DVD high anxiety
I feel like I'm the only person on the planet left without a DVD player.
I just can't figure out what to do. What I really want is a DVD player
which will output some form of HDTV format. Then, I could see a clear
upgrade path and I'd eventually have a player which output video in
a format I actually want to view.
I really want an integrated DVD player with a decoder and an amp.
Other wise you end up with a huge tv/video/stereo monstrosity which no
one can operate. A friend of mine had an existing TV, VCR and Stereo.
He made the mistake of adding a Satellite TV and a DVD player in short
order. He tried to wire them all together and found that his wife could
no longer watch tv.
It's no wonder. Just getting everything powered up is a feat, let
along getting everything in the right 'mode' to pass the audio and
video through the right processors and out of and into the right boxes
is nearly impossible. You end up with 4 remotes and no hope of ever
just pushing one button.
He ended up disconnecting the satellite and DVD and putting them on
another tv. Not exactly high tech.
One simple solution (which I plan to use) is to connect the DVD player
to "input 2" on the TV. That way everything works as it does today.
(and, btw, the fact that the VCR trumpts everything because it's last
in line is a huge blessing which I never plan to remove until the VCR
goes away).
What these devices all need is a common communication bus which they
all live on. That way the TIVO, by far the smarted and easiest to use
device I own could force them all to obey and 'do the right thing'.
(I think it's no coincidence that the TIVO runs linux, btw.)
Back to my anxiety, I want to bye the Sony DVPS360. But I also want 5
channels of sound. But I don't want one of those monster sound
processors with 400 buttons which my 2.5 year old will surely
touch/change/break. (you should have seen what he did to the on/off
switch of this old laptop).
Sony does make a box with an integrated decoder and amp. It's probably
no more than boom-box audio quality, but it is simple (it only has an
volume control on the outside)...