Mounting my Kinect to my TV

I previously wrote about mounting my Kinect to me TV using a car GPS mount kit. It worked for what it was but there were times that I took my XBox and Kinect to other places, so I had to remove it from the mount. This caused my mount to fall off my TV a couple times so I looked for a new solution. As mentioned in my previous post, the 3rd party Kinect mounts available didn’t fit my TV, so having shelf (like for a center channel) was the best option.

I talked to one of my carpenter friends and we designed something that would fit my TV. This is what we came up with:

I mounted it on the top holes where a wall mount would go. Here’s a look at the back of the TV

The only problem is that the it sits a little high off of the TV for my liking. But my friend did it for free and it still looks great. It’s designed to hold about 5-6lbs over the TV.

If you have a car GPS mounting unit sitting around, by all means try it out. The suction cup on the one I had didn’t hold well against the back of my TV. I’d test it out first. If you are handy and can make a shelf for your TV, that’s the way to go. It’s sturdy and you have options to put other things on the shelf. Also I think having the Kinect above your TV improves its functionality.

bits and pieces

I started to post on Tumblr. Basically just pics and videos that aren’t so serious. I’ll hopefully start posting more serious topics on my blog and leave the fun stuff to my tumblr page. Check it out…follow me…

http://inthekeyoft.tumblr.com/

 

I’m pretty typical…

National Geographic compiled the most typical face in the world…scaring thing is…it’s me

well…close…I do fit under the 9M han chinese male demographic, with a cell phone, and was 28 a couple year ago.

ones

1:11:11 1.11.11

all you need to do is ask

I’ve been looking into reducing my cable TV bill or even cancelling all together. But my wife watches TV during the day and was pretty resistent in the option of cancelling. I find the cost of cable TV pretty absurd. But with the lack of options where I live, I don’t have much of a choice. I thought about OTA (good ole antenna), but since I live in a condo, I can’t install an outdoor antenna, and an indoor antenna just wouldn’t cut it. Going with internet TV would have been a good choice, but living in Canada, we don’t get the services our US neighbours get. I have the option of Netflix, but the choices of what to watch it pretty minimal, plus the bandwidth that it would use with the amount of TV we watch would be astronomical.

(How I got free HD after the jump)

Mounting the Kinect on my TV with a GPS car kit

After having the Kinect for a week, I’ve been looking for solutions to mount the Kinect on top of my TV. It’s surprising that almost nobody sells a braket for a shelf that fits on top of a TV. My parents had one for their ole CRT, but try finding something for a flat screen. You’d think that someone would have had a solution for that. I found a centre speaker shelf out of the States, but wasn’t sure if it would fit my TV. So, I searched online to see if there are another other solutions.

There is a mounting bracket that is made specifically for the Kinect, I read reviews on those who have it and all of them said that it doesn’t really fit on a Samsung TV. Which is what I have…plus it’s $40. I wanted a cheaper solution, and then I stumbled onto a blog where Russel Beattie used a generic GPS car kit to mount his on his TV. So I went out and picked up one from WalMart for cheap and tried it out. Check out the result after the jump:

Kinect it all together

I picked up Kinect for my XBox 360 on Friday, excited, but not entirely sure of what was going to happen when I  set it up at home. I read that you need to have lots of room to play it and people with small living rooms will have difficulty playing.

most living rooms do NOT look like this

I have a fair sized area where my TV is, but I have 2 large couches and a large coffee table. I had a feeling that I’d have to move my coffee table to play. Not really wanting to do so, I was still hesitant in buying the Kinect. But the tech geek got the better of me and I went ahead. This is my current living room setup:

Kinect suggests that you need 6-8 feet between you and the TV. This puts the “sweet” spot in the space between the two couches. I tried to play Kinect without moving my coffee table and the result was the Kinect not being able to pick up where my feet were. This made for some hilarious looking outlines in the game. So the solution was to move the coffee table to the side and Kinect was happy.

Even by moving the coffee table, it’s still not perfect. It’s great for single player, but when you play 2 players, I’ll probably have to move my couch on the left on an angle to give it more room. I can’t move the couch on the right back since there is a wall there, and the couch on the left won’t go back any further too. I still haven’t found the perfect angle for Kinect. Currently it’s sitting below my TV on angle pointing more towards the open space in-between the couches. I’d like to get the mounting bracket and have it on top of my TV. I read that gives you an extra foot or so. There is room behind the “sweet” spot where people could use to play Kinect.

As for the Kinect itself, I think it’s great. Its a step in the right direction for motion controlled gaming. The Playstation Move is just a better version of the Nintendo Wii. You still have to hold something in your hands, and you can sit and play. Kinect get’s you off your butt and into the game. I can’t wait for more games to come out and see how studios utilize the Kinect technology.

What your phone says about you

What phone do you have? Funny that this infographic doesn’t include those with “dumb”phones.

[via C-Section Comics]

The Evolution of the Geek

Which geek are you? I’ve identified myself as up to 7…and possibly counting…

[via flowtown]

ooooo pick me!

Training Camp has begun, exhibition games are being played and the new NHL season is just around the corner. You know what that means…fantasy hockey drafting time!! I’ve been in the same hockey pool for about 4 years now and this year, the comish decided to change it up a little. Instead of doing the standard snake draft, it was decided that we were going to have an auction draft.

Basically team owners bid on players using a predetermined budget ($150 in our case). This format allows a team to have the ability to “buy” any player at any time during the draft. It also makes you think a little more since you need to stay under the salary cap. I wasn’t sure about it going in, but I really enjoyed it. Makes you feel like a real GM. It was interesting to see how other team owners drafted and bid on players. A few were a little to aggressive on bidding on players early and got them for too much. It hurt them later on in the draft when other names came up who are projected to produce more points, and they didn’t have any money to bid. I went in with a budget and didn’t want to overpay for player who I didn’t think deserved it. I think I did ok…here’s my team for the year with the salary:

Forwards
Daniel Sedin – Vancouver – $20
Pavel Datsyuk – Detroit – $22
Rick Nash – Columbus – $14
Corey Perry – Anaheim – $16
Milan Lucic – Boston – $2
Jordan Staal – Pittsburg – $1
Johan Franzen – Detroit – $5

Defense
Duncan Keith – Chicago – $19
Erik Johnson – St. Louis – $8
Nicklas Lidstrom – Detroit – $8
P.K. Suban – Montreal – $5

Goalies
Henrik Lundqvist – New York Rangers – $8
Antti Niemi – San Jose – $6
Steve Mason – Columbus – $5

Overall I enjoyed this format and can’t wait to see how team owners draft next season. There will be some obvious changes in strategy.