Computer Question, again.

[hungry]

I was looking at some info on my tower. There are plug in for the following:
SPDIF IN (OPTICAL)
SPDIF OUT (OPTICAL)
IEEE 1394 FIRE WIRE 6 PIN
DVI (DIGITAL VIDEO INTERFACE)
COMPOSITE OUT (FOR TV)
VGA (MONITOR)

There is no explanation in the manual for these ports. Anybody have any idea what they are for? Thanks.

 

[clules]

SPDIF IN (OPTICAL)
Uses a Optical Fiber Cable to connect your DVD/CD Player or Home Theater System to your PC. This is mainly used to transfer music and sound to MP3 or WAV format and save it to your PC

SPDIF OUT (OPTICAL)
Same as SPDIF IN except the sound is sent to the external device, such as a Home Theater System.

IEEE 1394 FIRE WIRE 6 PIN
Firewire was designed to replace the slower SCSI AND Parellel interfaces. SCSI and Parellel ports were used to connect external devices (printers, hard drives, CD-ROM, Camcorders) to your PC. This format has now been outdated by the USB standard.

DVI (DIGITAL VIDEO INTERFACE)

DVI is a popular form of video interface technology made to maximize the quality of flat panel LCD monitors and modern video graphics cards. It is a replacement for the P&D Plug & Display standard, and a step up from the digital-only DFP format for older flat panels. DVI cables are becoming increasingly popular with video card manufacturers, and most cards nowadays include both a VGA and a DVI output port.
In addition to being used as the new computer interface, DVI is also coming out as the digital transfer method of choice for HDTV, EDTV, Plasma Display, and other ultra-high-end video displays for TV, movies, and DVDs. Likewise, even a few of the top-end DVD players are now featuring DVI outputs in addition to the high-quality analog Component Video.

COMPOSITE OUT (FOR TV)
Send your PC video to your TV using this interface. Great for watching movies, Before I bought a DVD Player, I used the DVD-ROM in my PC to watch movies on my standard TV.

VGA (MONITOR)
This is the 640x480 video standard developed in 1987 by IBM. IBM went on to develop the XGA standard which is also know as SVGA. These eventually developed into the standard we have today on our Monitors.

You probably will not use any of these.

I was looking at some info on my tower. There are plug in for the following:
SPDIF IN (OPTICAL)
SPDIF OUT (OPTICAL)
IEEE 1394 FIRE WIRE 6 PIN
DVI (DIGITAL VIDEO INTERFACE)
COMPOSITE OUT (FOR TV)
VGA (MONITOR)

There is no explanation in the manual for these ports. Anybody have any idea what they are for? Thanks.

 

[hungry]

Wow clules, you are anything but clueless! Anyway, I understood about 30% of what you said. You are probably right, I will not use any of these. One thing did pique my interest. The composite out. Does this mean I can I can somehow hook my pc to my to to play movies from my dvd player that are wmi files. etc. on my tv? Thanks. You have probably helped a lot of us guys who buy shit that don't know what they are buying. I am sure it would be of use to you.

 

[Never Compromised]

IEEE 1394 FIRE WIRE 6 PIN
Firewire was designed to replace the slower SCSI AND Parellel interfaces. SCSI and Parellel ports were used to connect external devices (printers, hard drives, CD-ROM, Camcorders) to your PC. This format has now been outdated by the USB standard.

Not quite right.

1394 was not developed to connect printers, or CD-ROMS, it was developed as a high speed connection, not a slow connection.

USB 1.1 is limited to 12 mbps and is good for slow connections such as printers, keyboards etc. USB 2.x is 480 mbps and is better suited for drives and devices that transfer much more data.

Firewire 400 is 400 mbps and was originally much much faster than UB 1.1, and was developed to replace narrow SCSI for external drives, and camcorders etc. UW SCSI III is still much faster than FW 400.

Firewire 800 is 800 mbps and is obviously much faster than USB 2.x. It is suited for external RAIDS, or external drives used for video editing, etc.

Firewire did not get much "traction" in the market, but is still available on many computers and camcorders.

FW 800 is certainly not "outdated" by the much slower USB 2.

 

[clules]

Compromise.......Thanks for the clarification, I stand corrected.

Hungry..... I have a composite out on my pc, I am going to try it and see what happens.

 

[hungry]

Clules, did you try the compsite out? Thanks.

 

[basketcase]

The composite out will work but your computer (window I assume) will need to detect it. How this works depends on the type of video card and software you get. I have done it before but be warned that if you have a large screen, the picture quality might not be great.