Does anyone play PC games on their tv?

[ParadoxDenmark]

I use a 42" 1080p TV, and a 24" monitor.

Some games are best on the TV (MMOs, RPGs, etc) Some games like competitive FPS/RTS is best on the 24", because you're more precise, accurate and fast.

 

[HeXen]

this might work as a kb/m replacement
http://www.infoandinsights.com/veho-mimi-keyboard-gamepad-mouse-hybrid/

 

[Ross Ridge]

If you can sit on the couch with a laptop on your lap and use it comfortably you should be fine with any normal keyboard. For a mouse I just use a wireless mouse on a mouse pad on top of a thin stiff book on the seat beside me. There are also apparently "couch" mice designed to work directly on the fabric of your couch.

All in all it's a pretty normal PC setup for me, with normal PC input devices, just on comfortable couch.

I wish they made a wireless "gaming" keyboard with a full standard 101-key layout and full-size function keys, though.

 

[SZLiao214]

Like the others have said some games don't look that great on a TV. When i used to play WoW the text above npc's and players heads would be too blurry to read until i was closer.

Other games where text shows up in a window still look great. I love playing FPS and rpg type games on the tv. Amnesia: Black descent using IEMs and a tv is pretty amazing.

 

[lukeb]

I have been using a dual monitor setup for the past couple years, 21" LCD and a 47" 1080p HDTV (using DVI-> HDMI). For aircraft sims or RTS it worked great, but to me on fps games the quality and response times suffered quiet a bit.

Of course, some of it may have been just specific to my setup and distance. However, a couple months ago I replaced the 47" with an LG LD450 32" and have been lovin' it!

 

[baronzemo78]

I game PS3, 360 and PC games on a 55" TV with a 7.1 surround system.

It is amazing. Gaming on a small PC monitor doesn't compare.

I have a wooden lapboard that I use for my Logitech G15, and G9.

I use a USB-IR converter to use the wired keyboard and mouse sitting on my couch.

The 2 biggest things I've encountered is that old games don't easily support surround sound and wide screen without hacks and sometimes the text on PC games is small.

Overall it's great.

Do it.

 

[ioni]

There are also apparently "couch" mice designed to work directly on the fabric of your couch.

Yea, they are called optical mice. Any optical mouse will work on a couch.

I have a decent set up for PC gaming w/ KB&M on a TV from the couch, but text tends to look to small. I think consoles use a bigger font.

 

[AstroManLuca]

I used to have my 32" 1080p LCD at the back of my desk. It was awesome, looked great. I don't understand the pixel density complaints, it looked fine to me. A little farther away then a standard computer monitor but still a larger apparent size.

Couldn't afford to get another HDTV so I had to switch to a cheap LCD monitor for my computer and moved the TV into the living room. I actually had the computer set up in the living room for a little while but it was obtrusive and hard to use.

 

[dpodblood]

I have hooked up my PC to my 46" sharp LCD before. It looks nice, but I still prefer to play at my desk. Keyboard/mouse set up is much more comfortable at my desk with an ergonomic chair than it is from my couch. Also I can see more detail sitting 1.5' from my LCD monitor than across the room from my LCD TV.

 

[videopho]

12ft out from my 73" DLP and gaming on 3d Vision.
To ice the cake, there is a 7.2 surround sound to it.
I ain't going back to a midget 24" anymore.
Simply awesome!!

 

[Ross Ridge]

Yea, they are called optical mice. Any optical mouse will work on a couch.

In my experience standard optical mice work poorly when used directly on couch fabric. I had to use the setup I described before, mouse pad on a stiff thin book, to get something that actually worked as well as a conventional desk setup. I use my PC all day long like this.

 

[kalrith]

My computer monitor is a 32" 1080p TV that I sit about 3' from. It's more immersive than my 50" TV in the livingroom that I sit 9' from.

