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f13.net  |  f13.net General Forums  |  Gaming  |  Topic: Quick [tech] Questions Thread 0 Members and 2 Guests are viewing this topic.
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Author Topic: Quick [tech] Questions Thread  (Read 1186251 times)
Sky
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I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.


Reply #4130 on: April 23, 2019, 06:40:55 AM

Yeah, I've been pleasantly surprised with cable content. I expected that to be a wash, but it's improved remarkably (in that the fiancee remarked on it and she never notices stuff like that). I was really leery of a seeming sidegrade (since I'm primarily using 1080p content), but yeah, the pixel density and direct picture (vs rear proj) makes a huge difference. I hadn't realized the amount of screen sag I'd been getting on the ancient Mitsu set! And for the first time since 2003 it's nice to not have to deal with overscan and setting up custom resolutions.

For PC stuff, 4k looks pretty sketchy. Civ V keeps trying to load into a tiny corner box, lots of games don't scale text/UI. Windows itself is great, scales nicely. I'll keep it at 1080 for most stuff on PC. I could see a gpu benefitting the games that already struggled, GTA V in particular. PC graphics are so much nicer than PS4 but sluggish, the PS4 version runs smooth but the reduction in fidelity and more importantly, density and variety of cars, npcs, etc, is a huge bummer.

The PS4 has (of course) been a lot smoother, overall. Spider-man is smooth af in 4k so far, RDR2 less so. Madden stutters enough that I set the PS4 to 1080p before launching. Luckily, the set preserves settings not just per input, but per source resolution per input.

The only gripes I have are lack of full array backlight and the settings are a bit gimped on the lower end sets in the line. I'm not one to get hung up on stuff like that, though, since I don't fancy paying $20k for a tv to deal with it...
Cyrrex
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Reply #4131 on: April 23, 2019, 07:52:26 AM

Yeah, that 970 will probably only do older shit in 4K, and then the UI scaling will be a coin toss.

Another thing I learned recently, to a small amount of dismay, is that you may need to beware of routing through a surround receiver.  I was doing that for a while, but once I finally got the itch to do some 4K gaming on the LED TV, I started noticing problems.  There were strange things that made me think something was clocked too high and possibly overheating, but that clearly was not the case, temps were low on everything.  Going direct from the PC to the TV solved the problem instantly, so it is all but certain that my surround receiver - which is a fairly high end Pioneer Elite, but about 5 years old - cannot really do 4K pass-through.  I think it will do low intensive shit, but trying things like GTA5 and Sekiro in 4K made everything take a dump.  Too many bits and bytes, methinks.  So only pass the video through a receiver if you know it is certified 4K.  I was surprised this was an issue, I just assumed as a passthrough it was not going to be a potential factor.

"...maybe if you cleaned the piss out of the sunny d bottles under your desks and returned em, you could upgrade you vid cards, fucken lusers.." - Grunk
Sky
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I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.


Reply #4132 on: April 23, 2019, 09:59:04 AM

My receiver has 3 optical inputs and zero hdmi  why so serious?
Cyrrex
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Reply #4133 on: April 23, 2019, 10:22:29 AM

So, from the 90s then  awesome, for real

"...maybe if you cleaned the piss out of the sunny d bottles under your desks and returned em, you could upgrade you vid cards, fucken lusers.." - Grunk
Sky
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I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.


Reply #4134 on: April 23, 2019, 11:57:35 AM

So, from the 90s then  awesome, for real
Might've been 2001.
Cyrrex
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Reply #4135 on: April 23, 2019, 10:53:34 PM

My subwoofer is from....94?  It is connected via RCA plug  why so serious?  Sometimes the old shit is the good shit.  I will part with it the day it burns up.

"...maybe if you cleaned the piss out of the sunny d bottles under your desks and returned em, you could upgrade you vid cards, fucken lusers.." - Grunk
Sky
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I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.


Reply #4136 on: April 24, 2019, 08:29:11 AM

Do they have a new connector for subs? Mine is maybe 5 years old (the board on my 18yr old one went) and connects with an RCA.

I do need some solid stereo speakers once the budget recovers a bit. Never really got around to adding them, since I don't listen to much music through the system. But I do play Rocksmith, so it would be nice to have some better sound than my old L/R set from the surround kit (which are actually decent, super beefy magnets in them).

I've looked a couple times over the years, but haven't found a good combination of sound and not massive and normal living room friendly (I don't live in a spaceship!).

Now that I'm going to wall mount the tv, I'll also probably look at some new surrounds to put in the walls. Used to move the tv around a bit, so needed to move speakers, previously.
Chimpy
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Reply #4137 on: April 24, 2019, 02:46:50 PM

If it is a powered subwoofer, it will have an RCA in as the frequencies that subs handle are non-directional and thus are mono.

