HT Solution Suggestions

[Bibble]

Hey guys,

I'm moving to a new apartment next month and am beginning to plan a HT setup. Unfortunately, I do not know much about HT, so I come to you all for help.

The Space:

The room is a good size, perhaps 12'X15' with a 10' ceiling. It has 3 sides: a regular old wall (15'), an east-facing bay window (12'), and a wall of shelves (15'). I'm hoping that the shelves are either movable or my landlord will let me knock out a few so that I can put a TV in the middle and then all of my HT stuff + DVDs etc nearby. If not, I'll probably just go with the other 15' wall.

What I would like:

I'm thinking of maybe a 42" LCD 1080p TV. I know that is probably a little small for the viewing distance but I don't have a ton of money.

To not pay for cable if possible.

To be able to watch football (if there is a season this year).

To be able to watch Jeopardy (online or on ABC).

To be able to watch Netflix.

DVR would be nice but not necessary.

2.1 speaker setup (slight chance of going surround later but I'm not worrying about that now)

What I have:

Xbox 360 (2 of them actually as my roommate also has one)

A small budget, but I am ok with putting this together a little bit at a time (i.e. hold off on buying separate speakers until winter). Let's say ~$600 for the tv and then $100 a month after that to save/spend.


I know the 360 can stream Netflix, so at least I have that part down. I've thought about trying to get the networks OTA with an antenna, however I wouldn't be able to mount anything outside so I'm not sure how well that would work. I've also looked into building an HTPC or getting a Roku, but I'm not sure if I can get NFL games through either of those.

So what do you all suggest? I appreciate your assistance.

 

[Plugers]

If you have a deck, a 5 gallon bucket (or big nice looking plastic flower pot) plus bag cement and a pole to mount antenna or dish will work. (2 1/2" OD galv. fence post works).

Use HTPC for main HT and 360s can be used as extenders for your rooms (under win7 media center)

HDHomerun is a good OTA dual tuner and is $130, the older model is only $87 and has 2 inputs so you can use 1 for OTA and 1 for clear QAM from your cable internet povider (if you use cable)

With this setup your HTPC is also a DVR and the 360s (extenders) can be used to watch recordings or live TV from the HTPC.

 

[velillen]

Well like the above poster mentioned theres options to get OTA. Which should get you the local channels (ie nbc, abc, hopefully fox) which gets you most football games.

The xbox360 also has espn3 but not sure how that works (i dont have an xbox 360 but have used espn3 on htpc)

TV wise...If you can i'd save up and go for something in the 800-900 range. keep an eye out for sales and you should be able to find a 46-50" for that. If you can do plasma you for sure can find something.

Speaker wise....well he is the hard/crappy part. You need a receiver to go with those speakers. Depending on features and all that alone can be ~200 or more. A decent sub in itself is also starting at about 200. An option could be to just buy a used setup off craigslist or somewhere for the time being. Can find ones for 100-200 bucks with everything you'd need. Wont be able ot upgrade but for a start and since it would take 6 months to afford anything else really it might be worth it. Wont sound as great as a custom setup but hey for the price you can complain!

Like ya said you are in a tough boat with a small budget so just remember to not go to cheap. Save the extra month and splurge a little and youll appreciate it down the road. Speakers last a long time if cared for (as do tvs and recievers)