Most TVs can be set up to do zero overscan and be run at native res with an HDMI or DVI-to-HDMI cable. Many of the above comments are only applicable if using a VGA cable (since most TVs limit that to about 1024x768 res) or if not running at native res with no overscan. I use my 50" plasma with our HTPC, and it does great with video playback and web surfing. It would probably do great with gaming too if the HTPC didn't have a 4550 video card in it .

Edit: BTW I went from a Dell 2408fwp to my 32" TV as my computer monitor, and there's just no comparison for gaming. The 24" looks like a PSP screen by comparison

Also, go to www.tvcalculator.com to compare different screen sizes and use the following chart as a general guide for comparing different screen sizes, resolutions, and viewing distances:

 

[AstroManLuca]

My computer monitor is a 32" 1080p TV that I sit about 3' from. It's more immersive than my 50" TV in the livingroom that I sit 9' from.

Most TVs can be set up to do zero overscan and be run at native res with an HDMI or DVI-to-HDMI cable. Many of the above comments are only applicable if using a VGA cable (since most TVs limit that to about 1024x768 res) or if not running at native res with no overscan. I use my 50" plasma with our HTPC, and it does great with video playback and web surfing. It would probably do great with gaming too if the HTPC didn't have a 4550 video card in it .

Funny, my TV would only do 1:1 pixel mapping through VGA and it looked great that way. Using DVI-HDMI made it look bad because it was always scaled. I could adjust it to roughly match the edges of the viewable area, but it wasn't 1:1 so it still looked fuzzy.

I guess that's because it's an older, cheaper TV. If I got another one I'd want 1:1 pixel mapping over HDMI.

 

[coldmeat]

I don't get how everyone can call their monitor's tiny compared to their tv. Say you're sitting 6 ft from a 42" (my set up) and 2" from a 22". The viewing angle of the monitor is about 45*, compared to about a 28* viewing angle for the tv. So basically, the tv is puny compared to the monitor.

 

[GundamW]

I've been using my 40" Samsung 1080p/60Hz TV as my pc monitor for over a year now. It's on a tv stand against the wall. I sit about 5-6' from the TV with a flat table as my desk.
I've played/finished pc games (COD4MW1, Crysis, CS:S, TF2, ME1, Batman:AA, Ghostbusters, Rome:TW, TD flash games, etc), surf web, code developing, watched dvd/pron on it. I don't have any problem with it.
I don't think I can go back to regular 24/27/30" LCD monitor.

 

[Attic]

I don't get how everyone can call their monitor's tiny compared to their tv. Say you're sitting 6 ft from a 42" (my set up) and 2" from a 22". The viewing angle of the monitor is about 45*, compared to about a 28* viewing angle for the tv. So basically, the tv is puny compared to the monitor.

You'd have to imagine watching sports on a smaller TV but sitting closer vs. watching on a bigger TV while sitting further back.

Viewing angle doesn't really matter as much as the size of the display when sitting at a reasonable distance.

A bigger display at an appropriate seating distance is more immersive than a smaller monitor with a larger viewing angle IME.

 

[BurnItDwn]

a LONG LONG time ago I played games on a 27 inch CRT using Tvout from a Canopus Pure3D Voodoo1 card (with 6mb of ram!.)

It looked ok, but not great since it was 640x480. Was cool to have a "big screen" instead of a little 13 or 14 inch CRT....

Since then I ocassionally hooked up a PC to my old 61inch Rear projection set, but usually I would only hit 800x600.... sitting a great distance away, it worked fine, but really not that great.

I played a lot of games on an older 26inch 720P LCD, back on a GeforceDDR or Geforce 2 GTS.... you really couldn't get much higher resolution, and at the time, I had a 19inch CRT, so the LCD was a nice upgrade for some games.

Since then, I've hooked up a 1080p projector in the basement to a 106 inch screen, haven't done any gaming on it as I haven't bothered hooking a PC up to it other than my laptop when I was first calibrating it....

I've also got a 1080p 42inch in my living room, but, PC hasn't been hooked up to that either....

