07-21-2008, 10:20 AM

Hi All.


I have only stumbled across this place about 20 minutes ago, so please bare with me I am reading through things so that I can get a better understanding of what I want and how to get it.


I have pretty much fallen in love and want to get one of the new Imacs and benefit from the current price reductions here in London.

I need some advice as I’m not to sure what I want.

For your information this is the ideal situation I want to have.

42” plasma linked up to my imac so that I can watch movies on the IMac and also use it as a really nice media suite.

I also want to be able to play all the latest games on the mac and learn to use its features for creating music and design and what now.

So therefore am I able to buy an Imac and hook it up to a plasma / LCD screen and use this as a second screen

For example will I be able to watch a movie on the big screen TV and also play a game or do some work on the Imac at the same time? Or will I just be able to watch everything through my screen.

Which therefore leads me to the debate, should I just go for the 20” imac and put the extra money towards a TV or do I just go all out on the 24” Imac which is all singing all dancing.

Any advice would be appreciated.

07-21-2008, 10:42 AM

I think I have found one answer to my problem.

AppleTV.

I pressume that I can hook up Apple TV to my IMac and to my Plasma or LCD and then watch movies from my Imac on my TV!

07-21-2008, 12:12 PM

Apple TV will sync up to iTunes on your iMac so you can watch video if it's in the appropriate iTunes format. You can also view YouTube on Apple TV.

Alternatively, you could link up you iMac directly to your TV, via the Mini-DVI port and use make the TV a '2nd screen'.

For Music, if you're a total newbie, you can have a lot of fun with Garage Band which comes free with every Mac. If you're already a little more confident, try out Logic Express ($200), very powerful and a lot of fun, or if you're really very confident and need a pro-level music application, Logic Pro (around $450) or Ableton Live ($400 - $500) would probably more than meet your needs.

If your primary hobby is PC gaming, I would not really recommend a Mac, but if you must game on a Mac, the best route is to buy the Mac with the best GPU (the one with the Geforce 8800 GS is the best) and install Windows XP or Vista via BootCamp. There are plenty of on-libe guides for this. The iMac is as good a gaming machine as any mid/high-range of the shelf PC... but it's not exactly Alienware.

You could easily play a movie on one screen and work on another, or play a simple game (I would not recommend doing this if you're playing Crysis or something though).

07-21-2008, 12:38 PM

I have a cheaper more complicated way then apple TV if you don't want to spend the money, since the mini-DVI out on the back is a digital signal you can get a mini-DVI to DVI adapter and then a DVI to HDMI adapter and then a HDMI cable to go to your TV. I know that sounds crazy but I have done the same thing to go to a smaller HDMI TV with my MacBook Pro and it works great. That way the TV would act as a second monitor where you can open DVD player or iTunes to watch movies. If you buy the cables on eBay the cables should be under $50.

not sure what that is in pounds lol

07-23-2008, 08:01 AM

Thanks for getting back to me on this one.

Ok So I now know how to hook up my Imac and second screen it to a TV, along the lines of a 42"

However what I need to clarify now is what is the picture quality like and what sort of plasma or LCD should I be looking at,

I basically want it so that I can watch filsm on the plasma whilst doing other things on the mac, but I also want a great picture.

So any advice?