Hooked up a pc to a samsung hdtv to watch online movies

Do you have a DVI output on your PC? If so, I recommend getting a DVI to HDMI cable, which you can pick up at Best Buy, maybe Radio Shack, etc. if you live in the US, or mailorder if not. RGB is an analog connection so your PC is converting digital to analog and the TV converting it back again. Best picture results if you stick with all-digital.

thank you! no, i don't have a dvi output on my pc. i need to buy something. thank you! so don't get a graphics card? get a dvi card?

Most modern graphics cards come with at least one DVI output, and maybe a converter for connecting to an RGB monitor. If your PC uses PCIe or AGP graphics cards, then you should be able to pick up one for well under $100.

Alternatively, have you tried adjusting the TV for the RGB connection? What exactly are the symptoms or lack of quality issues with the picture? What model of TV are you using? For example, my Pioneer plasma lets me adjust certain inputs as to overscan or underscan, after setting it to display dot-for-dot on the HDMI input connected to my laptop's DVI output via the DVI-to-HDMI cable I mentioned before.

Also, you need to make sure your PC is outputting the correct resolution to the TV - preferably its native resolution (1920 x 1080 at 60Hz refresh for a 1080P LCD or plasma, for example).

thanks again fazers! yes, pci card is what I need for this particular machine. it is a newer samsung. i guess I was wondering how powerful of a card do I need? Sounds like you are saying a fancy card with 1 GIGA memory is not necessary. I am watching movies from movie2k.com and most of them look like I'm watching bootlegs as the picture is composed of larger squares as opposed to pixels! There is the test! you watch a movie from this website and see how the quality is! thanks again! jamie

Sounds like the problem may be the streaming video is not set to max quality (assuming you can set it). I haven't tried your site before but I have watched Lost episodes from ABC.com and you can choose either HD quality or lower, with their proprietary viewer. With HD quality, the picture is excellent - I'd say at least 720P quality - on either the laptop or TV screen. Of course, you need a decent broadband connection to move that amount of data without pauses or jerky motion.

With a large TV, you really don't want to sit too close to it at any resolutions less than 1080P since you'll see pixelization.

Anyway, I would try adjusting your viewer settings first since that is the cheapest solution by far!  

PS - I recommend you read up on HDMI, DVI, etc - THIS SITE has a decent explanation of the differences. Basically DVI senses whether it is connected to a digital or analog input source and selects either digital or analog output signals - not both. So that is why you can use it with either HDMI (digital) or RGB (analog) devices.

If you want to add digital sound to the HDMI input, you will need a DVI + digital audio interface like the one in the webpage above (pretty expensive IMHO - I'd shop around before buying).

If you are content with analog stereo audio, then you can always run a separate audio connection to the TV (what I do - the TV only has 2 speakers anyway). My Pioneer has separate audio inputs for HDMI inputs 4 & 5, and once set up properly, it'll use both inputs for proper video + audio.

Finally, some HDTVs like my Pioneer have an ethernet port built-in, with DHCP capabilities so I can just connect it to my router and it'll automagically get an IP address. Then I can stream video, pictures, etc from a home server directly to the TV, and don't need to connect the TV to a PC. But I don't think it has a web browser type utility so that you could stream video from an Internet site. Haven't actually tried it yet since I don't have ethernet strung to that location yet.

fazers, you are too cool. where you at?

LOL, thanks! I live in northern VA.

I've been wanting to build a decent HTPC system for some time now, and have been investigating this stuff ever since. I'd probably still be "investigating" instead of building, except last month Pioneer announced they were getting out of the plasma TV business. Since they make what is arguably the best TV according to many reviews, that got me to whip out the old credit card and buy one before the prices shot up (which they did for a while).

Finally, some HDTVs like my Pioneer have an ethernet port built-in, with DHCP capabilities so I can just connect it to my router and it'll automagically get an IP address. Then I can stream video, pictures, etc from a home server directly to the TV, and don't need to connect the TV to a PC. But I don't think it has a web browser type utility so that you could stream video from an Internet site. Haven't actually tried it yet since I don't have ethernet strung to that location yet.[/quotemsg]



Could you please elaborate how is it "streaming from home server directly to the TV"?
What is the server in your case, and what is the software running on your TV
I have Samsung HDTV, it has Ethernet port, but nit sure what it can do?

Thanks,
-MK