Recent content by Tony Loewen

As a user of an HTPC set up, I can attest to the fact that when using optical connections, you eliminate any ground loops or hum. It is electically isolated, so you don't pass on any electrical noise. My 2cents

You would use a panamorphic lens to zoom to the full 2.35/1 screen, then you would use a scaler like ffdshow to squeeze the picture into the 16/9 panel. If you use a quality scaling algorythm, then you're good to go and you would be using every pixel available on your panel, when watching...

Green will be ok as long as it's a flat green, anything flatter than semigloss will do, the flatter the better. We went with a deep burgendy, eggshell finish. That way it doesn't reflect the light and the walls tend to disappear when the lights are out, but still look good when the lights are...

http://www.musicplayer.com/cgi-bin/u...=0;DaysPrune=0 Here's a good forum for acoustic treatment construction/ideas to help with your panel building. Not sure if anyone has successfully done an acoustically transparent DIY screen on the cheap, but you could check here...

if you want to keep the industrial look, one thing that was suggested to me was to rent a paint sprayer and paint everything on the ceiling flat black, joists, wiring, ducts, etc. First off, the open joist ceiling will help to diffuse the sound, my basement is currently like this and I like the...

what type of projector do you have? It sounds like it has component inputs, no transcoder required [(Y/R-Y/B-Y)/RGB component] If you have a longer run to make, you can make your own cables with some rg6 and some connectors from radio shack. I have a 30 ft set of DIY cables, f-type connectors...

Oh, and decent bass trapping will help smooth out a null, maybe not eliminate it completely, but it will go a long way.

check out this article from Ethan Winer. It covers alot of acoustical treatment, including Bass Traps. He is very experienced in the field. http://www.ethanwiner.com/acoustics.html

I thought that you could turn PureVideo on/off through the drivers, however I have never used it, so I don't know that much about it. My bad. As far as decoders go, if you don't watch alot of interlaced stuff, like "Season XX of TV Show" on DVD or anime or stuff like that, dscaler5 codecs are...

If your video card doesn't natively support the resolution you want, you can use a utility called Powerstrip to create custom resolutions. I had to do this with my Sanyo Z2. Once you create the resolution you need with Powerstrip and reboot, it should be on the list of available resolution on...

Yeah, I could get on the internet, but not to the files on my other computer before turning off the firewall. I ran without the FW for about 6 months, then I got Trend PC-cillan, and enabled it's firewall, then set up an exception to allow any traffic between the two computers. Set that up on...

Acoustic treatments are a must, really. Digital room correction can be done with very high end equipment or a properly set up HTPC, but it is usually only effective for a very small part of the room, ie the money seat. All other seating in the room tends to have decreased sound quality. If...

For projectors, there is quite a large selection, depending on what exactly you are looking for. I personally had an LCD sanyo z2, and I love it. My friend just bought one for about $1000. You will typically get higher resolution (ie more pixels, sharper picture) for less money with an LCD...

Also, re-reading the previous post, I just felt I should mention that there are lots of utilities to get your PC to be much more superior to a set-top-box dvd player. Powerstrip and reclock can be used to dial in the refresh rate, and it can be checked with a program called juddertest to make...

Jesse, I spend most of my time over at avs, and yes, the HTPC section is much more comprehensive than it is here. I also agree with what others have said here. The problem is not with the PC/monitor being inferior to a dvd player/tv, the problem is definitely with the set up of the PC. You...