Eventually I'll put together an HTPC and give it a semi decent video card, but I'm just too used to sitting a certain way at my desk with my model M keyboard and a nice laser mouse that I dunno if I could get used to gaming another way.

 

[caboob]

I have a nvidia 2D surround system using a 47" TV flanked by 2 x 42" displays. Bad Company 2 is awesome. I came from a 30" 25x16 display which was sharper but now feels like I'm looking through a porthole when I use it.

 

[arredondo]

If you have the right setup, almost nothing on the desktop compares to an PC gaming rig on an HDTV. After years of plaing games at my desk, I will NEVER go back now that I get my PC game on from my comfy couch.

I have a 60" stunning HDTV (rear projection TVs still provide the inkiest blacks IMHO) through DVI-->HDMI extensions (30 feet). My couch is only nine feet away. I am immersed in full 5.1 surround sound with HEAVY booming bass through my audio setup, and it all connects through extended wires that snake against the back wall of the man cave in my house.

I use Logitech's rechargeable (through USB) wireless illuminated keyboard which let's me not deal with keyboard wires and it lights up in the dark. My mouse is the trusty Logitech MX 518 since I can't find a wireless mouse that compares (I have a USB extender for it.

For the keyboard, it sits on my lap and is easily set aside when I am done. The mouse doesn't need a mouse pad - the lip of my sofa is smooth enough so that I get perfect accuracy and movement in even the most action packed games.

The game experience is comparable to going from a standard movie screen (i.e. a 24" monitor) to IMAX awesomeness (the 60" HDTV). And since I am in one spot, I can switch between my cable TV and console without getting up, sometimes looking at one source (i.e. browsing the web) and listening to another (i.e. listening to a sporting event on TV).

Beyond gaming, it is the central spot for my whole family to browse 1080P family photos and home videos. Streaming Hulu programs is something my non-techie wife does all the time on my HTPC, since it is on the BIG screen instead of the smaller monitor in the kids' room. We can all sit on the couch to watch anything coming from my rig, rather than uncomfortably stand around a desk.

There is so much enjoyment to be had, I will never go back to old fashioned desktop computing for games or media.

 

[coldmeat]

A 60" tv at 9' is like using a 13" computer monitor.

 

[Soundmanred]

A 60" tv at 9' is like using a 13" computer monitor.

From a technical size/relativity standpoint they would be equivalent.
In the real world, not so much.
It's just more fun to play from the couch on a larger screen for me.

 

[kalrith]

You'd have to imagine watching sports on a smaller TV but sitting closer vs. watching on a bigger TV while sitting further back.

Viewing angle doesn't really matter as much as the size of the display when sitting at a reasonable distance.

A bigger display at an appropriate seating distance is more immersive than a smaller monitor with a larger viewing angle IME.

This. I tried sitting 2' from my 24" monitor, and it still wasn't nearly as immersive as sitting 3' to 3.5' from my 32". Viewing angle helps for comparisons, but it shouldn't be taken as a hard and fast measure of the level of immersion.

If you want a good example, go watch a movie at a 40° viewing angle at the movie theater. Then, watch the same movie at a 40° viewing angle on your 24" computer monitor. Then post in this thread how the computer monitor was just as immersive as the movie theater .

 

[abaez]

My U3011 is my pc and tv. At first I did not like the 2560x1600 resolution since some games chug at that res, but I don't think I'd go back to my 24"

 

[jlee]

Funny, my TV would only do 1:1 pixel mapping through VGA and it looked great that way. Using DVI-HDMI made it look bad because it was always scaled. I could adjust it to roughly match the edges of the viewable area, but it wasn't 1:1 so it still looked fuzzy.

I guess that's because it's an older, cheaper TV. If I got another one I'd want 1:1 pixel mapping over HDMI.

Same issue with my 40" Samsung (which isn't all that old - forget the model #, though). I can't get it to do proper 1:1 with HDMI. Every other TV I've tried w/HDMI has been fine (Toshiba and Vizio come to mind), but with the Samsung I had to use a VGA cable.