Send Typical TV Content to Video Headset - Possible?

[RhoXS]

Not infrequently, at night, I want to watch TV (news/late night comics/YouTube/etc.) while my wife is asleep but the bright TV disturbs her sleep as it would me. The video gaming headsets seem like a good idea but surprisingly (to me) none seem to have any provision for excepting an output signal from the TV either via an HDMI cable, wireless protocol, or any other means. Also, a Best Buy salesman told me all the video headsets on the market now require registration with the manufacturer and that I find totally unacceptable. I do not have a gaming console, I am not interested watching streaming movies etc. on the device, and have no other interest in the headset other than to have an alternate means of watching what would otherwise be on the TV screen (my TVs all have a function to blank the screen). So, since this is an arena I am mostly unfamiliar with, and there certainly are things I am not even aware of to research, anyone have any thoughts if this is possible?

 

[mindless1]

I have no experience with them, so I'd start with a search like the following which has hits with makes/models to research:

goggles with hdmi input - Google Suche

 

[Tech Junky]

@RhoXS

Well, all TV signals are IP based anyway so, it's a matter of serving the content to a display that is able to do playback.

The issue with OTA though is it's streamed out in MPEG2 or MPEG4 depending on the receiving end. Most low end devices will choke on this and thus transcoding comes into play. Transcoding will need a "server" in the middle to modify the stream into something playable on the end display.

I know there are headset phone holders that could get you there w/o needing to register a device.

So, the plan of action would be OTA > server > phone playback w/ headset holder??

First you'll need an input source to the server... I use a WinTV-quad card inside my setup that hooks up to an antenna and then feeds up to 4 channels live to the server which feeds into Plex for playback.... However, there are Silicon Dust options as well that are more standalone but feed feed into your network with their own EPG for program listings built into their app.

So, if your phone can install an app then you're done. If you go the full on headset route there should be apps for that as well. Both SD / WinTV have EPG's but, I don't recall WTV having an app but, for a PC there's a CD IIRC.

If you want to go further down the rabbit hole then there's also ATSC3 which is the next bump in OTA. It has some issues with media management though as it used a Dolby codec and it's not open source which makes it a real PITA unless you're watching live through the hardware's app.

 

[mindless1]

Well Tech Junky took an entirely different angle at it.

What is the *required* source for this programing? Are you needing to get output from the TV's tuner or smart streaming app itself? If so and you have no video output from it, then it can't be the source.

 

[RhoXS]

Well Tech Junky took an entirely different angle at it.

What is the *required* source for this programing? Are you needing to get output from the TV's tuner or smart streaming app itself? If so and you have no video output from it, then it can't be the source.

Very good question! I have three large screen Sony TVs and just assumed, obviously incorrectly, there would be a HDMI video out connector. To my surprise there is not, even on the year old 77" OLED unit. Thanks for pointing out something that is now obvious.