The projector

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Jane didn't like the CRT I had in the upstairs living room. She said she wanted a modern (LCD) TV. At first I'm sceptical but I get to thinking and eventually realise that she might be onto a good idea.

The upstairs living room has built in cabinets which built back in the days of tube TVs. Not really wide enough to accommodate a 55" TV but I think of a plan.

I look in all the shops and find the absolute thinnest TV I can. Then I balance it on the ledge in front of the walls of the cabinet. This way we can have a TV that is wider than the square TV "box" in the built in cabinet. I moved the soundbar upstairs to use with the new TV.

So we had this set up and all was well. This went on for a little over a year.

A friend gave me a Playstation 5. The new TV performed reasonably well even though it's only a cheapy TV. We only paid $1,100 for it. No 120Hz but it has really good HDR.

A few weeks after I was given the Playstation 5 Jane decided to put the TV in my mother-in-law’()s bedroom.

As a replacement she decides to buy the world's cheapest projector. You know the saying "if you bought x on Wish. I don't know if she got it from Wish but it was delivered from China so it may have been a similar website.

I ask her if it's 4K. She says it is. I look up the model number. It's 1080P. When I tell Jane says she says "Well the 'cable" is 4K" - By 'cable' she means that Chromecast that she plugs into it.

Instead of using a projector screen she points it at the vertical blinds that aren't even white.

Worst is the sound. Imagine the worst sounding TV you've ever heard and multiply the badness by 10^10^100. It sounds like an AM radio inside a box of tissues.

Actually it sounds like someone took a pair of wired headphones and then connected them to a big amplifier so that the volume coming out of the headphones is loud enough to be heard across the room but the headphones weren't designed for that volume. Its bass is non-existent.

We can't use the Sonos soundbar that we were using before because the projector doesn't have HDMI eARC. Jane says she can't tell the difference between the built in speakers on the projector and the Sonos soundbar.

She doesn't mind that there's a mess of cables going to the little table she balances the projector on while I had the cables carefully hidden behind the TV. I even installed cabinet lighting to make it easier to see when I want to plug new stuff in.

Jane and her mother don't understand why I can't just use one of the downstairs TVs for the PS5. I already use the downstairs TVs with the PC so why not with the PS5?

What they don't understand is that those 3 TVs downstairs are basically monitors. No 4K and no HDR. Try telling that to Jane. Jane's eyesight is so poor that she can't even tell the difference between composite and component.

I set up the upstairs living room very carefully and now there's a TV cabinet with a bunch of wires hanging out and no TV and a projector balanced on a little table.

I asked her why she didn't buy a better projector. She said she didn't want to spend much money. I asked her why she bought the latest iPad and iPhone if she doesn't like spending money.

Maybe Jane just needs more space to call her own. I gave her the study but she doesn't like the study. She says the study is too close to the air conditioner and that she wants to set up another desk in another part of the house. I said in that case I would take the study and she says - No, she still wants it. Like, she says she doesn't like it but she still wants it?

We got into an argument about it tonight. Why can't she use the right tool for the job? Why does she always want to low quality crap that hasn't been set up properly. She says it's to save money but then she spends thousands of dollars on shovelware from Apple.

She's always a cheapskate, buying "it looks like you bought it from Wish" style electronics unless it's a thing Tim Cook tells her she needs, then she spends $1,600 to buy an iPad Pro she never uses.

At the time I felt that we needed a new laptop. Jane said she would buy the iPad Pro and we could use it instead of the laptop. A few months later I ended up buying a Thinkpad because I felt that using an iPad as a substitute for a laptop is the equivalent of using a child's tricycle as a substitute for a car.

Then a while later, Jane is always wanting to use my laptop for her small business stuff. I didn't mind the first few times but then she starts wanting to use it more and more.

I said to her "A few months ago you said we could both use the iPad instead of a laptop. And now you want to use my laptop? Why don't you use your iPad instead?"

Me saying that really made her angry.

A while later she ended up buying a laptop for herself. Now the iPad doesn't get used at all.

Yes, an annoying life with a spouse who doesn’t share the same spending mindset

That sounds really frustrating. Does she even use the projector? Could she return it?

I think that finances should be kept as separate as possible but big purchases that will be used by both people should be discussed and agreed upon by both people.

Sell the stuff you don't use on Marketplace (or wherever).
Agree on spending limits and a budget, individually and as a couple.

I would find that very frustrating. If she's willing to spend a lot on purchases for herself without really caring about your input, you should be allowed to buy your own stuff. I'd tell her that I will buy my own stuff myself for now on so she will not waste her money buying me things I won't like or use. What me & Cass do when buying big ticket items is the one who makes the decision is the one who will use it the most, or who sets it up & knows the most about it, or if it's something that we will use equally we'd decide together.

Yes. She uses it pretty often. I don't watch it anymore but I have to hear the horrible sound quality when she's watching it or when our daughter is watching it. Preschoolers Youtube sounds even worse on those speakers (oh and don't get me started on how Jane manages to find the most literally cringe inducing kids shows on Youtube, I'm talking about stuff that makes Barny the dinosaur look like Shakespeare.)

