Ennui Blog

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I’m going to be getting my hands on a rather large 38″ TV this week and my wife and I have resolved to turn it into a home theater. The only problem is that the TV is from circa 1998. The picture is great and the TV works great but it doesn’t have any of the new fancy connectors such as HDMI or Component Video.

I’ve been jonesing for an Apple TV. It would work well with my Mac and my existing collection of Apple videos and the network integration is seamless. The only problem is that an Apple TV requires HDMI or Component inputs in order to work. The only solution I can find it to buy an expensive ($130) Composite Video to Component video converter. You can pick up an Apple TV for about $200 reburbed, but combined with the required converter (which may not work) it pushes the cost up significantly. So much, that I’m now considering going the extra mile and getting a Mac Mini.

A Mac mini would provide pretty much the same functionality as an Apple TV. It comes with Front Row for viewing videos and DVD’s. It has a built in DVD player and if we wanted to, we could surf the net, giving our house a valuable second computer. However, Mac Mini’s can be pricey, about $400+. The benefits are clear though, you can hook up a Mac Mini using old school analog hookups. Not only that, we can get a TV tuner for the Mac Mini and use at a free PVR.

Previously, I had hooked up my Aluminum iMac to our other analog TV using an adapter and 50 feet of S-Video cable. The solution worked pretty good. The picture was nice and the sound was excellent. The only problem was that the 50 foot S-Video cables were very fragile and would break after very little use. It was a very unreliable connection that we had to abandon.

Western Digital has just released a product that may do the job I want. It’s the WD TV, it’s a set top box that allows you to hook up your external hard drive to your TV and watch video with a Front Row like interface. This may be the solution we need and it only costs $100 and it will work with ancient connectors. It also supports a myriad of media formats, which is perfect for my video collection.

I’m open to any other TV set top box solution for watching videos from my computer on my TV. I’d like to spend as little as possible and have access to my huge collection of video on my home network.

Does anyone have any ideas?

Here’s a video demonstrating the WDTV: