Electronics gloat.

[Immortan D]

I have a Samsung Dex station hooked to my TV, I use that instead of a computer at home. All I have to do is hook my phone to the station to get a full screen, MS Windows-like user interface with mouse and keyboard (I have a wireless keyboard-trackpad combo attached to the station).

As for the "smart" part on my TVs, I connected a "Google Chromecast with Google TV" to each one of them. It is far from perfect but a lot better then the built-in smart apps on my outdated TVs. I get a common user interface on all my TVs and decent voice recognition with Google assistant. And unlike older versions of Chromecast this one has its own remote control, so no need for the phone whatsoever.

[Valleyslim]

When I was really into home theater. I watched movies on my htpc. You needed a good graphics card for the best 4k experience. I spent a good couple hours tweaking the settings in madvr. Had to download 3 sample videos 720p, 1080p, and 3680p or whatever 4k is and raise the settings until the frame rates dropped for each video. It sucked but it was either that or buying an oppo at 1000$ or Panasonic blue ray player for 400$. For streaming though its really hard to beat Nvidia shield pro

[drzaius]

16 hours ago, Valleyslim said:

When I was really into home theater. I watched movies on my htpc. You needed a good graphics card for the best 4k experience. I spent a good couple hours tweaking the settings in madvr. Had to download 3 sample videos 720p, 1080p, and 3680p or whatever 4k is and raise the settings until the frame rates dropped for each video. It sucked but it was either that or buying an oppo at 1000$ or Panasonic blue ray player for 400$. For streaming though its really hard to beat Nvidia shield pro

I have an HTPC, but it gets used hardly ever. Just too much hassle. When it dies I'll probably go with a Shield. I do use it for calibration & setup whenever I change things up. It's already connected and I use the TV as a nice big monitor. Just plug in the UMIK and fire up REW. Easier than getting out the laptop.

Now Oppo doesn't even make players anymore and Sony has a very decent Blu-ray player for about a hundred bucks. Do you remember a few years ago when Lexicon was selling a $3000 Blu-ray player, but inside was a few hundred dollar Oppo, chassis and all? Caused quite the stir among the snake oil aficionados, apoplexy even. I think there are many heads still in the sand to this day.

[Valleyslim]

On 6/28/2022 at 8:12 AM, drzaius said:

I have an HTPC, but it gets used hardly ever. Just too much hassle. When it dies I'll probably go with a Shield. I do use it for calibration & setup whenever I change things up. It's already connected and I use the TV as a nice big monitor. Just plug in the UMIK and fire up REW. Easier than getting out the laptop.

Now Oppo doesn't even make players anymore and Sony has a very decent Blu-ray player for about a hundred bucks. Do you remember a few years ago when Lexicon was selling a $3000 Blu-ray player, but inside was a few hundred dollar Oppo, chassis and all? Caused quite the stir among the snake oil aficionados, apoplexy even. I think there are many heads still in the sand to this day.

Unfortunately I wasn't in the home theater scene when that happened nor have I heard of it. Oppo stopped making blue ray players soon after I was getting into it. Gotta watch out for snake oil for sure. Thats why I went diy route. Even my subs are custom built. A buddy of mine builds subwoofers and he built them for me. He's good friends with ultra audio so he can get parts whenever he needs them. https://thelordofbass.com/ is where he gets the parts. Lordofbass is a sister company of ultra audio. He built these monster 21 inch subs  

  the owner of those subs built my boxes too. This was before I had tools

[drzaius]

10 hours ago, Valleyslim said:

Unfortunately I wasn't in the home theater scene when that happened nor have I heard of it. Oppo stopped making blue ray players soon after I was getting into it. Gotta watch out for snake oil for sure. Thats why I went diy route. Even my subs are custom built. A buddy of mine builds subwoofers and he built them for me. He's good friends with ultra audio so he can get parts whenever he needs them. https://thelordofbass.com/ is where he gets the parts. Lordofbass is a sister company of ultra audio. He built these monster 21 inch subs  

  the owner of those subs built my boxes too. This was before I had tools

That is either sane nor reasonable. I want at least two