Turn Your Wii System Into the Ultimate Entertainment Experience – 4 Key Ingredients
The Wii console is a fantastic video games system, but adding a few extra pieces of kit will turn your Wii system into the ultimate entertainment encounter.
Here are 4 key items that will take your Wii console to the next level...
- High Definition (HD) TV
- Wii Element Cable
- Home Theatre Surround Sound
- Wii Internet Direct
High Definition (HD) TV
Although the Wii doesn't have High Definition (HD) capability, its graphics are still fantastic to look at. Even though there's no HD, you can dial up the quality of the Wii's graphics a few notches by connecting your console to a High Def television.
When looking for a HD TV, the ones to look at are the newer 1080 pixel High Definition TVs. These 1080 TVs are marketed as "right HD", and offer the best picture quality for watching TV shows, DVDs and before a live audience video games.
Although the original HD TVs in the US only offered a pledge of 720 pixels, 1080 pixel HD has been around Europe for a few years already. If these facts sound confusing, the most vital thing to note is that the higher the number, the better the picture quality.
Another vital part of buying a HD TV is choosing the right size TV set. HD TVs come in uncommon sizes, from 19 inches to 112 inches. The size of the TV you buy is single-minded by the size of the room you're putting it in. Talk to an expert at your local electronics store. They'll be able to recommend the right TV size for you.
No matter what size TV you buy though, hooking up your Wii to a 1080 High Def TV will unquestionably take your Wii's graphics to the next level.
Wii Element Cable
You'll notice a dramatic difference in the Wii's graphics when you plug it into a High Definition TV, but you can still squeeze a small bit more out of the graphics by using a Wii Element Cable.
The Wii system comes with a ordinary audio visual (AV) cable packaged in the box. This ordinary AV cable has a single video cable to carry the Wii's picture signal to your TV.
A picture signal is made up of 3 uncommon colours - red, green and blue. These colour signals travel to your TV and bring together to make up a full colour picture.
With the ordinary Wii AV cable, all 3 colour signals have to fight to travel through the single video cable. This causes a loss of picture quality as the colours battle their way through to the other end.
The Wii Element Cable, though, has 3 break video cables. Each cable carries its own colour signal from the Wii console to your TV. This means that the signals don't have to fight to get to the other end of the cable, and results in a higher quality picture on your TV compared to the ordinary AV cable.
The Wii Element Cable is relatively cheap. You can buy either the original Nintendo Wii Element Cable or one of the excellent quality 3rd party cables, which are ordinarily a small cheaper than Nintendo's translation.
Home Theatre Surround Sound
Home theatre and surround sound systems have become really well loved over the last few years. Most home theatre systems come with 5 speakers placed around the room, and a sub-woofer speaker on the floor for pumping out the bass. These home theatre/surround sound systems are commonly known as 5.1 surround sound.
Most CDs and DVDs are made with 5.1 surround sound plotted into them. So when you play a CD or DVD on a 5.1 home theatre system, the sound is plotted to come out of all 6 speakers to make the perfect cinema encounter.
The Wii system doesn't have 5.1 surround sound plotted directly into it. Instead, the Wii has a technology called Dolby Pro Logic II. Dolby Pro Logic II directs the Wii's sound to all the speakers around the room, as if 5.1 surround sound was really plotted into the Wii's games.
To use the Wii's surround sound facial appearance, you'll need a home theatre/surround sound system with a Dolby Pro Logic II background. Most modern home theatre systems have Dolby Pro Logic II as ordinary, and this shouldn't be too hard to find.
Hooking up your Wii to a surround sound system makes a cinema-like encounter. The sound from the Wii's games immerses you as it plays around the room, giving you an even greater suspicion of being "in the game".
Wii Internet Direct
The Wii Internet Direct is a web browser designed specifically for the Wii console. With the Wii Internet Direct you can surf all of your favourite websites directly on your Wii.
Unfortunately, the Wii Internet Direct doesn't come loaded onto the console, and you'll need to download it from the Wii Shop. It costs 500 points to download but used tidily the Wii Internet Direct will boost your Wii's functionality!
The Wii can't play music CDs, and putting MP3s onto a SD card can be a bit of a mission. With the Wii Internet Direct you can stream your favourite internet radio stations like Last.fm and Pandora. Type in your favourite artists and listen to the music you want to listen to.
You can even watch YouTube videos on the Wii Internet Direct. Nintendo and YouTube have a made a website especially for the Wii. It's free and fun to use on the Wii Internet Direct.
Download the Wii Internet Direct and get even more from your Wii!
The Wrap Up
The Wii console is a fantastic games system, but a few extra pieces of gear will help make the ultimate entertainment encounter.
You don't need to break the bank to get this encounter either. The prices of HD TVs and home theatre systems are coming down all the time, and you can get a excellent system at an affordable price.
Shop around for prices and question the experts in your local electronics store for advice on the best televisions and sound systems in your price range.
Putting together that perfect Wii system really is an investment worth making.
Author: Steve Braude
Article Source: EzineArticles.com
Provided by: Guest blogger
