Home internet setup

[Uncle Shags]

I'm back baby! All I've had for internet at home for almost two years is garbage Verizon mobile 3g internet. Down load limits, super slow...it's sucked. I even got desperate and relocated my computer to my wife's office where I've been gaming (Rift and SWToR) on the university's connection. Talk about sketchy...

Well, now there is light at the end of the tunnel! They wired my road with fiber and I just signed up for a 15mbps connection - install in a week and a half!

So, considering I've been out of the game for so long, I figured I'd ask if anyone has any tips for getting back into the wired in world. I plan to finally buy a flat screen (thinking 40 inch LED) now that there's a reason. I want to be able to connect it to the internet (for steaming movies and such), my gaming computer (to get crazy and play in the living room on the big screen, WOOT!) and I suppose while I'm at it, my wife's laptop. Is my best bet to just get a wifi enabled TV and connect it all together as a wireless network? Is that all I really need to do?

So happy...

[Snowreap]

I don't think 40" is a good size for a PC screen. it's too small to be useful when you're sitting far away on the couch, but too big to sit directly in front of. it would probably work all right if you're sitting between 6 and 8 feet back from the screen, but are you set up to be able to do that? unless you're using wireless, your keyboard, mouse and headset cords will all need to be long enough to reach.

40" is probably great for streaming video and playing console games though (console games are written with larger screens in mind, so they don't use small hard-to-read text fonts as much as PC games do).

-ken

[Uncle Shags]

Sorry, I should have been more clear. The 40 inch will be my TV in the living room. I have a 24 inch for gaming. Connecting the big TV to my computer would just be a novelty - gaming from the couch.

[Uncle Shags]

I am starting to do research and am beginning to answer my own questions. It seems like I can get an HDTV with internal wifi or an adapter and connect it to the internet. I would access the internet through whatever browser/programming the TV has. In order to actually use the TV as a monitor for my computer I need to wire it to my graphics card or get a wireless hdmi kit like this: <!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.vizio.com/accessories/xwh200-free-shipping.html">http://www.vizio.com/accessories/xwh200 ... pping.html</a><!-- m --> and a long range wireless keyboard and mouse.

[Uncle Shags]

<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.amazon.com/Actiontec-MWTV200KIT-01-WirelessTV-Transmitter-Receiver/dp/B005L9ZZ32/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top">http://www.amazon.com/Actiontec-MWTV200 ... roduct_top</a><!-- m -->

Thar she blows! I plug the transmitter up to my computer and the receiver picks it up 150 feet away and plugs into the TV. Unlike the other ones I've seen (the Vizio I linked earlier), this supposedly goes through walls and everything. Full 1080p. I think it will also transmit usb at the same time, which means I can run a wireless mouse and keyboard from the receiver instead of trying to do it all the way across the house.

[Uncle Shags]

I got a new plan.

No wireless. It's too sketchy. I have a giant fireplace and it's foundation in between my office and the living room. I'm guessing that would be pretty bad interference.

Instead I was able to go through the basement and come out of the wall in the office, and the hole coming up in the living room is huge, so I just need to close a 25ish foot gap. Here's how I plan to do it:

Two of these to run the wireless mouse/keyboard to the living room:
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.monoprice.com/products/product.asp?c_id=103&cp_id=10311&cs_id=1031102&p_id=5345&seq=1&format=2">http://www.monoprice.com/products/produ ... 1&format=2</a><!-- m -->

This to run the hdmi:
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.amazon.com/HDMI-Extender-over-Cat5e-Cables/dp/B003LZA95W/ref%3dsr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1332855515&sr=8-1">http://www.amazon.com/HDMI-Extender-ove ... 515&sr=8-1</a><!-- m -->

That should do it. Just need a couple cat6 cables and some speaker wire and I'll be all set up. Oh, I need to buy the TV...

[Snowreap]

I don't think those USB/Ethernet converters are what you think they are. they look more like USB network interfaces to me, meant to allow you to connect to a Gigabit Ethernet network even if you have no expansion card slots available.

I've done a bit of reading in the past on the topic of USB port extenders, and the expert opinion is that you can't do it without violating the USB spec (http://www.usb.org/developers/usbfaq#cab1). in practice, if you use what's known as an "active cable" or a "repeater cable" you can do this, but as far as I can tell you'd still technically be out-of-spec. for example: use this repeater cable (http://www.monoprice.com/products/produc...1&format=2) and plug in a powered hub at the far end for your keyboard and mouse.

-ken

[Uncle Shags]

Thanks Snow. Yeah it looks like that is for running ethernet through a usb port. Although, that is really half of what I'm trying to do, but I assume it won't work backwards (usb->ethernet)?

