Turning my PC into a TV

[iskim86]

I live in a small dorm room.... and I was wondering if there is an easy way to turn my PC into a TV.

I know that I will need a TV tuner.... but what else?

I will most likely be triple booting Windows XP Pro SP3, Vista Business 64-bit, and X

that X will be the OS I will be using to watch TV on my computer!! I want to be able to do everything a TV does plus more.... like a living room media center PC. I'm totally new to the whole use-my-pc-as-a-tv field so any help would be appreciated

my PC is a:

Core 2 Duo E8500 OCed
eVGA nForce 750iL SLI FTW mobo
8800GT 512mb OCed beyond what is possible
DVD burner

i'm willing to invest a lot of money to make it into an entertainment center (well kind of)...

thanks

 

[iskim86]

oh yeah i want to be able to plug a game console into it

and preferably with ports on the 5 1/4 bay....

thanks a lot for any suggestions!

 

[mpilchfamily]

All you need is a tuner card. You don't have to have a specific OS to run the software. You'll be able to run the tuner card in both XP and Vista.

As for connecting a console to the front of your system there isn't a card like that. All the inputs will be in the back of the system on the card. But you could modify the card and make your own 5.25" bay connectors. I use to have an old ATI TV-Wonder that i soldered cables to the AV inputs of the card. I then modified one of the 5.25" bay covers on my case to have the AV connectors so i could have front AV input on my PC. You could also plug a cable in and run the cable into an open PCI slot and run it up to a modified bay cover.

Now the only problem with a capture card is the lag. It makes consol gaming difficult at times. There is a split second between the consol outputing the signal and the image displaying on your monitor. So a better option for you may be a converter box that uses your monitor as a TV. Better yet buy a nice new LCD TV monitor.

 

[iskim86]

Originally posted by: mpilchfamily
All you need is a tuner card. You don't have to have a specific OS to run the software. You'll be able to run the tuner card in both XP and Vista.

As for connecting a console to the front of your system there isn't a card like that. All the inputs will be in the back of the system on the card. But you could modify the card and make your own 5.25" bay connectors. I use to have an old ATI TV-Wonder that i soldered cables to the AV inputs of the card. I then modified one of the 5.25" bay covers on my case to have the AV connectors so i could have front AV input on my PC. You could also plug a cable in and run the cable into an open PCI slot and run it up to a modified bay cover.

Now the only problem with a capture card is the lag. It makes consol gaming difficult at times. There is a split second between the consol outputing the signal and the image displaying on your monitor. So a better option for you may be a converter box that uses your monitor as a TV. Better yet buy a nice new LCD TV monitor.

thanks... I can't spend much money, that's why i'm considering turning my main box into a TV and use my laptop for eveyrthing from now on. what's an LCD TV monitor? are those monitors with a cable input?