home theater, cord cutting, video streaming, a/v tech, and more!

Post by **dodint** » Wed Dec 18, 2024 10:58 am

What's good for a 2.1 speaker system and/or soundbar for casual living room TV viewing/gaming? I'm going to move my nice 7.1 system to a dedicated media room and right-size the living room system.

Post by **dodint** » Wed Dec 18, 2024 11:17 am

Nevermind, I misunderstood that market. I found something that'll do for my needs.

Post by **eddy** » Wed Dec 18, 2024 11:35 am

I would like to hear a Sonos Arc with two 300s and a subwoofer

Post by **nocera** » Wed Dec 18, 2024 11:37 am

This is what I have: https://www.rtings.com/soundbar/reviews/samsung/hw-q65t

It does the job.

Post by **dodint** » Wed Dec 18, 2024 11:43 am

That's where I went to do the research and also what I ended up going with.

The part that I'm crossing my fingers and hoping works is if I can export all of my sound from my receiver and into the sound bar via HDMI. I'm not sure if the analog sources will pipe through.

I want to use the current receiver as device switcher (I have NES, SNES, XBox, PS5, etc) and then plug the soundbar into it in place of using speakers. It *should* work but I haven't looked into it in a long time.

Once the media room is built all the consoles will move and the soundbar will just be connected to the TV.

Post by **skullman80** » Wed Dec 18, 2024 11:47 am

I have a Sonos Beam, Sonos mini sub and two era 100's in our basement downstairs. Works well for the PS5 and watching movies etc.

I also have just a sonos beam in our living room (with no surrounds) and it also works great. Not a cheap setup by any means, but works well for what we use it for.

Post by **dodint** » Wed Dec 18, 2024 11:50 am

Yeah, that's what I was inferring when I said I misunderstood the market. I assuuuuuuumed these sets would be low priced because they're a compromise. Better than PC 2.1 but not as good as a true home theater setup. And then when I looked I saw that, of course, people are prioritizing convenience over bothering with a true HT setup and found a way to make these things cost more than $1,000. So I just got the best one I could find under $300 and went with it.

Post by **nocera** » Wed Dec 18, 2024 12:41 pm

Hmmm I use HDMI ARC from my TV so my TV is essentially acting as the receiver. Whatever comes through there, goes through the soundbar.

Post by **dodint** » Wed Dec 18, 2024 12:43 pm

I'm confident all my HDMI stuff will come through fine. I just wonder if my NES/SNES and other non-digital devices will come through. They should, I guess, because they're coming through now. All I'm doing is adding another link.

Just worrying about nothing, as usual. Worst case I dig out my old component switcher and connect the analog stuff to the TV and then send it back through ARC.

Post by **dodint** » Mon Dec 23, 2024 12:08 pm

I was reading the manual for my receiver and it said it would only pass analog video signals through the HDMI, not the sound. While not a dealbreaker, I just hit the easy button and completely deleted the receiver from my setup. Now I only have a TV and soundbar, which is perfectly fine for this room. This also means that the Logitech Harmony remote has no use as I can do all my input switching with the LG TV remote.

The receiver and Logitech remote will be integral to my media room setup when I build that in the basement. But for now they've been pulled out of service.

The TV only has one composite/component input, unfortunately, so I'll have to buy a switcher if I really want to keep those. But the only thing on those inputs right now are the NES and Wii, which do not get played often (I have nearly every NES game emulated on an OG XBox on the same TV). And with the desired end state of moving all the retro gaming into the media room I may end up pulling those out of service as well.

The sound bar sounds good enough. It's nice having bass again, for sure.

Post by **scb147** » Mon Jan 06, 2025 9:51 am

Hulu + Live TV and Fubo merging:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... -into-fubo

Post by **DigitalGypsy66** » Mon Jan 06, 2025 9:57 am

Interesting - but the lack of competition will not control prices unfortunately.

Post by **Nuge** » Fri Jan 10, 2025 7:53 pm

I read last week that Disney was buying Fubo to have them drop their lawsuit against the proposed Venu sports streaming service.
They announced today that they’re pulling the plug on Venu. I guess this means that they are going to be pushing the new ESPN service pretty hard when it comes out this year.

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/venu-spo ... 11767.html

Post by **nocera** » Fri Jan 10, 2025 8:08 pm

Does that mean ESPN+ is going away?

