HDMI Droid X

[jrmuller]

So got the HDMI cable on Friday, and in testing I'm kinda disappointed only the Gallery Player (the proprietary one) is the only thing that kicks out the HDMI signal. Which by the way really rocks for playing back pictures, and video does a nice player control on the screen as well to fast forward, etc.. Watched some Empire Strikes back and it was amazing quality..

I was hoping that it would just show the screen no matter what's connected or what I'm looking at.. bummer that it doesn't.. would be cool for showing websites on the TV, etc..

Oh well, maybe 2.2 froyo has it in it..

 

[ceriem]

I'm hoping there will be an app for that in the near future after launch.

Or maybe I can make my own now with the App Inventor... hmm

I am actually gonna try to make one, so if I do I'll post a link somewhere on the forums I hope. Unless someone beats me to it.

 

[homeylarry]

i can only assume there will be one shortly with the EVO and X having HDMI this is surely something that SOMEONE will jump on

 

[ceriem]

i can only assume there will be one shortly with the EVO and X having HDMI this is surely something that SOMEONE will jump on

Well according to Apple fanboys, devs make less money on Android Market and are more likely to develop of iOS first. Following their logic, an app for this is more likely to appear on the iPhone before the Droid.

 

[homeylarry]

Well according to Apple fanboys, devs make less money on Android Market and are more likely to develop of iOS first. Following their logic, an app for this is more likely to appear on the iPhone before the Droid.

what with the iphone having HDMI out and all

 

[Stang68]

I really don't see the point in the HDMI out. Why would we use that? How often are you going to want to show a phone video to a group of people too large to crowd around the big screen on the X? Why did you take the time to rip Empire from a DVD just to play it on an HD TV when you could have just popped in the DVD?

 

[c4v3man]

Yeah, it's dissapointing, but I'm hoping they'll open it up long term. If anything, with the EVO having an unlocked bootloader, I bet we'll see OS-wide HDMI on the EVO first if at all through a custom ROM.

 

[ceriem]

I really don't see the point in the HDMI out. Why would we use that? How often are you going to want to show a phone video to a group of people too large to crowd around the big screen on the X? Why did you take the time to rip Empire from a DVD just to play it on an HD TV when you could have just popped in the DVD?

I actually would use it all the time. I frequently torrent movies and tv shows and upload them to my Storm2 and plug it via USB into my PS3 to watch it on my TV. It would save alot of time to not need to have the go through my PS3 to do this.

I haven't ripped movies onto DVD's in about 3 or 4 years. It's much more efficient to put them on flash drives and phones that can be reused and don't have to be labelled or anything. Plus, I can put HD content on any of these types on media and output it in HD to my tv. Again, can't be done on a DVD for the most part.

The function isn't a big selling point for me, but it's a feature I, and many others, will use once I spring for a cable.

 

[c4v3man]

I really don't see the point in the HDMI out. Why would we use that? How often are you going to want to show a phone video to a group of people too large to crowd around the big screen on the X? Why did you take the time to rip Empire from a DVD just to play it on an HD TV when you could have just popped in the DVD?

I'm taking a big trip via motorcycle later this year, and being able to output the browser/etc to the TV in the hotel room would be handy at times, especially for remote desktop usage. Would save me from packing a laptop/netbook.

 

[homeylarry]

I really don't see the point in the HDMI out. Why would we use that? How often are you going to want to show a phone video to a group of people too large to crowd around the big screen on the X? Why did you take the time to rip Empire from a DVD just to play it on an HD TV when you could have just popped in the DVD?

First of all, Netflix on a 42" TV is much better than the 4.3" screen on the X.
how often do you carry around your Star Wars DVDs? i always have a couple movies loaded on my ipod and i keep the TV out cable in my bag in case i'm in a hotel room and feel like watching a movie. now i can have some HD quality goodness straight from my phone instead of carrying the ipod too

 

[jrmuller]

First of all, Netflix on a 42" TV is much better than the 4.3" screen on the X.
how often do you carry around your Star Wars DVDs? i always have a couple movies loaded on my ipod and i keep the TV out cable in my bag in case i'm in a hotel room and feel like watching a movie. now i can have some HD quality goodness straight from my phone instead of carrying the ipod too

Homey is right.. when I'm stuck on a plane for 10 hours, or hotel room.. to just pull out the phone, put on my Dr. Dre Tour buds, and listen/watch dvd quality from my phone, or TV.. priceless..

 

[alan7467]

At home I would have almost no use for HDMI out from a phone. Traveling on the other hand, the feature would come in handy. Problem is how many TVs do you come across with HDMI ports when you're staying in a hotel? I'm poor and most places I stay at have a huge CRT TV circa 1990.

