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9Many Windows® Media Center PCs
come with TV tuner capability for
this purpose. Newer systems include
ATSC (Advanced Television Systems
Committee) tuners for over the air
high definition broadcast reception,
and some include QAM, which is
the cable transmission standard,
so you can hook your PC directly to
your cable connection to receive
open channels. Once you have tuner
capability, you also have a very
flexible DVR (Digital Video Recorder)
implemented through software
applications running on your PC.
To play packaged media, like CDs,
DVDs or Blu-Ray discs, you will need
an optical drive. Virtually every PC
today comes with at least one DVD
drive, usually a burner, but now you
can upgrade to Blu-Ray for around
$200. The drives at this price range
also include the software necessary
to play Blu-Ray movies and they
can also play DVDs and CDs. Most of
these drives are read-only for Blu-
Ray, but some can also burn CDs or
DVDs and one, from Panasonic, can
burn Blu-Ray as well.
For disc playback, you will also need
a software DVD player. Windows
Media Player (which incorporates
enrichment technology) will play
DVD's, but will not play Blu-Ray.
The Blu-Ray drives that are currently
available from Sony and Pioneer
include software players from
sound technology as well).
If you want to use your
PC to watch and record
TV, you must first get
content into the system.
7
These interface options naturally apply
to all types of display devices that you
might select for your system including
TVs, such as front projectors and
computer monitors.
Of course, if you are viewing video
directly on your laptop display, there are
no video interface issues.
However, you
can always connect your laptop to a
large LCD PC monitor to watch or edit
content.
In this case, your connector
opt ions are usually VGA or DVI with HDMI
and DisplayPort now becoming more and
more common. Most laptops can support
two independent displays. This is a great
way to view media because you can use
the laptop display for content access
and player control while viewing the
actual content on the external display.
This also works great when the laptop is
connected to a Television.
GETTING THE
PICTURE
CONTINUED
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