Thanks Ted. I appreciate that you're trying to help. I'm sorry if I'm being
unclear.
> Maybe the next option is to use the TV as a dumb audio/visual terminal to
> run input from my computer. If that's an option, then here's my situation:
>
I don't understand how you get to that conclusion.
If that's what you want, get an HDMI cable to hook your computer up to your
TV. Use your TV remote to select the alternate input. Use the computer
interface to choose what video you watch.
My TV would even take a VGA cable. I don't have HDMI output on my computer
nor do I have a dual-output video card. In any case, I don't want to run a
cable; it would have to be run through the floor and under the basement
ceiling in order to avoid crossing a doorway.
Warning: if you're running a Microsoft OS, it will likely want to restrict
how you use your video output with something like HDCP (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-bandwidth_Digital_Content_Protection) so,
as always, I'd advise against running Microsoft products.
It just sounds like a lot of new ways to annoy yourself. (Which, truth to
tell, all of these solutions are. #1 son used to install high-end solutions
for all of this; they meet all of your criteria except very notably the
'cheapo' part.)
Back to your conclusion: I would suggest what you need is a small low-power
computer/settopbox hooked up to your TV via HDMI, connecting to the
internet via WiFi (I don't understand how you can say you don't have a home
network, but you do have WiFi. Perhaps you don't have a WIRED home
network?) and controlled via a dedicated remote control and/or an interface
you can access from your computer or smartphone.
I use a router to share the internet connection among multiple computers;
some are wired, some are wireless. But all I'm doing is sharing internet; I
don't have a "network" that allows the computers to talk to each other.
In any case, the TV is not "networkable" in that sense: it can access a
wireless internet connection but doesn't have any capability to talk to
another computer. I realize--too late--that SONY makes TVs that have that
sort of capability but this is not one of them.
As for the related cross-talk question of how you get audio to your
entertainment center, there's a strong possibility that your TV has an
Audio Out connection (analog or digital) that you run to your
amp/entertainment center. You use the TV as the UI and the aforementioned
remote to route sound to the speakers.
Yeah, I wasn't even concerned about that. It's got a 1/8 inch jack for that.
My solution above does all of this, reading all the music (FLAC, WAV, MP3
and OGG) from a Samba share on the home Linux box.
The specific thing I really want to do is this:
View and fully control a Flash-enabled web browser on the TV screen. Then I
can go to any number of free (as in beer) on-demand TV sites (Hulu is the
most well-known but not the only one) and watch a wider array of programs
than are available on Netflix or Hulu+.
(With the kind of computer connection I'm thinking of, I could also use VLC
to play various avi/mpg/divx files that are not subject to DRM; Usenet
still exists and is a very valuable reasource. ;-) But I'm not likely to
use that option as much, so that's why I'm focused on the web browser thing.)
Yes, my TV will provide access to free YouTube via an app--if I want to
deal with using left/right/up/down keys on a TV remote to choose the
letters of the search term, one at a time. Yes, I have apps for Netflix or
Hulu+ and lots of other paid services on the TV. Yes, the TV has a built-in
web browser that does NOT have Flash and cannot be controlled via any kind
of wireless device other than the clumsy TV remote, which isn't adequate.
Apple devices do not support Flash.
Mobile android devices apparently do not support Flash.
That leaves Windows or Linux. My home computer is Windows XP but I don't
think DRM issues enter into viewing a web browser on a TV screen.
I am concerned about screen resolution; I have a feeling that outputting my
customary 22" monitor's resolution to a 46" TV is going to result in grainy
images, so there needs to be some compensatory factor for that.
Hence I need a wireless connection that will put what I am seeing on my
computer screen and hearing on my computer speakers on my TV, at a suitable
resolution for a very large screen.
If you or your son have a solution that will do that, I'm interested. If I
can do that, then I don't need a media server per se.
Thanks.
Ken Dibble
www.stic-cil.org
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