Brad wrote:I actually could use advice on our setup. We've been getting cheap TVs from Costco to fill up our new house, but we haven't started planning the media room yet. I'm far from expert on the subject too.
I guess it depends on what you want to do and how easy you want to make it. First I HIGHLY recommend a Harmony Remote from Logitech. Its a universal remote that you program on your computer to maintain all of your devices. Say you want to watch Cable or Direct TV. You would press a button on your remote called Cable or whatever you want to name it and it will turn on your TV, set it to the correct input if its not there already, turn on your surround sound if you use it. Say you want to play some DVD's or Blurays... press your DVD button, and it will switch inputs to the DVD and everything else that needs on. I honestly don't know how I could live without it anymore. I love my Harmony Remote!!!!
Second... I have a computer hooked up to our HDTV and that is how we watch all of our movies and tv shows. I have a BR player, but I will rip all of our movies to my computer and play them from there. So if I want to watch Tangled, ill switch the TV to my PC, go to my HD Movies folder and click on Tangled and it will play on my TV. All in HD. Its awesome! Took me a couple years to get to this point. Not because it costs a lot... just because it took me a while to figure it out correctly... lol
Say if I want to watch Netflix? I have multiple ways of doing it... go to my PC input and throw the browser over to the TV, maximize the show and watch it that way, or we have our PS3 or 360 as well. The fun thing with the PC being on the TV is not surfing the net... thats horrible... lol... but putting YouTube on it... lol.
Thats a bit of information on how I do things. It sound complicated, but it truly isn't. Just and HDMI cord from my PC to the TV, and its all good. I run duel split screen... included an image below on what it kinda looks like. The left is the TV, and the right is the PC. I think I may even have a thread on here somewhere with my setup?