Post by **Nuge** » Sat Jan 11, 2025 3:26 pm

I think espn+ will be included with the new service. I’m not sure if you’ll still be able to get it as is.

Post by **count2infinity** » Mon Jan 13, 2025 12:45 pm

I suppose this falls under A/V tech... Kinda curious: does anyone here vlog or stream?

I'm not exactly sure what our marketing team does, but they were to figure out a way for us to record short 5-10 minute vlogs to post on the company's linkedin and youtube channel. Most of them would be our scientific people explaining/discussing things, which is why I'm involved.

So far, their best answer is "just record it on microsoft teams and use that video."

... yeah, really nice and professional looking.

Looking mostly for software recommendations. Need something that's user friendly and relatively inexpensive. Free is great.

TIA

Post by **nocera** » Mon Jan 13, 2025 12:50 pm

Are your scientific people all in one building or would this need to be something where you could do remote recording? Would these be recorded as interviews or would you just let them go off an record themselves? Would you need to do any editing? If so, how much? Just cutting or would you need graphics? I can recommend software once I have a better idea on what you need to do.

The truth is, most people have a 4k camera in their pocket at all time. Your smart phone is going to look infinitely better than most web cams/teams. The difference between something feeling amateur and professional falls down to sound and lighting. Get yourself a decent mic and some sort of lighting rig, even if it's as simple as a ring light with a smartphone mount in the middle.

Mon Jan 13, 2025 12:54 pm

c2i probably already has a ring light for all his tik tok dances

Post by **count2infinity** » Mon Jan 13, 2025 12:57 pm

Most of it will be done in house with a person onsite. There are some ideas of doing videos with other folks that aren't onsite in an interview style.

Editing would be minimal. As far as graphics go, it would essentially just be like presenting a power point.

I believe the marketing team has bought a camera, but that's about it. I can suggest a microphone and then decent lighting of some sort.

Post by **count2infinity** » Mon Jan 13, 2025 12:57 pm

Lemon Berry Lobster wrote: ↑Mon Jan 13, 2025 12:54 pm c2i probably already has a ring light for all his tik tok dances

Amongst other things...

Post by **nocera** » Mon Jan 13, 2025 1:04 pm

count2infinity wrote: ↑Mon Jan 13, 2025 12:57 pm Most of it will be done in house with a person onsite. There are some ideas of doing videos with other folks that aren't onsite in an interview style.

Editing would be minimal. As far as graphics go, it would essentially just be like presenting a power point.

I believe the marketing team has bought a camera, but that's about it. I can suggest a microphone and then decent lighting of some sort.

Since you mentioned wanting to use powerpoint and recording that, I'd probably recommend Camtasia. It's user friendly and geared toward non-video peeps. You can record a video source as well as screen/sound record simultaneously. There is a yearly subscription but it's fairly cheap if I remember correctly. You can certainly get into a more typical NLE like Premiere or Avid or Da Vinci Resolve (free), but that's probably going overboard. I'd recommend using a better camera than what most typical work laptops would have, and again focus on lighting and sound. Find a place in the building with solid natural lighting, use a cheap lighting kit to fill it out, and get a mic. A big help to making it look good is to set the camera at eye level. I've seen way too many videos looking up people noses. If you need recommendations on specific equipment I'd be happy to help.

Post by **count2infinity** » Mon Jan 13, 2025 1:07 pm

Thanks. I'll check it out.

Post by **DigitalGypsy66** » Wed Feb 12, 2025 9:19 pm

It looks like YouTube TV may lose all of the Paramount channels tomorrow, including CBS owned stations like KDKA:

https://blog.youtube/inside-youtube/you ... ng-update/

Not a done deal yet, but there's a ton of channels that might disappear days after a price hike.

Post by **Rylan** » Thu Feb 13, 2025 10:19 am

YoutubeTV has been fine....but this is an absurd thing to have happen after a price hike. The lack of transparency is insane. Not that those channels are needle movers for me, but damn.

Post by **DigitalGypsy66** » Thu Feb 13, 2025 10:41 am

Yeah, the only one we watch with any regularity is Comedy Central. But it's 24 channels or something that will drop off their lineup by tonight. That's a significant number, for optics purposes.