Products that don't exist yet, but should
 

If I get my TV and/or internet and/or telephone via a phone wire
or cable or antenna wire coming into my house,
why do I need nineteen different components, each with their own
mini-transformer, dongles, and yards of spaghetti-wiring ?

I want only one wire/cable coming into my house connecting to one wireless router.
This generic router should have only one wire connecting to any 110v power source.
All the other components (TV's, monitors, computers, phones, printers, security cameras, etc.
should be like an electric alarm clock... a single plug for power.

All TV's, computers, play stations, smart phones, toys, security cameras, drones (:cool:)
should run off of one generic kind of wireless mouse+remote control devise.

It would be even better if the ISP cable were eliminated, so the
signals coming into the house would instead came from satellites.

Only geeks understand/enjoy the current situation.

You can turn the spaghetti into little bundles.

Just estimate how much length you actually need.

Search for "usb wall outlet". Installing one of these will let anything that can be powered by USB use a standard cable, hiding the wall wart inside the wall. You won't get internet through that, but if you've got wifi, you don't need a cable for any wifi-aware devices.
Satellites are slow, thanks to the speed of light. Municipal internet would have to be large-scale ground-tower-based ifi.

What am I missing here. I'm probably not understanding.
My search for "usb wall outlet" turns up wall outlets that "charge" USB devices.

Even if I do have wifi, isn't this concept going to require a wire running from each devise to a nearby wall plug ?
Or, is this include a way to distribute TV and network signals via the house-hold wiring, itself ?

Yes, I had heard from a cable-guy installer that satellites were too far away to give quick signal responses.
But still, that's only a minor problem and someone should be able to devise a simple work-around. ;)

If your wifi is set up, and your device supports wifi, then you don't need any cable for internet, but you will need a power cable unless it runs on batteries. The USB charging wall outlet allows you to use a USB cable instead of a wall wart.

Television is a different story. You will need a direct coaxial connection to the cable box, so at least that one will need two cables. Some DVRs may then be able to stream video, or you could get something like a SlingBox to get he video to another device.

There are ways to use household wiring for internet, but that essentially puts an ethernet jack on the outlet, and two cables are still needed from that outlet to the device, so if wifi is viable, it is probably better, if your goal is minimizing wires.

There are wifi enabled tvs now that will let you stream Netflix, Hulu, etc.

We just switched to satellite. We get 20mbps now. This is about 40 times faster than we used to get via landline.

Sent by thought transference

I'm sure this has been suggested before, and I can't believe it still isn't standard.

I go to the TV set, and I push the button marked "locate remote". The TV sends a signal to the remote control which begins beeping and doesn't stop until I find the #$%&er and press a button telling it to stop beeping.

If this were available, no-one would buy a TV without it again.

My remote does that automatically... because it has to be recharged all the time, and beeps when the battery gets low. So either it's in the recharging cradle, or it's beeping until I find it.

You can get things that you can stick to a remote, to do that, but it does seem logical for it to be built in.

The Roku has a headphone jack built into the remote, so audio has been done.

I wonder if there is a patent and a greedy inventor is looking for licensing fees nobody is willing to pay.

Edit: There are a ton of patents. The oldest is one where you clap your hands, and the remote chirps in response. That one is probably in the public domain by now since it issued in '85.

Heh, in highschool I had one of those key-finder things where you whistle and it goes beepbeepbeep. It was fine, until I was in music class with the kids with the flutes. :lol:

This stuff is changing fast. Lamplighter, check this out. If you can get it onto your phone, you can get it onto your TV. Including YouTube videos. $35.

Isn't roku Japanese for six?
Not relevant to this thread, just showing off something I learned this week.

Yes Z, that's actually what prompted me to start this thread.

The $35 + Google's offer of free Netflix made their inventory sell out in just 1 day !
I've been reading the reviews...
The price is so low, people are embarrassed to complain.
But, there are a few issues... picky, picky, picky.
... some geek issues about sound options, picture quality, etc.

Apple TV and Chromecast will compete with one another to improve both.