Connecting your Mac to your TV

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bobtomay

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Nabooley:
To be honest: Don't have a clue what may be available in that price range.
If I've ever owned a TV in that price range it's too long ago to remember.

Am personally a Panasonic buyer currently because their plasma displays are the best displays on the market. Am down to only 2 TVs in the house - both are Panny plasma displays.

Brands I recommend looking at include Panasonic, Toshiba, Hitachi (are they still making tvs?), and Sony.

Happen to find an LG or Sharp you like at the price point you want, they make some nice TVs also.

I wouldn't buy one, but have to admit, at the lower price points, seems Vizio is the King of the throw away TV brands. I wouldn't buy a Sanyo either, but for those really needing a price point lower than the major players and can't find even a Vizio, well, ok.

Brands I recommend you never take home with you: Westinghouse, RCA, Phillips (in fact, all the names that were well respected in the 50s to 80s of the last century) and Samsung.

Brands I don't know anything about, but wouldn't give them a 2nd glance in the store:
Insignia, JVC, Element, Sceptre, Coby (and every other brand you've never heard of &/or is not a major player in the TV market). With TVs, stick with the name brand players.

What I recommend you look for would be a minimum of 2-3 HDMI inputs.
Check out Amazon at your price point, search by brand name.
Pick about 3 that have good reviews, then head to the manufacturers web site - look up the owner's manual and then buy the one that gives you directions in the manual for connecting a separate audio input with an HDMI input. If they've got those directions, then the rest of the manual is likely to be pretty good also.

As for cabling - get a TV with HDMI inputs and you have the right adapter/cable for that.

Audio cable - you won't know what you need until you pick the TV. Some use RCA jacks and some use a 3.5mm stereo jack to work with the HDMI input.
 

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Brands I don't know anything about, but wouldn't give them a 2nd glance in the store: Insignia,

I know all about that one... your favorite brand: Insignia is the Best Buy store brand made for them by Samsung. :p
 
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Nabooley:
[SNIP]

Alright thank you so much! I'm on it. My main issue was that there's literally hundreds of TV's within my budget so I had no idea where to begin.

Regarding the Panasonic plasma, my parents had a 46" one that went bad after 2 years. They had an extended warranty and it was replaced by a 50" Samsung smart tv LCD. Iliked both. Any reason why Samsung isn't recommended?
 
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Stuff happens with all brands.

If you happen to get a Samsung that has a problem - worst customer service in the industry - bar none. Wouldn't wish them on anyone.
Based on my own personal experience with one of their video products, nothing produced by that company is allowed in my house.
Or, how would you feel if your TV broke down during the warranty and 6 months later it still was not fixed and the only offer the manufacturer was willing to make was for them to replace it with a unit who's retail price was 50% of the one you had paid for or you can continue waiting.
 

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I suggest that before making a final decision you visit somewhere, if possible, and get a look at some of the brands you are interested in. I've noticed that there are some brands I can hardly stand to look at while others like those brands.
 
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Make note, however, you cannot judge a TV by the way it appears in any of the big box stores... Most all of them on display are set with both brightness and color saturation set way too high and no telling how many people have played with the settings.

Not to mention that they will configure the brands with the highest profit margin to appear better in store than the ones with lower profit margins.
 

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Make note, however, you cannot judge a TV by the way it appears in any of the big box stores... Most all of them on display are set with both brightness and color saturation set way too high and no telling how many people have played with the settings.

Not to mention that they will configure the brands with the highest profit margin to appear better in store than the ones with lower profit margins.

How right you are. I should have mentioned that. I picked up that habit looking at computer monitors back in the day when there were sometimes major differences in picture quality.

Given the caveats you mentioned I'm basically looking for overall impressions of picture quality. I also look for a quick impression of how quickly the setting changes you mentioned can be undone.
 
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Given a little time, most of today's sets can be made to look pretty darn good and in a whole lot of cases indiscernable from the set sitting next to it when they're not sitting next to each other (unless there is something wrong with it).

When I'm looking, I def take the time to go in and check out the settings and adjust.
With TVs today though, I rely pretty heavily on reviews for purchase decisions.
It takes me 1-3 months before I buy nowadays.

Have a new receiver suppose to arrive today - fingers crossed - think it took me 2 months of looking and reading - along with waiting for at least a few real user reviews to show up before pulling the trigger on it.
 

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Color me Jealous. Though I am pretty happy with the Yamaha I bought a few months ago. Apple TV arrives tomorrow so I get to patch that in.
 
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I went with a Denon this time around replacing my 6 yr old Onkyo. Will finally have enough HDMI ports on the receiver. Need to get an ethernet switch now - have 7 needy devices and the TC I use there only has 4 ports.

Nabooly:
If you plan to use HDMI and sound on the TV from your Mac, the LG will not work - see pg 21:

..

Screen Shot 2013-07-12 at 5.19.42 PM.png
 
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The Panny will work and Amazon is offering 24 month financing.


This is an Amazon search of 35-39" screens and only 2013 models - link.

All Toshibas offer separate audio with HDMI or VGA - 2 of them are the same model with different exterior case.

None of the Vizios offer separate audio via HDMI and neither of them have a VGA port.

