I have movies and stuff on my laptop that I want to watch on my telly. What I'm currently doing is connecting them with an (AV?) cable but it's a PITA usually (switch off the laptop, drag it and all it's associated cables, cooling stand, charger over to the TV, plug it in, switch it on, wait 20 minutes for it to fire up).

So I want a solution so I don't have to go through this and the options I am currently considering are:

1) buy a cheap DVD player that can read DVDs that I burn from the laptop and have it permanently connected to the TV

2) buy an XBOX. I am surprisingly close to persuading the wife that this is a good idea because it can stream the content from the laptop. I don't currently have any spare time to play games on it but maybe one day…

3) something else as recommended by STW…over to you. What have I forgotten (or more likely never knew existed)?

ta

Buy the cheap DVD player
ONN from Asda ~£30, it will play anything pretty much, including playing avi files etc straight from a USB stick

cooling stand for a laptop? blimey how hot does it get?

why do you need to turn the laptop off?

Yeah, the fan on the laptop is basically knackered so it needs a cooling stand and I need to plug in the cable before switching the laptop on or the TV doesn't get the picture.

EDIT: So is a new laptop going to help me at all? 🙂

Try on of these maybe? I've heard good things said about them but never tried one myself.

Don't know what sort of stuff you download, but it'll play 1080p and act as a bit of a home entertainment hub. As for laptops my last one came with a HDMI out on it which has made connecting it to the TV much easier!