Xbox 360 connected to a Laptop screen?

tomsolomon

Well I was just thinking that, most laptops have some sort of monitor extension, so he could kill two birds with one stone and also have digital tele on the move.......:D

darkfibre

tomsolomon wrote: »

Well I was just thinking that, most laptops have some sort of monitor extension, so he could kill two birds with one stone and also have digital tele on the move.......:D

Haha Kamran I hope we're not making your life any harder..! Decisions decisions...:rolleyes:

Kamran

lol, it's probably better to have too many options than none at all! thanks for all your help guys!

So essentially, I either get a TFT monitor and hook that up to the xbox (and my freeview box) using various cables

OR

Get a TV Capture Card for the laptop, which will allow the laptop to be able to watch TV as well as enabling it to hook up to the xbox.

Am I right? Which is the better solution with regard to quality of picture do you think?

:T:D

tomsolomon

Not entirely sure to be quite honest. Can anybody answer this?
Does pcmcia use the pci bus?
If it does, then it should, technically be faster than USB.
So there's your answer in a round about sort of way. Hope someone can enlighten us.

darkfibre

darkfibre wrote: »

Hi,

It may be possible to connect a USB video capture device to the laptop that has a composite or s-video connection, then connect your 360 to that, but I think the image may look a bit ropey...

Well, as mentioned above in my 1st post, you could go the way of a video capture card, whether that be USB 2.0 or PCMCIA. I don't see any reason why it shouldn't work, so try it and see. 'Proven' picture quality wise, I would have to say AV VGA cable between 360 and TFT out of the two options. Only real limitation of PCMCIA is that you can only really use it on a laptop (i.e. USB 2.0 is more 'transferable'), unless of course there is some kind of adapter out there to make it USB...

Now we're going into adapters for adapters! :think:

Kamran

I'm leaning towards getting a TFT monitor. It would be less hassle that way it seems, and it looks like it'd be better quality from what I'm reading.

2 more quick questions if I may:

1) The TFT monitor link posted earlier was:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Acer-X193W-Widescreen-TFT-Monitor/dp/B000WFQBYC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1209672372&sr=1-1
- Is this monitor HD ready? It doesn't seem to mention HD anywhere on the page. If it were to be connected to an xbox 360, would it do the console justice?

2) How would you connect the freeview box to the monitor? Also using the AV VGA cable?

Thanks a lot guys, much appreciated :T

darkfibre

1) Don't worry about the 'HD Ready' malarky...you will be pleased with the AV cable and TFT combo...trust me. Seek a cable that is at least 1080i (1080p if you can find it...)

2)

darkfibre wrote: »

That TFT screen can be used for basically almost any video signal you throw at it, including a Freeview signal. Yep, you can connect it to the TFT, using Scart to VGA cable or similar. But please bear in mind, quality can vary!

Kamran

cool :T

I've checked kelkoo at the following link:
http://shopping.kelkoo.co.uk/ctl/do/search?numPerPage=60&catId=114401&sortBy=totalprice&siteSearchQuery=Tft

and found the following monitors. Surely the bigger (in terms of screen size in inches) the better value for money right?

Philips 190WV7CS 19" TFT Widescreen Monitor 1440x900 300cd/m2 850:1 5ms

http://www.ebuyer.com/product/128645


HANNSPREE BOSTON 19 WIDE HA TFT

http://www.misco.co.uk/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=312660&sourceid=2004

darkfibre

Well the Acer one I suggested is the same size as the ones you've found. I'm liking the Philips one...but something that lets it down is the contrast ratio of 850:1. The Acer is 2000:1. Basically, the higher the ratio the better, as it improves image depth and dark colours.

Personally I haven't heard much about Hannspree...plus it has an even poorer contrast ratio than the Philips.

Something else I've also noticed - ebuyer are selling the Acer X193W 19" Widescreen TFT Monitor @ £122.23...and Amazon are selling it for £99.99. If I were you I'd go for the Acer from Amazon before they adjust their price and realise that it should be a little higher...!

dc

I would suggest that getting a LCD monitor with a digital input (DVI) is the bet. Then getting an HDMI to dvi cable, from say ebuyer for a few quid and that will connect directly to the Xbox giving you HD pics.

Also if you get a Freeview box with HDMI upscaling then you could use the same lead to watch TV.

Ordinary analogue video from a Freeview box cannot be displayed on a lcd, without being processed, as the scanning signals are not the same. Hence LCD tvs being much more expensive than monitors