LG does not have a manual online for that model - yet.

Personally, I'd pay the extra $50 for a Toshiba without even looking at the other 2.
 
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MacBook Pro to Receiver

I have never had any issues connecting my MacBook Pro MD103LL/A 15.4-Inch Laptop to my ONKYO Receiver until last night.

Even after I choose the receiver in my Audio Settings, the laptop plays the sound rather than the receiver. I'm using a thunderbolt to hdmi cable. Like I said, this has always worked in the past...

Anyone ever see this?
 
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2008 iMac not displaying to TV using VGA

Hello,

I am having difficulty connecting my 2008 iMac 2.8 24' to a box-fresh Samsung T27B350 (manufactured in 2012) - manual here. As far as the TV goes I have tested it with a Dell laptop using the VGA cable and it works fine, so I think that is set up ok. I am using a Mini-DVI to VGA cable to connect to the TV, as recommended to me by an Apple store and also confirmed through following the first 4 posts of this thread. However, without a functioning screen I cannot make any setting changes on the iMac. Am I wasting my time? Is there another issue that I am missing?

I noticed some strange behaviour when the iMac is plugged in to the TV (TV on first, connected to the iMac then switch iMac on). Even though the message on the TV screen is 'no input', the TV screen goes blank within 1 second, behaviour it does not display if not plugged in at all or on any other input setting. Don't know how to explain that.

Background:
The reason for me wanting to set this up is that the LCD screen on my iMac has failed. I am taking this route because although I purchased my iMac in London I now live in Brazil and the local Apple certified repairer wants to charge me a frankly certifiable R$1500 for a replacement LCD screen (about $750).
I should also note that the LCD had been intermittently working until very recently - ie between the time I ordered the TV and the time it arrived...

Thanks for any advice.
Ben
 
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Connecting my MacBookPro to my TV

Hello,

I have included the specific specs of my apple mac etc, however I will first state the problem I am finding.

In system preferences > displays, there is no option for 'arrangement', and no option for 'detect displays'. However if I search for these terms it directs me to displays. I'm starting to think this must be a problem on my mac and not necessarily my adaptor or TV. The TV also correctly shows which HDMI the adaptor is plugged into, but nothing shows up on the screen.

I would be grateful for any help!

Specs:
Laptop: 2009 mid September, MacBookPro OS X 10.9.1, 2.66GHz
TV: Sony Bravia KDL-42W653A
Adaptor: Mini Display port (Mini DisplayPort (thunderbolt) --> HDMI (Becken Bower).
 
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You have unplugged the cable and plugged it back in?

There will be no arrangement tab until the external monitor is detected.
There is also no 'detect displays' button with the latest versions of OS X - nothing wrong with your Mac there.

With a TV not being detected, I really have no other options than all those I've described in Post 2, Item # 1 at the beginning of the thread. You just have to work through them all one by one until you get to the end which is going to require testing with a different cable and different TV.
 
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MBP 15" to LG TV but no sound

Hey guys,
I have been doing a lot of research on this the past couple days but I still cannot figure out how to get the audio to my TV. I bought the "Mini DisplayPort to HDMI® Adapter w/ Audio Support" and a "6ft 3.5mm Stereo Plug/2 RCA Plug Cable"... When I plugged the mini display port into the computer and connected the HDMI cable to the TV, I was able to get the picture.. now I know that my mac (mid 2009) doesn't support sound through that, which is why i also bought the 3.5mm to RCA cable.. but when I plugged that in as well, there was still no sound. I used HDMI 1 which is the closest to the RCA ports and is what the tv manual said to use. I have gone into sound settings in my TV but I don't see any options for it. Also, I have switched the sound settings on my mac to use the headphone port, and I have switched the picture to the TV. This is driving me insane! Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Hardware I'm using:
LG TV - 60PA6550
Macbook Pro 15", Mid 2009, 2.53 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo, OS X 10.9.2
Mini DisplayPort to HDMI® Adapter w/ Audio Support
HDMI Cable
6ft 3.5mm Stereo Plug/2 RCA Plug Cable
 
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bobtomay

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invictusm7:

Need to check the manual again - page 21.

You have the wrong audio cable and are plugging it in to the wrong audio ports on the TV. You need a stereo 3.5 mm at each end.


and please do not post the same question more than once... thanks


...

Screen Shot 2014-03-19 at 5.59.53 PM.png
 
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Didn't mean to, I thought I posted it in the wrong place on accident. Since I have a mac and don't have a DVI, whats an RGB? And I tried to plug the 3.5mm end of the cable I bought into the other ports that looked like that, but it didn't fit.
 
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RGB in this context is referring to using a VGA cable.

DVI is not only the name of a port and cable. In this case it stands for "digital video input" and your mini displayport output is a digital video output (which includes DVI, Displayport, HDMI, Thunderbolt) vs analog (which would be composite, VGA, and component). Related to TVs, the manufacturers refer to all digital video outputs that do not carry audio as DVI.

And actually, because Apple was the first one out of the gate with Displayport, there could be, but I'm not aware of any other manufacturer that put out a device with Displayport that does not carry both video and audio.
 
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