The digital living room
- Make the switch
- Room to move
- Get your game on
- Wireless wonderland
- Play it safe
- Are you being served?
Today’s gadgets put a world of entertainment at your fingertips, and the modern digital lounge room offers an impressive view from the couch.
Forget about five fuzzy channels and your old DVD player, the digital revolution delivers a wealth of entertainment right into your lounge room. Digital television and digital radio offer raft of new channels, with fancy tricks such as time-shifting so you can enjoy content when it suits you rather than the broadcasters. Meanwhile Blu-ray players let you enjoy high-definition movies and even tap into the best of the web if you’ve got a fast broadband internet connection. Other gadgets make it easy to play immersive games, hire movies online and even bounce music and video around your home.
TIVO 320 High Definition DVR
Personal Video Recorders save digital television to a hard drive rather than tape, letting you perform impressive tricks such as pausing live TV and watching the start of a movie while you’re still recording the end. Look for a PVR with high-def tuners which can record at least two shows at once. Some PVRs rely on the Electronic Program Guide embedded in the broadcast signal, while others from the likes of Topfield, Beyonwiz, Strong and Humax can tap into IceTV.com. IceTV adds a host of extra features such as remote scheduling and intelligent series recording which checks the schedule for changes. The TiVo and Foxtel’s iQ2 have these features built in. Some PVRs also let you play music and video from USB storage and even stream content from your computer and/or the internet.
Make the switch
Australia’s digital TV switchover has already reached regional Victoria, South Australia and Queensland. Regional NSW will go digital-only during 2012, followed by Tasmania, Perth and Brisbane in the first half of 2013. The rest of the country, including metropolitan Melbourne, Sydney and Adelaide, will complete the digital TV switchover by the end of 2013. After the switchover reaches your area, you’ll need a television, set-top box or Personal Video Recorder with digital tuners in order to watch live free-to-air television.
Room to move
You can enjoy your video library in any room throughout your house thanks to streaming video players. They come with a remote control and plug into your television and your home network (via Ethernet or Wi-Fi), making it easy to browse your digital video library from the couch. You’ll find a wide range of streaming video players such as the Apple TV, WD TV Live, D-Link’s Boxee Box and NetgearNeoTV. You’ll also find media player features built into some PVRs, Blu-ray players, games consoles, tablets and smartphones. Most streaming boxes can play files from a USB stick as well as use the DLNA streaming media format, requiring a compatible network drive or else software on your computer to serve up content. Some PVRs can even stream TV recordings to other devices via DLNA. A few media players also support Samba for streaming from almost any device.
Get your game on
Sure they let you play shoot ‘em ups, but games consoles have also evolved into jack-of-all-trades entertainment devices. Sony’s versatile PlayStation 3 is a DVD and Blu-ray player, plus it plays music and video files from its hard drive, attached USB devices or across your home network via DLNA. The icing on the cake is access to online Catch Up TV and movie rentals, plus the optional PlayTV tuner turns it into a PVR. Meanwhile Microsoft’s Xbox 360 is a DVD player, plus it has a movie rental service. Apple is also one to watch, with the iPhone 4S and iPad 2 letting you play games on your television via an Apple TV.
Wireless wonderland
You’ll also want a home WiFinetwork to support all your portable gadgets, plus other devices which you can’t reach with Ethernet. Look for Wi-Fi base stations which support faster 802.11n networks running at 5GHz as well as 802.11g running at 2.4GHz. Dual-band Wi-Fi base stations can run both networks at once, which is handy because you’ll get faster streaming and less interference at 5GHz while still supporting legacy 2.4GHz devices. While many portable gadgets now support 802.11n, it’s often only at 2.4GHz. For the best results don’t put your Wi-Fi gear too close to cordless phones and microwave ovens. Also avoid putting it too close to your television and other AV gear as it might interfere with the picture.
Play it safe
An unsecured Wi-Fi network is an invitation for people to leech your download allowance or, worse yet, undertake nefarious activities and let you take the blame. Use WPA encryption rather than WEP and ensure you change the password from the default. Your new password should be at least eight characters long with a mix of upper and lower case letters along with numbers and symbols. Don’t use dictionary words or obvious terms such as your name. The best passwords look like gibberish but are easy to remember. Consider using the first letters of a rhyme, such as “Mary had a little lamb”. Mix it up a bit and you’ve got the beginnings of a strong password such as MhAlL-iFwWaS*70.
Are you being served?
If you want to stream music and video around your home you’ll need a server -- but don’t panic, it’s not as complicated as it sounds. The easiest option is to use a computer running DLNA media server software. You’ve got a range to choose from including Windows Media Player, Orb, TVersity, PlayOn and PS3 Media Server. Once it’s running, you should be able to browse the files on your computer using a streaming media player connected to your television and your home network. The computer can stay tucked away in the study, as long as it’s also connected to your home network. DLNA compatibility can be a little hit and miss, so you’ll need to experiment to see which software offers the best results with your streaming media players.
Source: TechLiving Magazine: Issue 10 – Updated Summer 2011
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