For the past couple of years the oldies have been coming to stay for Xmas. Because my mother isn’t physically 100% right lately my father has to spend a lot of time with her in their room and being alone can be quite miserable – well I think so anyway. To help out, we thought it might be nice if they had a TV in there so that the old man could watch the box or see a DVD while sitting in bed. Magic!! 🙂
So… anticipating their return this Xmas… we bought a small (19″) LCD TV which has an integrated DVD player. The thinking was that these things have a *very* small foot print compared to the old CRT’s so wouldn’t overpower the room . We had visions of it sitting at the foot of the bed, or on a small table next to him so that he could access the DVD without having to get up. We also have a ‘spare’ pair of wireless stereo headphones which would keep the sound levels in the room down to a minimum, so thought (for once) we were organised.
Of course *this* year was the year the daughter and her tribe decided to visit us over Xmas, so the old man felt it wise to stay home where it’s quiet. In retrospect I can’t say I blame him, several times the noise levels here have reached the point of causing hearing damage and they’d have gone crazy! 🙂
Anyway, we bought this thing not long after they’d left last time… April 2006 I think… so it’d been sitting in it’s box in our walk in wardrobe for ages waiting for the right time to be brought out in triumph and installed. I’m not sure what finally prompted me to unpack it but it wasn’t until last week I decided it was time for it to be used, but out it came!
It took just two minutes to get it set up and *working* which was a real treat in itself! The DVD player is ‘upright’ on the left side of the screen and works with no problems whatsoever. It has the usual sockets such as AV in and out, as you’d expect and also a ‘computer mode’ so in theory at least I could connect it to the wife’s lappie which is sitting behind it. It probably won’t be used for that, we’ll be moving her back downstairs once everyone has left… and might well move *all* the computers into the oldies room until just before they return next Xmas… assuming they do… and assuming we’ve not gone off to Uluru or Surfers for the season… or something! 😀
The picture playing DVD’s is as good as I could wish for and the sound is more than adequate for the purpose, though I’m yet to connect those wireless speakers to test them out on it. For the time being though I’m *very* pleased with it. It’s ‘pixel perfect’! I just wish the old man could be here to watch it instead. Still, next year maybe? 🙂
The Eclectic Interweb 