New Entry into <$200 Monitor???
 

AUVIO™ 7" High-Resolution Portable Digital TV - RadioShack.com

Just went to radio shack and they had this portable TV behind the counter. $200. 800x400 resolution. Battery life of 2 hours. AV Input. Headphone Jack. The unit has a great picture. I am seriously considering this as an external monitor. Can someone give me some power options if I need it to last about 4-5 hours and a mounting solution. I am not sure if the unit is too heavy for a shoe mount. Also a hood for sunlight. Thanks!

for battery...
 

I'm really happy w/ my tekkeon 3450. Thinking of getting a 3700 to replace a 3450 that died on me. Fairly light weight and run for ages. Usually hang mine from a tripod leg when using it to power the smallhd.

cheers!

Mounting this on an A1
 

Thanks Andrew. Since this does not have a threaded mounting hole, what would you use to mount this to the Canon A-1?

This unit looks good. Resolution is actually 800 X 480 which is the same as a Marshall unit I believe. The screen is non glare. The back is black with a nice rubbery soft touch surface. This unit has a quality feel, the remote, the box, and the external antenna connector cable all say quality at first glance. For $40 you can add a 2 year guarantee. Only available thru Radio Shack I believe. I hooked my HV30 up at the store and it is a good picture for basic composition and focus, in my in-store opinion , especially when you MAGNIFY the image on the HV30 display. I would first consider using a Totevision ball and socket mount available from BHPHOTOVIDEO for about $20. This adapts it to a flash mount, and probably this unit is no heavier than other 7 inch monitors that are being mounted to a flash mount, although you have to be careful in that regard since not all mounts on cameras are created equal. I would probably opt for an off camera mounting location, depending on the camera. Need to come up with a threaded fitting to attach on the unit, maybe something from the hardware store epoxied to the bottom edge of the TV (spread out the bonding surface as much as possible, maybe with a metal plate in between the unit and the threaded fitting to avoid stress cracking of the case), but would be nice to come up with something that couldn't crack the case and void the warranty. For a hood, a home made jumbo version of the HOODMAN with rigid sides that folds flat and attaches with velcro straps around the back is an option. Tekkeon 3450 is a winner for long lasting external power.

Edit: Don't judge it by what the store is displaying on the unit--they had some sort of DVD player inputting an image on it, and it looked horrible. Bright, good color, excellent viewing angles.

I'm not saying anything for or against any of the particular monitors talked about here.

I'll just say that in general, people gravitate to TV sets that produce bright, colorful pictures. The manufacturers know this. So they engineer and set up TV sets to be both bright and colorful.

Video MONITORS on the others hand, are expected NOT to necessarily be "bright and colorful" but rather ACCURATE. To display what is fed to them, regardless of whether that looks good or not.

Which is the whole point of a monitor. If somethings wrong with the signal - you want to SEE that. NOT have it hidden by colorometry or adjustments that make the picture look artifically "pretty."

So always be a bit wary of using a consumer TV to judge any video signal. It may be OK. And it might not. And you'll never know unless at some point you get your signal on an actual monitor designed to show what the picture underneath all the TV set auto-color adjustment stuff actually looks like.

And you kinda want that to happen in the field where if there's something wrong, you have a chance to fix it - rather than to find out in post and have to go back and re-shoot something.

FWIW.

It's all about cost/benefit ratio. What serves the purpose now for some is the point, not what is the best. Right now, it seems all of the small LCD monitors are in a state of flux, no one in the $1000 range is making the unit that can be and will be available in a year or so. Something less expensive to fill the gap can be used by some people until the "has it all" $1000 LCD 1080 HD monitor is available--something with the specs and features of a Marshall and the full HD 1080 screen.

Regarding the Auvio 7" now on sale at Radio Shack for $169:

Has anyone come up with a way to mount this unit?

Since this thread title is not descriptive of the monitor in question, I decided to post my mounting solution in its own thread with a title that I think is descriptive:

http://www.dvinfo.net/forum/sdtv-hdt...-170-sale.html