High Fidelity

Ever since we got our HDTV for the living room about a year ago, I'd been jonesing for an HDTV in the bedroom. And to give myself a kick in the rear to get the TV purchase moving, I swapped out our SD bedroom cable box for an HD one. Months went by and I was still watching the HD to SD downconvert in the bedroom.

On a routine Costco mission, I spent more time in the TV section than usual, and I finally settled on a nice 26" Vizio box. I showed the missuz, and she didn't like it. What did I expect? She didn't think we needed another HDTV in the house. This coming from the person who gets to watch her Bravo network addiction in full SD glory on an HDTV, while my viewings of SportsCenter have dwindled to maybe an hour total a week.

But Lily eventually came around while we were still in the Costco, and she thought that the new, thinner Vizio LED 23" TV would be a welcome addition. Being the research freak I am, I couldn't bear to bite the $299 bullet without finding out every last detail of what this LED TV was made of.

Days later I still couldn't decide. Suddenly I remembered the HD LCD computer monitor that I had purchased a few months back for editing. It was HD. It had 1080p capability. And I'd only paid 150 bucks for it. I pulled it out of its hiding spot in the closet and hooked it up HDMI style, and bingo! Glorious High Definition Television in the bedroom! Needless to say that sucker stays fixed on pictures coming from ESPN.

But the sound. Oh the sound. That little computer monitor was never meant to pipe out decent audio, now was it. Besides that, I had no way of controlling the volume through the remote. That would be so pre-1980 to have to walk over three steps to the monitor to turn the sound up or down. Besides, I'd have to get off my lazy horizontal ass in the bed to do it as well. Time to research some speakers...