 

[homeylarry]

At home I would have almost no use for HDMI out from a phone. Traveling on the other hand, the feature would come in handy. Problem is how many TVs do you come across with HDMI ports when you're staying in a hotel? I'm poor and most places I stay at have a huge CRT TV circa 1990.

so true...well when the company pays i will be able to use it in a hotel

 

[ceriem]

At home I would have almost no use for HDMI out from a phone. Traveling on the other hand, the feature would come in handy. Problem is how many TVs do you come across with HDMI ports when you're staying in a hotel? I'm poor and most places I stay at have a huge CRT TV circa 1990.

I think use at home is going to be geared more at college aged consumers. I for one know that at my apartment at school, I never watch DVDs anymore. I stream everything from my laptop to my XBox 360 and watch movies that way. An HDMI cable from my phone would actually come in handy alot. DLNA will also be very handy in this regard.

It's really a case-by-case basis whether or not people will use it heavily and where they will use it, so it's really not fair to say that no one will use certain features (I'm not saying that you had implied that, however).

 

[jackard]

So got the HDMI cable on Friday, and in testing I'm kinda disappointed only the Gallery Player (the proprietary one) is the only thing that kicks out the HDMI signal. Which by the way really rocks for playing back pictures, and video does a nice player control on the screen as well to fast forward, etc.. Watched some Empire Strikes back and it was amazing quality..

I was hoping that it would just show the screen no matter what's connected or what I'm looking at.. bummer that it doesn't.. would be cool for showing websites on the TV, etc..

Oh well, maybe 2.2 froyo has it in it..

No one has asked this yet. Is that a ripped copy of Empire you watched and if so what format? I thought I had read in the manual where it would only output via HDMI video that had been captured on the device.

 

[1088933]

I think use at home is going to be geared more at college aged consumers. I for one know that at my apartment at school, I never watch DVDs anymore. I stream everything from my laptop to my XBox 360 and watch movies that way. An HDMI cable from my phone would actually come in handy alot. DLNA will also be very handy in this regard.

It's really a case-by-case basis whether or not people will use it heavily and where they will use it, so it's really not fair to say that no one will use certain features (I'm not saying that you had implied that, however).

I agree, the HDMI will be very handy for me in college, but I think what will come in use more is going to be the DLNA

 

[c4v3man]

No one has asked this yet. Is that a ripped copy of Empire you watched and if so what format? I thought I had read in the manual where it would only output via HDMI video that had been captured on the device.

I'm almost positive a review mentioned that anything you can watch in the gallery app can be viewed over HDMI. So feel free to torrent a copy of your movie and watch it over HDMI, but don't think about renting a movie via the Blockbuster app.

Some claim that the blockbuster app will output over HDMI in it's final release, however I haven't seen it demo'd personally.

 

[jdbower]

My potential uses for HDMI:

When possible (either at home or at a friend's/relative's house) I feel that showing pictures on a TV is a much better option than on a handheld device. Many high end cameras (the DSLRs that are actually there for stills instead of trying to be movie cameras and phones at the same time) have an HDMI out these days, having upgraded from the old RCA video out.

I have my entire DVD collection on a DLNA server as well as PlayOn for Hulu and NetFlix support. Previously I didn't bother with getting TVs for certain rooms since I'd need an XBox 360 or other DLNA-enabled media player with a whole new interface that I didn't want to manage. Now I'm thinking I can just plug the Droid into the TV and watch whatever I want, and how cool is it to have the Droid as a remote that's showing what's on the screen as well as giving the ability to use the control buttons? Now I just need to run an HDMI cable from the TV to wherever the viewing area is.

I'm curious to see if I can hook the Droid up into the projectors at work. If I can run a presentation from the Droid I may not need my laptop. Since most projectors these days have at least a DVI input I have hope that I'd be just a cable away from this.

Recently I was at a party and tried to get a neighbor's PC hooked into their home theater setup. We ended up hooking into the projector behind the room via the VGA cable and then running a long 1/8" extension so we could plug it into a portable radio at the rear of the room because we couldn't reach the audio system. It would have been so much nicer if I could load the video onto the Droid and just plug the HDMI cable into the receiver.

The big question is what will be HDMI-able? I've seen some specific examples of what is, some of what isn't, a generic statement about "non-DRM video" but I'm not sure what the API allows now nor what it can be expanded to in the future. Even if there's no PPT viewer today that can output to HDMI there may be an upgrade as more phones support it.

Would I use HDMI daily? Probably not. Would I use it frequently? Once I add a TV into the bedroom and the exercise room to replace the aging laptops there now, I think I would. For me HDMI was actually the driving factor between the X and the Incredible, I'd like the Incredible's "hackability" but I see a lot more potential in HDMI than I do in getting Gingerbread a few months earlier than Verizon would let me.

 

[TurboCam]

I'm taking a big trip via motorcycle later this year, and being able to output the browser/etc to the TV in the hotel room would be handy at times, especially for remote desktop usage. Would save me from packing a laptop/netbook.

i doubt you are going to have an hdmi input on most hotel TVs.

 

[MolecularGraph]

I've personally found these cables on the internet for 15/16 dollars.