Wireless streaming of video onto my home theater??

[porsche-addict]

I hope I'm posting this question on the right forum - I think so.....

I'm trying to determine if the appropriate software/hardware exists to add a "wireless media server" into my home theater system for watching movies and MPEG2 home videos. From my own research, I think there are at least two alternatives to this problem:

1) Connect a PC which is running the WinDVD software application(presumably the PC has to have a TV video out card) to my home theater receiver. Through WinDVD, I access my movie/home video on a remote, massive hard drive (part of a big "media server" PC), which is streamed via an 802.11g wireless network. As far as WinDVD is concerned, it's simply playing back a video file from a file folder, not knowing (or caring) that the file is being accessed remotely and wirelessly.

2) Find a custom-built box (like the recently announced Omnifi Media DMS2 product - www.omnifimedia.com) that can be wired into my home theater receiver and then use that product's interface to access the same remote media server, again using an 802.11g wireless connection.

My questions about these possibilities are:

1) For the PC/WinDVD solution, I'm not sure if I can use WinDVD to playback a movie or MPEG2 home video via a TV-out connection into my home theater receiver. Is there a better/cheaper/easier way to accomplish this?? All I know for sure is that I'm looking for something that I can connect via an S-video cable (and RCA cable for L/R audio channels) to my home theater receiver.

2) For the custom-built hardware solution, the main issue is the DMS2 product is released yet and I usually hate to be an early-adopter. Are there equivalent products already available that will wireless stream video content and finally route it through an S-video cable into my home theater receiver?? My reading and on-line research didn't locate anything, unless is was super-expensive (>$2000).

Any suggestions or pointers to appropriate forums, products, or solutions would be greatly appreciated!! Thanks in advance from a newbie poster on this forum.

John

[yoda313]

Hello,
I'm not qualified to answer your wireless questions (as I don't have a wireless anything yet). But, your video question I can do. Your professional dvds won't play through tv out unless you have a macrovision hack for your card. The other option is to rip them to the harddrive OR backup them up to dvd-+r (make them region and macrovision free). That will play like any video file.
Kevin
(Good luck on the wireless system)

EDIT -- I'm not 100% sure if it's macrovision (or the css protection) that blocks the tv out signal on pro discs. The point is that you need SOME kind of a tv out hack to playback regular dvds. Your backups will be OK.

[porsche-addict]

Thanks for the feedback on the macrovision issue. I guess it's something I can work around in the long term, if forced to do so.

The one thing I'm still not clear on is how (or even if) I get WinDVD and a TV out card to work together, especially if the TV out card has it's own MPEG2 decoder (i.e., like an ATI card). Wouldn't the the software MPEG decoder and hardware MPEG decoder conflict with each other, or is WinDVD (or some other equivalent) smart enough to use the hardware decoding if it's available?

Maybe I'm making this too complicated, but since my computer doesn't currently have a TV out capability of any kind, I'm not sure what kind of hardware to look for and whether that hardware will work correctly with the software DVD player. And to reiterate my original posting, I'd really like to find a TV out card with an S-video connection rather than just RCA composite.

Any thoughts??

[yoda313]

Hello,
Many new 3d cards do have svideo outputs. Also, the tv out sends the ENTIRE signal out. Whatever is on your screen goes out. You need the content decoded to play through.
Kevin