Moving into a new house.

Bonus room over garage will be entertainment room.

Goal: to play PC games on Plasma tv.

I have not purchased a HDMI out card yet.

Consequences: Apparently there will be a little distortion in the proportions. Cannot watch TV and play games at same time.

Question: Does anyone know the best way to set this up for comfort and practicality. It doesn't seem that playing from the couch would be feasible. Also, would it be worth it to have a computer desk on wheels that can be rolled in front of the tv with just a wireless keyboard and mouse and then rolled out of the way in order to watch a movie or entertain people.

What do you think about this. The plasma would be up against the left wall. Its deeper than it looks in the pic.



[Edited on July 26, 2008 at 10:11 AM. Reason : das]

7/26/2008 10:10:37 AM

just say no.

7/26/2008 10:11:51 AM

I've done this, though it was a projection TV, not a panel. The resolution was a little off due to overscan (1808*1016 instead of 1920*1080) though this may not be the case with a panel. The desk on wheels is a good idea. If you plan on using this for a desktop as well as games, get an LCD instead of a plasma. Nothing would suck worse than sitting down to watch a movie and seeing the words "Mozilla Firefox" permanently burned into the top of the screen.

7/26/2008 10:26:08 AM

How is the quality of gaming?

Did you go back to regular monitor?

7/26/2008 10:33:22 AM

i have this exact setup right now.ran into overscan issues with my 720p set and had to tweak the resolutions but you shouldn't have any problems with 1080p. sitting more than a few feet away at 1080p will make text really tough to see so if u plan on browsing the web or emailing on it u may have to adjust the dpi and text size.for gfx i recommend the ati hd4850 video card if you have a receiver that can do hdmi since it does 7.1 uncompressed(blu-ray) through the hdmi port and does extremely well with games for the low i think newegg has one now for like 140$ after the rebates . i'm replacing my 9600gt with a ati4850 for that reason. if you don't have a newer receiver just do dvi>hdmi and optical for sound. let me know if you wanna buy my 9600 ;-)


i wouldn't worry ab burn in if it's a newer plasma just set ur anti burn in stuff to the max and set up your screen saver to come on after a bit. i have yet to have any issues with mine.

[Edited on July 26, 2008 at 10:54 AM. Reason : .]

7/26/2008 10:38:45 AM

Samsung has a "Just Scan" mode (at least the 650 and 750 series do, check on lower models) and Sharp has a 1:1 mode even on their lower models that eliminates the overscan issue. But especially if you're using Vista, you may have to get a 3rd party tool to force the video card to output that res (Vista doesn't even detect my CRT res properly, when the same computer in OS X does). Also, you don't NEED an HDMI out, you can use DVI->HDMI adapter (tyheyre the same signal, just different connectors).

7/26/2008 11:43:00 AM

yeah, i don't know what's up with my computer(s) and my 720p 42" samsung

if i connect them via HDMI on my HD3850 (HTPC) or my 8400GM (laptop), they have a box all around the picture on the television (using 16:9 mode, or "just scan") regardless of whatever resolution i use (and they both have 720 and 1080 options in the resolution control panel)...if i put it into "wide view" it will get rid of the black box surrounding the pictures, but due to the overscan, something on every side is cut off

if i connect the computers via VGA, they work just fine

what am i missing?

7/26/2008 3:48:18 PM

Quote :

"How is the quality of gaming? Did you go back to regular monitor?"

Well, I actually did this as a media center and not for gaming, but I did play Frets on Fire on there and enjoyed it. It would probably be great for first-person shooters, racing games, party games, etc., but I probably wouldn't try to play World of Warcraft on the big screen.

7/26/2008 4:31:30 PM

my 8500GS has native HDMI output with 7.1 surround. Works like a champ on our 42" Samsung 1080p LCD.

We did have to tweak the video a little bit, but that was for brightness/contrast. The driver for the card had the right resolution and refresh settings, recognized the TV out of the box.

7/26/2008 6:45:54 PM

As long as the TV is on a stand, or it's a freestanding TV (meaning it's not gonna be 5-6' off the floor), just get a light chair that you can pull up to the front of the TV for when you want to play a game. Get a TV tray/wheeled desk that you can use the keyboard/mouse on.

I wouldn't do it cause it'll look CHZY as fuck. Console games? Sure, it's fine, and it's plenty playable. PC Games? Ehh... Just go drop $300-350 on a 24" LCD monitor and put a little computer desk in the room. The 1920x1200 resolution on the 24" LCD will make for a nice computer setup for playing games. You'll also keep the TV free so people don't feel like kicking you in the nuts when they want to watch TV (as your ass is in the way playing veedya games).

