questions re internet tv

Hey y'all!
Hope your Thanksgiving was great and nobody burned the house down deepfrying a frozen turkey!

I hit the Black Friday sales and got a Panasonic Viera TV and a Netgear WNDR3700 router, which (the router) is hooked up to the Wii, a Blackberry and a laptop (wireless) and two PCs (wired). I would like to hook up the new tv, but I'm a bit confused about internet with the tv, so I have some questions I KNOW someone there can answer!

What exactly IS internet TV? My new tv doesn't have direct WiFi access and it wants me to buy a very specific dongle thingy in order to work with my router and allow internet access. Before I go out and buy this, what exactly will happen when I hook it up? Right now I tried to access internet through my Sony BluRay player (which I did connect to my router) but it's not like I get a homepage thing like on the computer and then type in a web address and off I go. Instead, it looks like a bunch of apps that I can click on, like Pandora and Netflix and Hulu and stuff like that. If I buy the dongle the TV wants is that all I'm going to be getting? Or will the internet through the TV (with the dongle) be like the internet on my computer? We can get a kinda normal looking internet through the Wii, but we can't stream stuff through Hulu because the Wii doesn't have a flash player or anything. And that's another thing... can the Wii support that? Also, one of my kids is getting an xbox 360 for Christmas (LOVE Black Friday). Would we be able to run internet better through that?

Sorry for all the questions, but I've spent two days searching for this info all over the web and can't find anything this specific... I guess most people know about this already. Feel like a lumbering dinosaur with all this stuff :confused

Thanks for any help!

legolass

 

To cut out the bs, you would need a router to share your ISP connection to all. Then you need to decide either you are going to go Wired or Wireless for the TV. And then, I would suggest really reading the documentation that came with your tv, or did you just toss that out with the box.

 

I'm pretty sure you'll find that your TV will act much like your Blueray player in regards to internet. There's no controller per se, so how would you type? >>>>v^<<<^<enter would be rather slow don't you think? The Wii controller gives faster typing. I guess you could have a wireless keyboard or mouse, but then what would be the point? I'm under the impression that you can add your TV or BR player as a Media Center Extender if it's supported (home computer with Win7 and TV tuner card can stream recorded video to the Extender), but I don't have any experience doing that. If the BR player couldn't do that and you knew the TV could that would be the only reason I would think you'd want to get the dongle for the TV. Either that or you go back to the store you bought the TV from and ask them to show you that internet TV functionality. If they can't figure it out, then maybe that's an indication of just how spectacular it would be.

We use our Wii more for streaming movies from Netflix than gaming. But then your BR player probably can do that just as well too.

 

Hi there!

Well, I do have the manual (and the box and even all the packaging - it's not recycle day yet). The manual does go into detail about setting up the internet (and anything else you can think of, including keyboard and mouse) but it doesn't cover what it does after that, other than that you can now !!access social networking and stream movies!! I've never actually seen how internet works with the tv (other than through our Wii, where you can 'type' in websites and go to them) so I was wondering if the tv would be just like a giant monitor.

Your excellent suggestion, cabbiinc, of going to the store and asking them, is, well, excellent! As you say, if all I'm going to get is what I already have through the bluray player, I can save myself some $40-$50.

Thanks very much for taking the time to help me!

legolass :wave

 

legolass, check over at avsforum.com for the particular model of tv that you have. I know that some people have had problems with the wifi connection on most of the Internet capable tv's out there. Make sure that you do update the firmware, once you get it online. If it was my choice, if you were me, I would opt for a wired connection, vs wifi, due to it will be more stable.

Also, make sure that you have a router that is multicast capable, and if you use a switch, look at using something along the lines of the Netgear Prosafe GS switches. I have the GS108, due to I have ATT's U-verse.

As for using the tv as a giant monitor, you could build a HTPC, or hook up a computer to it, and use a wireless keyboard and mouse. I know that googleTV kind of met a death knell, but there is still the fact that it allows for some web browsing.

 

Thanks for the site, brownizs. Other people ran into the same thing - unless you get a specific usb adaptor it won't work wifi as this model does not have a built-in. I wanted wireless because the tv and the router are not that close, but I'll try wired to see what I get and if it's more than what I can access through my bluray I can run a wire through the (unfinished) basement... what's a couple of holes in the floor, after all? :-D :-D

Until I can find the drill, what do you think of going through a laptop? I have HDMI on the TV and the laptop, and I can get a 35' cable for about half the price they want for the dongle. I'd likely watch shows I missed by accessing through Hulu or something like that for maybe a couple of hours at a time, if I can wrest my son's laptop away from him.

You have Uverse? I'll likely be watching tv in heaven before they ever get it where I live... even the fastest internet in this area was 3.0. That's why I switched to cable...

 

All of my cat-5e runs up through the floor from the basement. I have all of the runs going to a patch panel, and the modem/router & a switch sits on a shelf on the rack that the patch panel is attached to. It has worked for me that way for over eight years. Everything home runs to the basement, and we actually get pretty good wifi signal from down there. The house is only 26x30, but the range goes out about 30 feet from the house, with the U- Verse RG down in the basement.

I have two runs in the living room, one in our bedroom, three in my son's (two at his tv, one for his computer), one run pending for pull into the dining/kitchen area, and two runs in the basement. We use a mix of Wifi and wired. The Roku works pretty good on wifi, and is stable on it, since the speed for Netflix is under 7mbps.

 

Hi again!
Just to finish this off, I did wire my tv in and got the same stuff I was getting through the bluray... it's just like apps to access stuff. We will be drilling holes all over the house because my husband decided he likes the stability of wires, and now wants wired access upstairs and down so the movie streaming will be anywhere. Well, it's nice he has a project... he gets bored without something to keep him busy... :zzz

Thanks again for your help and input!

legolass :wave