If your sub is that old, you should make sure that the ring around the cone has not decayed. If it has, you can take it to a stereo repair shop and get it re-coned for less than 100 bucks (happened to me, my sub was about 10-15 years old when I took it in to be repaired.)

'Reality' is the only word in the language that should always be used in quotes.
Cyrrex
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Reply #4138 on: April 24, 2019, 10:40:37 PM

Yeah, that makes sense now that I think about it.  My old sub is so awesome that I haven't even looked at any others since I bought it several decades ago, so they probably are all RCA or wired leads for connections for all I know.  It also appears to still be in perfect condition still, though I imagine at some point the electronics are going to take a shit on me.  That will be a sad, sad day.

"...maybe if you cleaned the piss out of the sunny d bottles under your desks and returned em, you could upgrade you vid cards, fucken lusers.." - Grunk
Sky
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I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.


Reply #4139 on: April 25, 2019, 07:02:04 AM

The fail point for just about any modern version of older technology is the circuit board.

That's why most of my musical gear is point to point unless it was invented after 1980 (DSPs, digital recorders).
Druzil
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Reply #4140 on: April 25, 2019, 07:59:48 AM

Not really sure if this goes here or the music thread but since it's currently on topic I'll put it here.  

Anyone have any advice on choosing a stereo receiver?  My living room has built in speakers and I'd like to take advantage of it.  The price ranges on receivers is so broad I'm a little unsure what I should even be looking at.  My wife bought me a cheap-ish Panasonic receiver a number of years ago and it was absolute garbage and was totally broken within a year and a half, so I'd like to get something at least a little better this time.  I won't need to buy speakers but I will need a sub.

I'd only need 5.1 support.  I'm not an audiophile.  A radio tuner is fine but most of my music would be either via Bluetooth or WiFi.  Other than that I'd pretty much just be hooking up a TV and an Apple TV (or similar device).
Cyrrex
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Reply #4141 on: April 25, 2019, 09:28:50 AM

7.1 is mostly just a.....unnecessary extra.  I have it, but few apps and software actually support it, and even when they do the content usually does not take advantage of it anyway.  And even in the event the stars align....it does not really blow you away.  5.1 is required, but 7.1 is kinda meh.

I usually buy middle range new stuff.  Technics, Sony, Panasonic.  It has all been pretty decent.  The Pioneer Elite I mentioned a few posts ago, I bought it use (about 2 years old at the time) for about a third of the original price.  Ended up being cheaper than a mid-range receiver and it is WAAAAAAAAAAAY better.  Holy shit.  I thought it would mostly be better from a features POV, and it is that, but the sound is dramatically better.  Also very powerful.  I feel like I got a steal.  So if you are willing to take the risk, that is totally what I would do.  I will probably never buy a new receiver ever again, just buy the leftovers of rich people who have to have the latest and greatest.

"...maybe if you cleaned the piss out of the sunny d bottles under your desks and returned em, you could upgrade you vid cards, fucken lusers.." - Grunk
Sky
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I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.


Reply #4142 on: April 25, 2019, 11:25:13 AM

I did notice, in the email pushes I'm getting after buying my tv, that there seem to be "4k" receivers on the market. I'm sure there's a lot of marketing hype, but I wonder if they update the HDMI subsystems to handle the higher bandwidth needs were talking about earlier? I'm not in the market, but if you're going to push your hdmi through the receiver, it's worth looking into.
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Reply #4143 on: April 25, 2019, 03:49:48 PM

I did notice, in the email pushes I'm getting after buying my tv, that there seem to be "4k" receivers on the market. I'm sure there's a lot of marketing hype, but I wonder if they update the HDMI subsystems to handle the higher bandwidth needs were talking about earlier? I'm not in the market, but if you're going to push your hdmi through the receiver, it's worth looking into.

If they are marketing it as "4k" then it means their HDMI ports and switching circuitry are capable of handling the necessary bandwidth, mostly.

As far as receivers go, I have been pretty happy with the Pioneer one I bought on Newegg about 10 years ago now for like $225 bucks. Which surprised me as I usually was not a fan of their stuff back when I was an AV nerd. It has I think 5 HDMI inputs that lets me switch between a number of different devices without fucking with my TV. As per above, mine was marketed as "3D 1080P" if that tells you what was the AV fad of the day at the time.

The most important thing is to make sure that whatever you get, that it has a powerful enough amplifier. Contrary to what people think "makes sense", more speakers are blown from being driven by an under-powered amplifier than one too big. Of course, pretty much anything on the market now is going to have enough oomph.