I'm not really too worried about getting the money back for the projector because the amount it cost was extremely low. I spent more on buying HDMI cables and cabinet lighting for the TV that used to be in that room than she spent on the whole projector (and I didn't even get the expensive HDMI cables, just the normal ones).

One of Jane's friends bought the same projector so Jane copied her and bought the exact same model. The friend did a somewhat better job of setting up, like putting it in a room that's actually dark, pointing it at a flat, white surface and connecting it to stereo speakers (I think I should connect it to speakers too but the last time I attempted this Jane got angry, she says she wanted to have the built in speaker).

Jane greatly admires this friend and her husband and wants to imitate them. Heck, even my daughter wants to imitate their daughter.

Do I spend money too easily? Maybe. Jane wants us to be "saving". She says I should save for big things instead of spending money on little things.

The trouble with that is that all of the "big things" are things that Jane wants. If I buy some little thing for myself now, I'll get to have something for myself. If I save up thousands of dollars for a "big thing" it will end up being a big thing that Jane wants (like saving up to send our daughter to a religious school. Jane is an atheist so why does she want to pay for religious schooling?)

The hypocracy of it! Like she's allowed to waste her money on stuff but not me.

Same as how she's on my ass everytime I make a little mess but she leaves rotting food in the living room for days at a time.

I think she has some sort of depression. It turns out depression can lead to obnoxious behavior.

Sounds like some weird TV tech problems. Solution: I've never owned a TV in my life. Occasionally use them, but if they all disappeared from the house I wouldn't notice much. If I wanted to watch something I'd watch it on my MacBook or iPhone. If something new was truly worth seeing on a bigger screen I'd go out to a movie.

If you just eliminate all the TV's then you won't have any TV tech arguments.

i've had a 100+ inch tv set [front projection] before, it was like every night was movie night. since HDTV though, i have not updated it, i need to get the latest laser projectors with motion compensating judder elimination, that makes everything look so real

Oops. Thought this thread was about my wife and my ex-wife.

My big LCD TV is an extension to my Switch.

It's nice playing games on a decent and decent-sized TV. I remember my childhood fiancé playing SMB3 on a tiny black and white TV. Kids don't know how good they have it these days.

I don't play video games ever. Like maybe 2 minutes every couple years at someone else' place if they insist.

I do have the option of playing real games but rarely do - probably should once in a while though. We have a pool table, poker table, dart board, pinball machine, and video slot machine downstairs in the basement.

I just waste my screen time online instead. Facebook, news, forums etc. Really should do more real things, exercise etc - especially when the weather is nicer.. no excuse to be on Facebook or watching TV when I should be out riding my motorcycle or at the beach.

TV shows and movies are okay once in a while, though.

Sounds like you've been having fun /sI like social media as much as the next dude but social media looks better on a big screen and I can respond faster with a keyboard instead of a touchscreen.

Here's a picture of Satan gesturing towards all the cool physical keyboard phones he's going to destroy and replace with his evil touch keyboard technology.

Things were looking up a few days ago when I convinced Jane that having the projector pointed at some vertical blinds wasn't a good idea.

Then last night we got into an argument. She said she wanted to put it in our bedroom (which isn't so bad), then she said she wanted to buy a cheap projection screen from 淘宝 and hang it on the curtain rod (which isn't so bad).

Then she said instead of doing that she would just straighten out the existing curtains and project onto that. What the bleedin' eff?

Those curtains are never going to be entirely straight without something tensing them. I don't want to project onto a curved surface. And that curtain has embroidered patterns on it. and it's mostly transparent. I don't think these semi-transparent curtains can reflect enough light back to our eyes (and do we really want to give the neighbours a free show through our french doors?)

It's like Jane has unwittingly invented the rear projection TV, using curtains as the screen. Jane watches TV pretty late and I don't want to keep the neighbours up late by putting a giant and very bright screen across from their bedroom. The neighbours drives off at 4 AM every morning so I think his work starts pretty early and maybe he would appreciate being able to go to bed early.

Jane is still furious about the 130 lbs CRT TV I put in our bedroom. She says the picture is "low quality" (How dare she insult Sony Trinitron).

But the worst part is the hypocrisy. She says it's "low quality" and then she buys a cheapy projector for 130 Australian dollars. and then she devises a series of increasingly unsuitable surfaces to project the image onto.

Jane said she didn't like my "TV from 20 years ago". I said her cheaply made projector, projecting onto a wavy curtain is like a TV from 50 years ago!

She wants modern? Generally technology gets better over time but the worst of 2023 isn't going to be better than the best of 2003 just because it's newer.

It's like how the worst car of the 21st century so far isn't going to be better than the best car of the 20th century.

I'd tell her we should go back to using the table I modified to be a vertical projector holder to project onto the ceiling (no easy task since Jane's extremely cheap projector doesn't have any mounting points) except that Jane's fussy mother has taken that table into her bedroom to use as a vanity and if I remove it it will literally start ten world wars.