Re: Is VHS Dead?

On Mon, 4 Sep 2006 10:03:30 +0200, ender wrote:

The monitor, by the way, is the one I use. It's really
neat. It has 1680X1050 resolution with PC and home entertainment inputs,
including VGA, DVI, composite, component, and S-video inputs. It's
widescreen and swivels to give you both landscape and portrait
orientations.

My monitor is the only thing that's HDCP capable (not that I knew that when
I bought it - I just noticed that it's mentioned in the manual), and has
the same range of inputs (it's a 24" widescreen, 1920x1200). Check if your
monitor supports HDCP, because if it doesn't, you'll probably only be able
to play high-definition movies downscaled, even if your graphic card has
HDCP.

My monitor supports HDCP. It's one of the few on the market today that is
both an HD-TV monitor and a computer monitor. I use my home desktop setup
for language learning. I want to have all electronic media at my disposal
on one screen. I use the computer for internet text, e-books,
sophisticated electronic dictionaries, video, and audio files. I have a
pretty sophisticated audio/video amplifier that I use primarily as an
interface box to connect an HDTV cable box and digital video recorder, game
systems, DVDs, VCRs, laser disks, etc.

The DVDs and HDTV cable box and DVR are connected to the audio video
control center using HDMI cables. In turn, the A/V control center is
hooked up from the HDMI out to the DVI input on the monitor. The other
devices are hooked to the A/V control center through the best available
interface (component, S-video, composite, digital optical, etc.) The A/V
control center feeds this video to the monitor through component video. If
the video input is something other than component, the A/V center converts
it to component video using its video up capability. In order to get all
these interface features, I had to get a pretty powerful 7 channel audio
video surround sound amplifier. However, I did not get it for its features
as an amplifier but for its features to integrate all my inputs and feed
them to the monitor. I listen to all sound through headphones connected to
the headphone jack in the amplifier rather than through surround speakers.

I can watch movies in widescreen up to and including full 1080i and 1080p
resolution. While doing so, I can switch to the computer by pressing a
button on the keyboard, the specially configured thumb button on my
wireless mouse, or by pressing a button on the side of the monitor. If I
am watching a movie that has a lot of challenging vocabulary and need to
frequently use the electronic dictionaries in the computer, I watch the
video in a picture in picture on the computer screen.

I imagine there are few subscribers to this newsgroup that have my passion
for foreign languages so much of this is not relevant. However, the point
I am trying to make is that if you want true integration and convergence of
your entertainment and information content, with a little bit of foresight
you can achieve it. My setup is not that expensive. The monitor at $400
was the most expensive component. As I said in an earlier post, I'd seen a
multimedia Gateway at CostCo with the same monitor bundled in for $800.

Mata ato de,

Phil Yff
.