'Reality' is the only word in the language that should always be used in quotes.
Cyrrex
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Reply #4144 on: April 25, 2019, 11:14:28 PM

Yeah, a 4k stamp would mean they have certified the bandwidth of the HDMI.  I used to think this was bullshit, but a few years back when we started getting into monitor resolutions beyond 1080p, it became clear that older HDMI versions wouldn't cut it any longer (it would throttle, for example, the refresh rate).  So yeah, it matters.  My brain fart was more due to thinking that it made no difference if it was just a "pass through", but that is me being a retard.....my old receiver did pass through, not the new one.  The Pioneer Elite is actually processing, so it definitely would need to meet the 4k standard, which it doesn't.

No big deal, I have other options.  But if I were in the market for a new receiver, it might be a consideration.  The only reason I have this problem in the first place is because of the retarded decision of video card manufactures to cut down the number of HDMI outputs in favor of Display Port outputs.  I would bet my left testicle that HDMI is still vastly more common as an interface, so why anyone would put 1 HDMI out and 3 Display Port outs on a video card is beyond me.

"...maybe if you cleaned the piss out of the sunny d bottles under your desks and returned em, you could upgrade you vid cards, fucken lusers.." - Grunk
rattran
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Reply #4145 on: April 26, 2019, 05:26:59 AM

Displayport is royalty free, hdmi costs $10kUSD/year, plus $0.04-$0.15 per connector.
Cyrrex
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Reply #4146 on: April 26, 2019, 09:04:41 AM

No shit?  The more you know....

Still, would have been nice if, you know, DP had more of a presence before they started such a dramatic shift away from HDMI.  And the HDMI is still there, so they are not saving much.  15 cents on a card that cost me 800 bucks.

"...maybe if you cleaned the piss out of the sunny d bottles under your desks and returned em, you could upgrade you vid cards, fucken lusers.." - Grunk
Druzil
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Reply #4147 on: April 29, 2019, 06:07:32 AM

I bought a few cables on amazon that were DP on one end and HDMI on the other for like $8.  They seem to work great, though I'm not doing 4k atm, so I can't vouch that they will work there.
Cyrrex
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Reply #4148 on: April 30, 2019, 02:54:47 AM

I am pretty sure they will work as long as the HDMI cable has the right level of cert.  And I actually ordered one of those a couple months ago, but it got lost during the shipment.  Probably because of Brexit (it was Amazon UK).  So now I am reminded to order another.  Might go with German Amazon this time.

"...maybe if you cleaned the piss out of the sunny d bottles under your desks and returned em, you could upgrade you vid cards, fucken lusers.." - Grunk
Sky
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Reply #4149 on: June 10, 2019, 10:11:22 AM

Anyone done cablecard on Charter (I'm on Spectrum, which is Charter's Time Warner region)?

Getting a tivo bolt 1TB in tomorrow, just wondering what to look out for that might trip me up (other than cable tech support). I'm also going to run an RG6 line, as I think I have RG59 or w/e in the attic.

When I picked up the cablecard the dude gave me a tuning adapter, because they have SDV on our network.
Trippy
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Reply #4150 on: June 10, 2019, 10:44:28 AM

I haven't used mine in a while and mine is with Comcast but pairing it can be a bit fiddly so you'll need to be patient with that.
Salamok
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Reply #4151 on: July 22, 2019, 12:26:20 PM

Anyone have experience with setting up a Nest thermostat in multiple AC unit situation (3 thermostats 2 AC units)? 
Salamok
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Reply #4152 on: July 31, 2019, 10:55:31 AM

How about some of the newer mesh based whole home wifi equipment, anyone have some preferences here?  I was thinking of getting a Netgear Orbi but Amazon seems to have a fuckton of refurbs so that scares me...

edit - I do see that they have had some problematic updates in the past which may have been a result of some refurb fodder and the main reason I am leaning towards the Orbi are the 4 ethernet ports per unit.
« Last Edit: July 31, 2019, 10:57:21 AM by Salamok »
Trippy
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Reply #4153 on: July 31, 2019, 11:46:40 AM

Those things are huge. If that doesn't bother you it seems like a good choice.
Salamok
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Reply #4154 on: July 31, 2019, 11:52:15 AM

Those things are huge.