They have extenders for usb 1.1, but I assume that's too slow.
Here's one:
<!-- m --><a class="postlink" href="http://www.monoprice.com/products/product.asp?c_id=103&cp_id=10303&cs_id=1030304&p_id=6042&seq=1&format=2">http://www.monoprice.com/products/produ ... 1&format=2</a><!-- m -->

What do you mean by "out of spec"? As in the signal will degrade?

As far as the powered usb on the far end, I assume you mean it has to be plugged into something that's powered? Like a printer or something? Are you sure? If that's the case, how would they use it as an extension for the Kinect?

As far as going to ethernet and back, I think that's what they are suggesting in this answer (below) on that usb link you posted. (I say "I think" because I have no idea wtf they are talking about...)

4. I really need to put a USB device more than 30 meters away from my PC. What should I do?

A: Build a USB bridge that acts as a USB device on one side and has a USB host controller at the other end. Use a long-haul signaling protocol like Ethernet or RS-485 in the middle. Using cables or short-haul fiber, you can get ranges upwards of a kilometer, though there's no reason why the long-haul link in the middle of the bridge couldn't be a pair of radio transceivers or satellite modems.
Embedded host solutions capable of doing this already exist. Also, two PCs connected via USB Ethernet adapters are essentially a slave/slave version of this master/slave bridge.


Why the hell is this such a pain in the ass? I would assume lots of people would want to do what I'm trying.

[Snowreap]

correct, a USB->Ethernet adapter won't work backwards. there are two reasons why: first, you need special software to translate USB signals into something that can be carried in Ethernet packets, and software at the other end to convert things back again. second, there is a big difference between a USB host port (the socket you plug devices into) and a USB device plug (the plug that goes into a hub socket). devices can only connect to host ports, host ports can't connect to each other and devices can't connect to each other (unless you have a special dual-mode device that can act as either a host or a device, but even in that case it can never act as both at once).

USB is designed to work without bus terminators. but without bus terminators, when the electrical pulse representing a bit hits the end of the cable, the energy of the pulse will be reflected back the way it came. the length limits for USB cables are calculated so that the reflected signal won't cause electrical problems or data corruption. all this to make the wires easy to manage, and to make it ok to leave loose cables plugged in with nothing connected to them. it makes things easy for the user, but it also results in these kinds of engineering restrictions.

by powered hub I mean a hub that gets power from its own AC adapter, rather than getting its power from the PC. USB cables do two things -- they supply power to connected devices, and they also provide a data connection that allows those devices to communicate with your PC. a repeater cable is optimized for data, not power delivery (and it may use so much power itself that there's little left to run your downstream devices anyway). it works best when you leave the job of power delivery to another device (a powered hub).

-ken

[Maren]

If you have the ability and resources to pull ethernet cables through the walls and set up true ethernet plugs, I think you would enjoy that more. I had 4 cables pulled through my house to dedicated wall plugs with my Verizon FIOS router sitting in my closet - is worked so well that I am able to stream to 2 different TVs in different areas of my house and game on my desktop

[Uncle Shags]

Update!

After many hiccups and delays I am finally set up! It works just like I hoped. The wiring itself was a bit easier than I thought. For some reason I had heard you couldn't run HDMI or USB over long distances. I got 50 foot cords for both at monoprice for $65 including tax and shipping and ran them through he walls and basement. I tried to get the 40" Toshiba I was looking at, but couldn't find one, so went with the 42" Vizio LED for $650. It's badass. I also got this goofy little mouse/keyboard for surfing from the couch. Not bad for 20 bucks. Figured I'd test it out and see what I like/need in a mini-keyboard before I spend more.

All in all I am very pleased. All the connections are perfect even over 50 feet, 1080 streams great and looks awesome on the big screen. Very pleased.

Things I learned:
--Don't buy shit at radio shack. I couldn't fit the giant end of my powered usb through the hole so I went to radio shack to get a short usb. 18 bucks for what cost 85 cents on monoprice. A $2 hdmi angle connector is $17... I ended up buying the usb because I didn't want to wait for it to ship.
--Silverlight sucks balls. I had avoided getting it on my desktop because it looked shitty. I was right. I had to install it to watch netflix and it took me several hours because the latest version doesn't install for Vista 64bit.
--Call to make sure they actually have the TV in stock in the store you are going to before you buy it online. The online numbers were wrong for me twice at two different stores. I bought a TV that didn't exist...
--CCC (for AMD) sets up a second display as an extension of the first by default. What you want to do is duplicate the first one. It is not intuitive at all how to do that. You have to right click on the monitors at the bottom in the "Creating and arranging desktops" tab to make it duplicate. I was pulling my hair out on this one.
--Butter the wife up before spending big bucks on a new TV.