Got hold of a wire which lets me connect my tv to my laptop and use that as the monitor. The picture works fine but theres no sound, is that normal? I only wanted it to watch movies and tv shows without having to burn any discs.

what you are using for connecting your tv with your laptop? if you're using some kind of dvi/hdmi adapter, your laptop's video card doesn't have any kind of audio support which is why there's no sound. i'm not an expert with these things but as far as i know you need to buy an av receiver and use that to transfer audio to your tv. you're going to need a miniplug (=a basic 3.5mm plug) to rca adapter and a rca cable which you'll use to connect your pc's sound with your av receiver. then you'll connect your av receiver with your tv and then you'll have your sound. a decent av receiver costs around $300 though.

or if you're using your tv's own speakers you can do it without an av receiver.

If you want sound why not use one of these:
http://www.amazon.com/3-5mm-Stereo-Male-RCA-Cable/dp/B0002KR1OG

Plug the stereo end into your laptop's audio out (headphone port) and then the other end into your TV's audio in. I'm not sure if this will work if you're not using RCA in for the video  (come to think of it you're probably not, so this probably won't work).

Yeah looks like im using the VGA Cable you linked Ed.

Also im pretty sure my monitor from my old pc used one of those Stereo Jacks, I'll give that a try.

Wire is very short but its working perfectly.


Thanks GW

Does your TV have an available HDMI input and does your computer have a DVI output? If so, you can connect the two together with a simple cable, this is the best option as it will support full 1080p HD. Other connection options are composite, S-video, component and, VGA. For composite and S-video (assuming both your TV and computer support these), both of these connections can also be made with a simple cable, however the resolution will be limited to 480p. A component video connection can also be accomplished, it will give you resolutions up to 1080i, but will require an adapter that could be expensive. If your TV has a VGA input (not nearly as common as HDMI), you can also connect this way but you will probably be limited to 1280x1024 resolution.

You can use external speaker if you cannot use the TV speakers.

I found just using my pc speakers and with my tv works loads better than trying to use the tv for sound. For some reason the volume on the tv is super low when using it as a monitor so I don't bother with it.

You can use external speaker if you cannot use the TV speakers.

yeah, just use the external speaker