Living Room Convergence – What Does it Mean?
We started to hear the phrase “living room convergence” back in 2004. This is a great idea of taking your living room and turning it into more than just a place to watch television, movies, and listen to music. Now you can actually access the internet right on the your television, which means you can do so much more.
Within the concept of living room convergence piles of DVDs and CDs will be eliminated along with home phone service and cable boxes. Even though we are not 100% there yet, living room convergence has started and it is time to see where we are before 2011 is over with.
Where Living Room Convergence Has Reached
Wireless has taken over our worlds. We now have wireless internet allowing us to, not only connect anywhere we want, but also connect devices to each other. You can even make a MAC computer talk to a PC printer or vice versa, if you want. With a home network you can share everything you want from one device to another.
Another wireless device we are now seeing is the surround sound speakers. There was a time when people would have a new house wired for surround sound to eliminate the ugly wires from the speakers. Now you don’t have to worry about that because many of the best surround sound systems have wireless speakers you can put anywhere.
Wireless has even expanded to the video game consoles. Now they come specifically with wireless controllers instead of wired controllers. This means you don’t have to worry about how far you are away from the television you can play the game with your controller from anywhere inside about 50 feet. Once again, this saves from the ugly wires all over your living room.
The next big living room convergence advancement has been the actual television itself. Now you can get a flat screen and mount it to your wall. This will take up much less space and the best part is you can use it in many different ways. It is almost a computer itself now and you can do so much more than you used to be able to do.
A new television can give you access to the internet, streaming movies, YouTube, and so much more. Not only do you get this from your television, but many new gaming consoles will act just like a computer as well. The best part is with the right set of devices all of these can be connected to your computer and even your smart phone.
Finally, we can look at the tablets that are now on the market. Instead of sitting around the living room with your laptop or sitting in front of a computer you can now hop right on your tablet. It is not all that much larger than your cell phone and with the touch screen you can do nearly anything you need to do, including access the internet.
Living Room Convergence and Automation
One last thing to discuss with the living room convergence concept is the automation of your home. You can set up your media center and control everything from your phone, your laptop, or your tablet. This means you can turn on and off lights, play music, adjust settings on your television, adjust your DVR or DVD, and so much more.
When set up correctly your entire home can be automated giving you full control over the entire house. The best part is there are more advances to come and this is just the start of the living room convergence.
Tags: automated technology, living room, living room automation, living room convergence, tablets, wireless, wireless technology