[Franz]

Ok, I figured out how to hook up the Mac Mini to my HDTV and display a picture (I am using the DVI to VGA adapter thing that was included and then using a VGA cable to connect to my TV). I've got two questions now:

1) Resolution: I would like to run Mini in the native resolution of my TV which is 1366 x 768. Is there a free and simple application that can allow me to do this? I want to get the best picture quality possible.

2) Audio: I want to hook up the Mac Mini to my TV speakers - the ones built-in to the mini are kinda weak. Is this possible and what is the best way to do this? I know next to nothing about audio stuff but if it helps my TV is a Samsung LN-S3251D. I guess I need to buy some kind of adapter?

[TailsToo]

When I had my G5 hooked up to my TV, it knew that 1366x768 was the native resolution - I have a 32" Samsung LCD 3228, I think.

[mduell]

1) ResSwitcherX. If you want the best picture quality, you should be using HDMI rather than VGA; the difference is significant.

2) You need a 1/8" minijack to RCA audio adapter.

If you tell me how far it is from the mini to the TV, I'll give you links to the right products at Newegg (which is literally an order of magnitude cheaper than retail [RadioShack/Best Buy/Circuit City/Tweeter/etc) for the same cables).

[Franz]

Thank you.

The Mac Mini will be sitting directly under the television (to the right of the base for the TV), it would need a 3 foot cable at most.

[TailsToo]

I couldn't get the HDMI port to work on my Samsung. It only worked with VGA.

[eddiecatflap]

i'm using vga on my imac to a sony bravia 40"

it has ghosting but it's still amazing to look at

[mduell]

For video there's 3 different ways to do the same thing; which one is best for you depends on what other uses you may have for the cable. Your Mac mini has a DVI port and your TV has an HDMI port, so you need to convert from one to the other; the two standards are the same electrically (so conversion is cheap), just the physical connector is different. You can buy a DVI cable and DVI-HDMI converter (useful if you might plug a different DVI display into your mini in the future), or an HDMI cable and a DVI-HDMI converter (useful if you might plug your TV into a different HDMI box [HD-DVD player, TiVo, etc] in the future), or a cable with HDMI on one end and DVI on the other (cleanest and cheapest of the three solutions, useful if you don't see your setup changing in the near future).

DVI cable: 3' for $5 or 6' for $9
$3 DVI-HDMI converter for use with DVI cable

HDMI cable: 3.3' for $10 or 6' for $10
$3 DVI-HDMI converter for use with HDMI cable

DVI-HDMI cable: 6' for $10

For audio, grab this 6' $2.50 cable.

If you think it's silly to pay $6.29 in shipping for $12.50 worth of cables, consider that if you go to RadioShack/Best Buy/Circuit City/Tweeter/etc they'll charge you literally 10x the price. BestBuy.com wants $32 for the $3 video adapter, $99 for the $10 video cable, and $20 for the $2.50 audio cable.