Hook up Nintendo Wii to my 19" LCD????

[Crosshatch]

Hi guys, could someone recommend a reasonably priced (under $100) solution to connect my (future) Nintendo Wii to my Acer AL1916fbd 19" LCD monitor? I will be using component cable output from the Wii. the recommended resolution of the monitor is 1280x1024.

I have seen "vGA Boxes" on Ebay that look kinda shady. you don't really knwo who the manufacturer is, or what the quality will be like. Does anybody know of a good solution from a reputable brand? Does anyone have any experience doing this?? Thanks!!

 

[lb19984]

get any tv tuner card and make sure that it has video in...
you might possibly be able to connect it if your video card has a svideo in
but most probably you will have to get a tv tuner card

 

[lb19984]

just get an ati tv wonder or something like that

 

[CompTIA_Rep]

?????????

No dont get a tuner card for your PC. ALL cards of moderate value and quality *such as the hauppage, or ATI wonder cards lag. This is normal. It also makes playing consol games impossible.


They have Composite to VGA converters. Take a look.

 

[SwissFreek]

Most of them introduce lag because of the fact that they are recording the TV to your hard drive, and then you are watching the recording on your screen. That's how come you can rewind and stuff, so there HAS to be a slight delay.

BUT, that being said, in the past six months or so there have been several TV tuner cards and boxes that have started to come out that have a "Game Mode" specifically designed for hooking up a game console. What it does is deactivate the recording function of the tuner, so instead of watching the recording on your hard drive you see the direct feed, meaning there is no lag. The eyeTV250 is one of these (only works on the Mac, sadly, but I think Miglia makes basically the same thing but works for the PC as well, or maybe Hauppauge). So if you are inclined to go that route, it IS possible, but you're talking about spending at least $100, and really more like $150 or $200-plus.

Now if only my eyeTV200 had "Game Mode"...

 

[CompTIA_Rep]

I have used 10+ tuner cards and they all lag recording or not. This is because the video processor isnt fast enough to encode the image, apply w/e, then send it to your screen. You can buy pro cards that do this as fast as a TV.

 

[vanka]

SwissFreek I don't know which TV tuner cards you've used; but my experience mirrors that of Comptia_Rep. All PCI tuner cards I've used had lag making console play impossible; the difference was in the degree of lag. The only luck I've had with PC based tuners was with ATI's All-in-Wonder line (specifically: the AIW 128, the AIW 7500, and the AIW 8500DV; all AGP cards and absolutely no lag). My theory is that it isn't the tuner's video processor that introduces lag; but the PCI bus itself isn't fast enough to stream the video signal in real time. I came to this conclusion after I tested ATI's TV Wonder tuner (which uses the same tuner and video chip as the AIW line) that has only software recording and there was still lag. ATI's TV Wonder Elite which has an onboard hardware MPEG2 encoder (as required my Microsoft to be MCE compatible) that encodes the TV signal into MPEG2 format and requires MPEG2 decoder software to watch TV had even more lag because of the extra processing required.

Crosshatch, if you really want to use your Wii with your monitor, check this out: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16815100114 . I can't vouch for the quality as I haven't actually used it, but it looks alright and I was contemplating getting one myself.

 

[sirheck]

i would go with mr. familys idea.

get the adapter

 

[predatorgsr]

If you download the program called Dscaler, it will eliminate the input lag. It worked for my bro and the ati hdtv tuner card.

 

[Aids]

I second that, forget the new tuner card and get an adapter. Won't cost near as much as a tuner card, less problems, and less hassle. Then you have the wonderful excuse of "i was playing with my wii" that everyone wants to be able to use.

 

[vanka]

The adapter you recommend appears to be an adapter for an ATI <b><i>video card</i></b>. This would be something you plug into your DVI port on your ATI video card and use component inputs to plug your TV in; this way you can get better picture quality than with the S-Video port. The user comments posted re-enforce that this adapter works only with ATI Radeon cards; so it probably won't work if you plugged it in directly to your monitor. If you have an extra $22 laying around you can get it and see if it works.

 

[sirheck]

The adapter you recommend appears to be an adapter for an ATI <b><i>video card</i></b>. This would be something you plug into your DVI port on your ATI video card and use component inputs to plug your TV in; this way you can get better picture quality than with the S-Video port. The user comments posted re-enforce that this adapter works only with ATI Radeon cards; so it probably won't work if you plugged it in directly to your monitor. If you have an extra $22 laying around you can get it and see if it works.

that is a standard dvi connect it will work on any dvi female connect.

 

[Bexox]

The WII should be able to send out a 480p signal using the component video cable (640x480vga).

Nintendo WII component video cable:
http://tinyurl.com/ycpqbt

Then, because you don't have a component video in on your monitor, you can use a VGA transcoder. Something like:

X2VGA VGA transcoder
http://www.x2vga.com/

VD-Z3 VGA transcoder
http://tinyurl.com/53wxn

Lik-Sang.com used to have a $40ish component video to VGA transcoder, but thanks to Sony, Lik-Sang is dead.

Anyway, I just checked play-asia.com and they have one that looks similar to the lik-sang version. I think this does the transcoding you need as well, only you don't have to buy the xbox component cable with it:
http://tinyurl.com/ykej5t

After you have those two cables, your monitor gets the proper 640x480 vga video signal, and the internal scaler will map it to your native res (probably 1280x1204). Since it is directly doubling the pixels in both directions, it should look pretty decent. Also, the 480P to VGA conversion has no perceivable lag time. The monitor should be pretty quick for 640x480 scaling as well.

Anyway, that should give you get best looking solution. I don't know if the Wii will be like the GameCube in that is asks you at the boot of each game if you want Progressive mode or not. That transcoder won't change 480i to anything your monitor can handle. You should set it up on a tv that does 480P (any HDTV with comp video) and check it out...

Later!

Jim