That's just my thought though. Looks like a nice place. Amusingly, the colors of that room are identical to my apartment right now (carpet, wall paint, trim).

7/26/2008 8:56:54 PM

went to rooms to go to look at shit with 3 women and found a nice ass coffee table thing that actually has the top come up and out towards the couch. Makes a perfect place to put your keyboard and mouse while on a couch/chair. And it has storage space in it for the keyboard and mouse. ha

7/26/2008 10:41:32 PM

Quote :

"I wouldn't do it cause it'll look CHZY as fuck. Console games? Sure, it's fine, and it's plenty playable. PC Games? Ehh... "

What's the difference between playing console games and pc games on a big tv? It's usually impossible to tell a difference. Walking into my apartment i could be playing Call of Duty 4 with a 360 controller and you'd never know it was on a pc. Guitar Hero, COD4, Bioshock, Orange Box, etc etc all look the same on the computer as on the console. Aside from the graphics looking a little better through a computer there's no reason not to play PC games on a big tv. Use a 360 controller, or get a nice wireless mouse/keyboard and you're set.

7/27/2008 6:33:26 PM

Quote :

"if i connect them via HDMI on my HD3850 (HTPC) or my 8400GM (laptop), they have a box all around the picture on the television (using 16:9 mode, or "just scan") regardless of whatever resolution i use (and they both have 720 and 1080 options in the resolution control panel)...if i put it into "wide view" it will get rid of the black box surrounding the pictures, but due to the overscan, something on every side is cut off if i connect the computers via VGA, they work just fine what am i missing?"

i think kiljadn suggested one of those custom resolution programs (i forget which, but i downloaded it and tried it) and it didn't make any difference

7/27/2008 10:16:16 PM

damn, that's not a very big room, or how it appears to be in the pic. Pretty sure a 42" would be sufficient for that size.

7/27/2008 11:16:26 PM

powerstrip didnt work?

7/28/2008 11:35:45 PM

^ no

i can't figure out what's going on...if i hook up anything else via HDMI (like my friend's blu-ray player), it shows up just fine

and since it's doing it on both an ATI card and an NVIDIA card, i can't narrow it down to that, either

7/29/2008 8:55:06 AM

my guess is, your tv doesn't support non HDCP streams over HDMI. Which would explain why everything works except your PC output from a dvi converter cable.

You need a video card capable of outputting an HDCP compliant signal if that is the case.

7/29/2008 12:34:56 PM

Your TV is probably just overscanning.

7/29/2008 12:47:30 PM

Quote :

"yeah, i don't know what's up with my computer(s) and my 720p 42" samsung if i connect them via HDMI on my HD3850 (HTPC) or my 8400GM (laptop), they have a box all around the picture on the television (using 16:9 mode, or "just scan") regardless of whatever resolution i use (and they both have 720 and 1080 options in the resolution control panel)...if i put it into "wide view" it will get rid of the black box surrounding the pictures, but due to the overscan, something on every side is cut off if i connect the computers via VGA, they work just fine what am i missing?"

I may be missing the point, but my friend has a 32" samsung and had a similar problem with his HD4850. A lot of HDTVs aren't actually 720p or 1080p. If you look at the resolution on the box it's like 1366 by 768 or something around there (my friends samsung wasn't exactly 1366 by 768, it was +/- a few pixels). So when we tried to display 720p output from the video card it had a black box around the picture. We finally found out the exact resolution of the monitor and made a custom resolution with the ATI control panel.

7/29/2008 2:29:53 PM

I think I will need to have a small station somewhere in the room with a pc monitor just in case people want to watch tv/movie and still have access to the internets and maybe games. Got to figure out the best way to wire that up to have two workable monitors to switch between.

Still haven't sold myself that this investment is worth it. This coffee table that I want is 400 bucks. Its very nice and perfect for this application. Also probably wouldn't be able to find something like this again in any decent furniture piece. Plus I would end up upgrading soon after regardless to take full advantage of the setup and commit to future gaming.

I probable need to take my ATI 1800xt with a dvi=> HDMI converter to the tv and see what happens.

UNLESS only the new HD cards can do it properly.

input please.

7/29/2008 5:58:37 PM

cover that window with a 58" plasma


NEXT

7/29/2008 6:12:26 PM

I want to stream b/w my computer and tv unless its $RussianMofiaMoney to do instead of cables. See I rent and can't easily run cables either

8/5/2008 12:55:38 PM