A new dongle:TV on a laptop


The laptop is a way to take a lot of activities on the road, or trail.
I've already mentioned the SDR dongle elsewhere, as well as the definition of a computer dongle.

A new kind of dongle arrived in the mail a couple of days ago. This dongle is video oriented and will allow me to watch local television station programming on my laptop.

The particular unit I chose is the Hauppauge WinTV-HVR-950Q.
The unit comes withe software and hardware to get up and going with your new 'TV'.

The company makes several products that perform similarly and that are newer.
I chose the 950Q for the low price on eBay. There were no hardware accessories with mine but I don't need most, or can get replacements or substitutes on eBay.

I did have to pay for an 'activation key', the company continues to make money from resold and second hand unit sales.

The software accessories are readily downloadable from the web.
The setup program scans for available stations using whatever antenna you have hooked up.
I used the rooftop antenna ordinarily connected to my 55" HDMI 4K Smart-TV.

My setup picked up digital and Clear QAM stations 5,11,19,36, and 39.

A makeshift antenna can be made for portable use. There are electronic amplifiers that increase signal strength. Those are an option, though a battery powered unit would be needed for camping.
An inverter can be used to convert automotive battery power to 120vac, the type power used in your house. Such inverters come in power levels measured in Watts. The smallest one will be more than enough for the amplifier. There may be enough for the laptop as well.

My reason for getting the dongle is to watch the news, primarily. A side benefit is the possibility to record programming from my 55" TV, using the appropriate AV cable. This is a hypothesis that remains to be tested. As far as I can tell, LG has placed only audio outputs and a trigger control output on the TV. Almost all ports are dedicated to input.



Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Drive rack, ventilation and wiring.

 My drives have a new rack to hold them. Hot glue and square wood dowels provided the materials with which to build the rack. I used zip ties and a small computer fan attached to the end of the rack to provide cooling air ventilation for the drives. This will increase the lifetime of the drives. Previously the were stacked on top of each other and became noticeably warm during use. The wiring really was bad. Too many cables/wires held together with zip ties. I added a surge protected outlet strip of a newer, more sophisticated design. I rearranged the system wiring to minimize the number of outlet strips and the disarrayed wires. Two strips were screwed to the wall. One was removed. The circular strip was moved from the entertainment center to a work table beside the other two strips and combined with them to supply all devices attached to the system. The strip removed replaced the circular strip in the entertainment system.  Overall, the current setup works better. Both syste...
Read more

Philips Hue lights Updated

 Philips Hue lights are known for the ability to program brightness, saturation, and hue using software. Most people use one or more cellphone apps to control their Hue lights. I've a history in computrer science and electronic technology and engineering, so took this up as a new interest. WiFi control of light bulbs' colors has interested me ever since I read aboout the topic some years ago. There happened to be seven Hue bulbs available from one eBay seller and for a reaosnable fee, approximately $20. A bridge device is used to communicate with the bulbs, so I waited for a good deal on eBay and got one. Philips has evolved a developer community and resources for those who want to explore the possibilities in lamp light control. The user joins the communnity and gets a temporary API key, formerly referred to as a 'username', good for one session. Then a browser or app, can be used to send commands to the bulbs. There are other avenues of communication. Python libraries...
Read more

Jellyfin media server

 The owner of Emby has blocked my using the WebOS access method of using Emby. I discovered the method and posted on the product's forum. That software is no longer my media server and has been removed from my computers. I replaced Emby with Jellyfin. Jellyfin is the evolved Emby open sourced. Emby was originally open source (and free) but was privatized and monetized by the creator. Many considered that move unethical.  The last open source version became the basis for Jellyfin,  easily competitive with Emby and almost, if not equally, well known. I've been using Jellyfin for about a year, perhaps more. The software has issues but is in constant development but is very useful in the current state, version 10.8.5.
Read more