Hello
For the past week or so we have had a poll running (you can vote on the current poll on the right, and see this poll below) asking how you watch Online TV?
At the time of writing 30% of you watch Online TV only on a device such as a computer or tablet.
There are a few different ways to connect your device to a TV and then you can sit back in your regular TV chair, cup of tea (or can of Coke) and a slice of cake to hand, put your feet up and watch the latest episode of MasterChef on BBC iPlayer on the big TV in the corner.
Chromecast & similar
Chromecast marketing image
These types of devices, such as a Chromecast or Kindle Fire TV Stick plug into your TV, then allow you to connect a device wirelessly to it, you can see Google’s marketing image on the right where they are playing a film on a tablet, but displaying it on the TV. This is a fantastic way to watch Online TV which works with for example All 4, BBC iPlayer and Netflix, but Amazon Prime Video will only work with the Amazon Fire TV Stick… they could have picked a shorter name :-). Some new tablets let you share the whole screen with your TV so you could play for example Candy Crush Saga with friends on the big TV, using your tablet to control it.
Using a cable – HDMI
Connecting your Laptop to the TV via a cable, ideally if your TV AND laptop both have an HDMI port you can run a cable between them and the sound and video should ‘just work’. If they don’t have a HDMI port it is still possible but quite often it requires multiple cables and setup. In this case the Chromecast route would probably be the way to go if you were looking for a solution…
It would be interesting to see if the poll results change over time so we may run a similar poll in the future!
Happy watching
Mike =)
P.S. Today I bought a £1 pizza, and it scanned through the till at 25p, the guy behind the till questioned a more senior member of staff and they just said “if it is on the till, it must be right”, go technology!!
Image used is from Google’s marketing page here.
[UPDATE: The TV Licensing structure is changing from September 2016.]
The Poll
[poll id=”7″]
June 17, 2016 at 11:59 am
Hello Mike,
Thanks for all your information and musings, especially the Map your Hike app which I will download and use.
Can you clarify what you mean about the Inner Circle problems? I was unaware there were problems.
Also how do you access the internet without a phone line? Are you using a dongle for remote access? If so would you write about using these and if they are cheaper/better than a landline?
I’ve replied to the poll on owning a mobile phone and wondered why you were asking about them. Are you thinking about branching out into giving advice about mobiles. Now that would be really helpful!
Regards
Philip
PS What ?do we enter in the ‘Website’ box below
June 21, 2016 at 11:29 am
Hi Philip
Thank you so much for your kind words, I really do enjoy writing these blog posts, I just wish I had more time to do more, I have a couple which are 1/2 written, but I must find time to finish them!
IC problems
I can’t remember exactly what the problems were, but we have some problems with comments on blog posts (not on the club room), and we had problems with the in page “print” button, which is now fixed. We also had a problem when I broke the site for 1/2 an hour and a nice girl at the hosting company fixed it for me.
Internet without a phone line
So I will let you in to secret, in an upcoming blog post to you all I admit that I have given in and bought a phone line. I did try Mobile internet from Three which was not a bad price, but I live somewhere without a good signal (on any network) so in the end I decided to go for a landlines (which due to Cashback from QuidCo and a special offer was actually cheaper than mobile internet. If I had had signal from Three I would have got one of these http://www.three.co.uk/Discover/Devices/Huawei/E5573_4G_Mobile_Wi-Fi
I can’t say much about the mobile phone poll…
… but it is something we have thought about. As ever you can ask any questions in here and we will do our best to answer them, or point you to somewhere you might find the answer.
Website box
This is aimed at people who want to promote their own websites or a webpage about who they are, For example if you click on my name above it will take you to intro post here: http://www.pcinnercircle.co.uk/index.php/2016/04/hello-from-mike/
Thank you so much for getting in touch, really good to have some feedback
Mike