Originally I was looking at the AmpliFi HD which seems much more svelte but then it occured to me how much I dislike typing in wifi passwords on consoles, smart TV's and other devices that do not have a decent keyboard.  Shit I may even wire one to my desktop just to ditch the wifi manager.
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Reply #4155 on: July 31, 2019, 12:05:14 PM

i got google wifi thing and it's fucking amazing - the pack of 3 completely blankets all 4 floors, the garage, both patios and like 20 feet outside
Salamok
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Reply #4156 on: July 31, 2019, 12:16:14 PM

I looked into Google WiFi as well but a few minor items (ac1200, lack of extra ports) swayed me away from it.
Druzil
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Reply #4157 on: August 01, 2019, 09:23:24 AM

I also have Google WiFi and love it.  It killed every dead space in the house that I had with the expensive non-mesh router + extender combo.  Only complaint is no USB port for Network storage.  The App is great too.  It might be annoying if you're a network nerd that wants to super engineer your home network.
Salamok
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Reply #4158 on: August 13, 2019, 08:58:05 AM

Alrighty, completed setup of the Netgear Orbi and so far it works amazing, hopefully it doesn't melt itself to a slow death or get broken by the automatic updates.
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Reply #4159 on: August 13, 2019, 01:25:23 PM

It occurred to me that Google Wifi would be a great solution to the lakehouse wifi problems we have.

Why am I homeless?  Why do all you motherfuckers need homes is the real question.
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Reply #4160 on: August 17, 2019, 10:14:41 PM

It occurred to me that Google Wifi would be a great solution to the lakehouse wifi problems we have.
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Salamok
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Reply #4161 on: August 19, 2019, 10:37:19 AM

So I inherited a partial home theater setup in the new house, there are 4 speakers in the walls (looks like it is wired for 7.1 though), a 1080p projector mounted to the ceiling and a nice 12' screen.  I had Spectrum drop in a cable box and the picture is good, to temporarily get sound I just plugged some computer speakers into the cable box.  I am now ready to work on a more permanent solution and the last receiver I bought was in 1989.  I do not want to spend a ton of money, I want something easy to use and doesn't require the volume cranked to 11 to hear dialog, I also am planning on upgrading the projector to a 4k benq when the lamp goes out, so thinking I should get something that will support 4k.  Currently looking at what seem to be some popular options on Amazon:

Yamaha RX-V385 5.1-Channel 4K Ultra HD AV Receiver with Bluetooth

Sony STRDH590 5.2 multi-channel 4k HDR AV Receiver with Bluetooth

I will also need a center channel speaker and a subwoofer.

Also, anyone have experience with Spectrum Cable + a Samsung Smart TV.  I can't seem to figure out how to get 1 remote to do everything (or even just handle all TV functions).
Sky
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I love my TV an' hug my TV an' call it 'George'.


Reply #4162 on: August 19, 2019, 11:30:24 AM

Haha goddamned Spectrum.

I was at 3 remotes with my Spectrum DVR, Mitsu tv and Panasonic receiver. Now I'm up to 4 remotes with the tivo and Sammy smart tv.

Tivo as main remote
Sammy for source selection
Receiver remote for source selection
My old Spectrum DVR remote because the power button on my receiver remote is broken (it's 20 years old, so...).


Yeah. Fiancee is even less happy than me. I almost bought a new receiver just to drop the 4th remote.
Salamok
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Reply #4163 on: August 19, 2019, 01:31:56 PM

Haha goddamned Spectrum.

I was at 3 remotes with my Spectrum DVR, Mitsu tv and Panasonic receiver. Now I'm up to 4 remotes with the tivo and Sammy smart tv.

Tivo as main remote
Sammy for source selection
Receiver remote for source selection
My old Spectrum DVR remote because the power button on my receiver remote is broken (it's 20 years old, so...).


Yeah. Fiancee is even less happy than me. I almost bought a new receiver just to drop the 4th remote.

I moved over to AT&T/uverse when the Time Warner buyout was happening not really dissatisfied but wanted a new subscriber rate, now 2 years later I sign up with spectrum for the same reasons and am like holy fuck I want AT&T back.

edit - Also is there some special test you need to pass before they determine you are a big enough moron to design UX for TV menu's?  HBO app sucks, Spectrum channel guide sucks, Starz app sucks, showtime app sucks, where do they effing find these people?
« Last Edit: August 19, 2019, 01:37:50 PM by Salamok »
MahrinSkel
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Reply #4164 on: August 20, 2019, 09:18:10 PM

edit - Also is there some special test you need to pass before they determine you are a big enough moron to design UX for TV menu's?  HBO app sucks, Spectrum channel guide sucks, Starz app sucks, showtime app sucks, where do they effing find these people?
Patents. Everything relating to intuitive DVR/Smart TV UX is covered by patents, and working around them makes for fuck-awful messes.

--Dave

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