Alright me again, here's what's up. I want to watch cable on my monitor so what do i do? The coaxial (from the cable) goes INTO the cable box thing...that i cannot play around with. There are a few jacks on it. There's the composite jack, and the L/R audio jacks. There's also another coaxial jack for OUT obviously -> TV/VCR or whatever. That's it. http://www.motorola.com/business/v/...f3b6110VgnVCM1000008406b00aRCRD&vgnextnoice=1 The monitor has options to support composite, component, s video, DVI, HDMI. Basically everything (no COAXIAL though). What is the route i should take? I don't need stellar quality (i don't have HD cable anyway). But it should be good, like basic CRT good is fine. I'm a noob at these things clearly and i would like to purchase the relvant cables but i dunno which ones. Should i get a TV card and plug the coaxial out into it and have the feature of being able to record videos as well? Open to all ideas, as long as it works. Thanks in advance. edit: I think i'm going to go the TV card route
A TV card will work okay, though it will eat up a few system resources... Assuming you're not using the computer for anything else at the time anyway, you'll be fine. Assuming the cable box is like mine (looks the exact same, and by Motorola as well), the Composite (Yellow) output on the cable box should hook directly into the monitor... You will need to hook up the audio output to a set of amplified speakers to get audio though.
There's no TV tuner built in to the monitor, so you'll have to get an external TV tuner and plug it into a set of speakers and use the composite in socket on your TV. You'll have to use a Scart to component (composite, l/r audio) lead as well. If you do it that way, you can PiP your TV in a window overlaying your PC's desktop from the vga/dvi input. The other option is cheap TV tuner card.
ahh ok, a question about composite though, i've heard the quality gets a bit butchered though. is that true? Wil i be able to have pip with the other inputs like dvi and hdmi? just wondering
I have the 2007WFP and I can do PiP in the following combinations: EITHER dvi or vga AND EITHER composite or s-video. I can't PiP vga with dvi for example. I think you can probably PiP hdmi with dvi on yours but I haven't checked (google the spec sheet or check dell's website...). Even a hdmi input which is NOT a hdmi signal, unless you've got an upscaler, will come out at SD resolution, just like composite would. As long as you set your PiP to be 1:1 instead of scaled to fit the screen, it'll be perfectly visible either way, and cheaper with composite cabling. You haven't said what country you're in however you mentioned cable so its not too likely you're in the UK, in which case my insights about set top boxes won't really do you any good. If you are in the UK, pop into your local large supermarket (eg a big asda or tesco) and pick up a £14 freeview set top box, and while at it get a scart to component splitter (assuming you don't have one laying around from an xbox360 box or something) and a composite/l/r audio cable with the phono plugs.
Very informative thank you. I'm from Trinidad & Tobago (Caribbean) I actually checked out the composite route, it looks a bit...uh washed out?! so to speak. I tihnk the cables weren't good though as i was geting a lotta static as well. I'm not familiar with scart, so i'll have to read up and get back to you. Also unsure of teh availability of set top boxes. I think the motorola i linked in the first box qualifies as one doesn't it? The cable company distributed that one. So i change chanels and **** via that. It's just a matter of getting the display with good quality on the monitor.
This is what SCART is http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCART. In the UK its used to connect set top boxes, DVD players, etc, to your TV. You can split a SCART adaptor into composite and audio, however as you mention you've already got composite out. Unless your motorola box has another type of output, which your monitor supports, you won't be able to use it as a TV, sorry!
