything.

[Templarian]

Sorry man. The HDMI ports are HDMI inputs which means you would connect say an HDVD player into your PS3 or another player. This way you don't have to unplug players when you want to watch different formats (they were probably anticipating that their blueray format wouldn't be the dominate and that people would be HDVD players also... thus they wanted users to use their system as the median between the TV).

Sony doesn't use HDMI output for its video and audio it uses a combination of video and audio cables.

Sorry for the confusion man... i just lol'ed a little because of the thought of being able to use two TV's with one console.

//edit, I edited my post a bit while you were typing below.

[nobody]

Oh sad. Why would you want to hook something up through the PS3?

Freaking HDMI. I'm clearly getting old because this is just confusing me. I get that it's audio and video in one cable, and it also allows control of other devices or something? Meh, stupid technology overloards.

[fester8542]

No it's pretty confusing to me too man.

The reason you would want to hook an HDDVD player through the PS3 is (if) blue ray fails you could use the PS3 as your home media center.

I've seen the stuff the PS3 can do for photos and video, so it's pretty cool they would allow you to do that.

Plus Sony is well aware they are notorious for failed media. MiniDisc, Betamax, UMD....etc... there are a few I forgot.

[nobody]

I guess I don't understand why you wouldn't just directly hook up your HDDVD player or whatever you have directly to the TV. Or does it act as a switch like a receiver? Either way it still eludes me. Oh well :P

[Vexir]

Um, I'm pretty sure the 360 Elite's have HDMI. I'm not sure if normal ones do, but I heard that a while after the Elites have been out (and its been a while) they were going to put HDMI in all new boxes... I'm too lazy to look it up for sure tho.

[indiasfinest]

elites have HDMI, normal ones do not, elites also have a 120 GB HDD while normal ones only have 20GB,

[Noct]

That used to be the case, but now all models except the core have it.
Really ticks me off that I bought a Premium launch system. MS should offer some kind of a rebate/trade-in for people that want to upgrade. I get a bit of interference using the component cables that I would love to get rid of...

$280 Xbox 360 Core- No HDMI
$280 Xbox 360 Arcade system - HDMI
$350 Xbox 360 Premium - HDMI
$400 Xbox 360 Halo 3 Special Edition - HDMI
$450 Xbox 360 Elite) - HDMI

[k77]

Checked your topic out. First if you want to output HD, get a blu ray, its better and winning and more choice, or HDDVD, or a SKY HD box depends if you in the states, every country still has the "get extra hd channel fee"

I have had a PS3 and an Xbox 360.

PS3 - The graphics if you played on an xbox 360 you will find you are not all that suprised, I test both with Pro Evo 8. The contrast on the PS£ and all other graphics are a bit darker so it seems to have better graphics, depends on games, assassins creed I got a hard on playing it on PS3. 360 has better games and more variety, BUT DON'T FORGET GTA5 is coming soon..

Bonus with PS3 - BluRay movies are winning the war, better games graphics, dont need to upgrade or pay for the online play (upgrade I mean xbox needs hd dvd player, hdmi ports etc)


Xbox 360 - The amount of games and creative games are so immense, its really cool you can go to your friends house put his xbox on with your joypad save your settings, its so social elite, if you play at his house your profile is saved there, and your online profile is always being updated, good for gamers. Few naffs, xbox live is subscription; they do have free gaming nights but it LAGS.

Bonus features : Amazing online functionality, xp media centre ready, the elite version has 1 hdmi port with it. but don't forget, with a 360 you will be paying for components, components, components..


I decided on the new vaio blu ray setup. looks appeal to me and it will go well in my place.

Cheers

[Noct]

Not only was that was an extremely opinionated post, parts of it are entirely untrue...

First of all, neither format is "winning", in fact, both have pathetically small sales and are not doing well in the grand scheme of things at all. Beyond that, it is WAY too early to declare any winners in the war, but as of right now they are basically dead locked. Since Paramount and Dreamworks have recently decided to go HD exclusive the two formats now each have 10 Major studios on board.

If you want to base anything on past history, HD would actually be in the lead since they allow pornography, which Sony does not. A lot of media analysts have speculated that the lack of pron is in fact what sealed BetaMax's fate in the 80s.
While on the subject, Sony has failed in EVERY proprietary disk format it has ever tried, so why would you put so much faith in this particular one?

Second, Ps3 does not have "better graphics" then Xbox 360. It is a widely known fact that Sony has some hardware advantages to their unit, but most developers have agreed that both systems share similar bottlenecks in their graphics processing, and that puts them on largely the same scale for what they are capable of. Sony is also supposed to be a bit harder to develop for, and addition to that it takes longer to load data off of a BD then a standard DVD so streaming data as you play is much more difficult on Ps3.

So, proprietary software developed ONLY for PS3 could have somewhat better graphics if it was designed from the ground up, utilized the increased power and storage capacity while managing NOT to pull large amounts of data from the disk during play, but we have yet to see that so far. Actually, if you read competing reviews of titles that appear on both consoles, most reviewers tend to favor the Xbox visually. But again, this could change eventually if someone actually learns how to harnass the Ps3's power effectively...

As for GTA4 (not 5) , it is not a PS3 exclusive; You can watch the trailers for it on the Xbox live marketplace. That is exactly the problem with Ps3 so far, there has been maybe two exclusive titles that are even worth mentioning. I am by no means a MS fanboy, I have owned every Sony system to date, but I have yet to see anything that made me want to buy a Ps3. This year could change that though, there are a few exclusive titles that may actually be "system-buy" worthy. (Little Big planet, MGS4)

As for needing to "upgrade" an Xbox360 to put it on the same level as Ps3...lets do the math as based on EBgame's prices right now:

Xbox360 Elite "Holiday" package (with HDMI) 120gig HDD & 2 Games -$449
PS3 80GB with MotorStorm Bundle - $499
(There are cheaper versions of each console as well, but this is assuming that you want backwards compatibility and a good enough HDD to download anything)

So yes, to get the HD drive add-on you would have to shell out another $200, which would put you at $150 over the Ps3, but with 40 extra gigs to your hard drive, and 6 free HD movies. (1 pack in, 5 through the mail)
Plus Xbox gives you achievements, has 20 times the quality titles, is fully networkable with a PC, and has a much better community experience. Not to mention that all of Xbox's peripherals are supported by Windows. (As in you can plug any Xbox controller into your pc and use it), and since this is a developers forum it should also be noted that Xbox supports the XNA creators club which allows you to make your own 360 and Pc games...

[killahert]

if you didn't buy the HDTV yet maybe you want to wait for another few month and join new millennia with the laser TV which according to rumors online are going to blow plasmas out of the water and it will be as twice cheaper than plasmas and better color accuracy than plasmas. speaking of lcds I had an eye on sony
sony

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16889252056


but decided to wait for another few month for laser

[indiasfinest]

NVM