Why don't more people use their TVs for web video? Netflix, Hulu, Joost, Adobe Media Player, and the direct network sites such as abc.com, nbc.com, thecw.com, and so on all have streaming videos of many of their shows available for the low cost of only a few ads (compared to nearly 20 minutes of ads during broadcast for an hour long show) or none, in the case of Hulu.  Some even provide movies (Netflix, of course, and Hulu). Some also do HD streaming.  On ABC, this translates to 720p video at about 2 Mbps.  The result is video that looks better than a DVD.

I'm constantly seeing how even relatively savvy people watch these services on their laptop but state that because it's still a so-called lean-forward experience that they don't use them much.  Why is this?  Both of our TVs have VGA input, with a standard DB25 connector.  They're just LCD monitors that have a physical resolution of 1920x1080, which may even be lower than your laptops display (many 15+ inch displays have 1920x1200 displays). I tend to leave a VGA cable hanging out so all I have to do is plug it in to the machine.  In Windows XP, you'll probably have to tell it a monitor is plugged in but in Vista it just figures it out and goes.  Then you I just play the video full screen on the TV display.  Simple.

Yet, very few people seem to do this.  It can't get much easier than that short of a dedicate HTPC or set top box that can handle the video. So, why don't more people do it?

Even if their TVs don't have VGA input, DVI and HDMI are relatively common on TVs and are also starting to become common place on computers and even laptops (I've got a three year old laptop here that has DVI).

To me, doing this seems like the perfect way to not have to pay for cable or DVR service.  Add Netflix to the mix, and you've got all the HD titles you can rent available to you in a day or two (arguably faster than some download services).

What's stopping you? Is it that you browse while watching TV?  I can still do that -- the show is on the second screen and doesn't use all the power of even my 2 Ghz Core 2 to play.  (My iPhone also works brilliantly for browsing in front of the TV.)

Posted by Shane on April 18, 2008 3:01 PM | Permalink