PC question/help

[SPV]

I have a pretty good gaming computer set up in my basement office. I would like to use it on my television screen in my living room upstairs every once in a while. I can run a cord to it if necessary, but I can’t figure out how to get a keyboard, mouse, or controller to connect to the computer from that distance.
I could buy something to connect it to, but I’m just trying to find out what my best option would be.
I’m getting into my middle years, so my computer knowledge isn’t as good as it used to be.

 

[RandV]

I'm not sure how it rates against other options, but as someone with a 'gaming PC', no smart TV, and no modern console, when it came out some years ago I bought a Steam Link to plug my PC into my TV. It might be wireless but my router is next to my TV so I just have it plugged in with an ethernet cable, and another 50' ethernet cable to connect my PC directly to the router. The Steam Link has USB slots so you can plug mouse & keyboard into it.

 

[Osprey]

It looks like Valve discontinued the Steam Link hardware in 2018. There's now just the free Steam Link app. That might work if you have a supported smart TV and can also connect one or more input devices to that. If not, building a Raspberry Pi or buying a mini PC, connecting your input devices to that and that to your TV and then running the Steam Link app on it might work. You could test the app on a phone, tablet or laptop to make sure that it works well enough before buying any hardware.

There's also an open source project that consists of a host app (Apollo) and a client app (Artemis for Android or Moonlight for all else) that works like Steam Link, but with any game on your system, not just Steam games, can also duplicate your desktop and reportedly has better performance and features:

https://joeysretrohandhelds.com/guides/apollo-artemis-streaming-setup-guide/

You know, instead of buying hardware, if you happen to have an old laptop laying around, that could be just as good as a Pi or mini PC and wouldn't cost you anything. That's what I'd probably do: hook an old laptop up to the TV via HDMI, configure it so that it doesn't go to sleep when you close the lid, connect a mouse and keyboard and then install Moonlight on it and Apollo on the desktop PC.

Edit: Ok, this is cool. I installed Apollo on my desktop PC and Moonlight on my main laptop and just played about 15 minutes of Starfield and a couple of other games on it. It worked surprisingly well, even over WiFi. There was occasional audio and video stuttering/choppiness, but it was quite playable and I imagine that playing over ethernet would be even smoother. It seems like a viable solution to play games on a laptop that are running on a desktop, at least on the same network, so I imagine that it'd work even better for streaming to a TV, as long as you have the hardware (old laptop, Pi, mini PC, etc.) to install the client app on and connect input devices to.

 

[SPV]

Thank you for the advice.
I don’t think my TV can connect, but I found a few mini PCs on Amazon for about 150 dollars, with rewards and gift cards I can get it relatively cheap.
I’ll try both options you mentioned once it arrives. In the meantime I’ll run a wire from the main PC to the living room to connect to the mini computer. I’m guessing that would be either a USB cable or an Ethernet cable?

 

[Osprey]

Thank you for the advice.
I don’t think my TV can connect, but I found a few mini PCs on Amazon for about 150 dollars, with rewards and gift cards I can get it relatively cheap.
I’ll try both options you mentioned once it arrives. In the meantime I’ll run a wire from the main PC to the living room to connect to the mini computer. I’m guessing that would be either a USB cable or an Ethernet cable?

A mini PC seems to me like the ideal option (cost not considered), since it'd probably be the most powerful and versatile. Even if it doesn't work quite to your satisfaction for streaming games, you can still use it for a host of other things, like playing simpler games directly on it, turning it into a retro game emulator, using it as a media center and more.

There are USB bridge cables for connecting devices, but hardly anyone uses them and I can't say how well they work. Ethernet is much more common and safer, so I'd stick to that. That said, if you'd rather not run a cable (and don't want to use WiFi), you might look into options to use Ethernet over coax if you have TV outlets in both rooms... or Ethernet over powerline, since you obviously have power outlets in both. In either case, you would need to buy an adapter for each end to convert the Ethernet to coax/power. You can find them on Amazon by searching for "ethernet over coax" or "ethernet over powerline." If you have a choice, Ethernet over coax might be better, since there'd be less chance of interference, but either should work.

 

[SPV]

A mini PC seems to me like the ideal option (cost not considered), since it'd probably be the most powerful and versatile. Even if it doesn't work quite to your satisfaction for streaming games, you can use it for a host of other things, like playing simpler games directly on it, turning it into a retro game emulator, using it as a media center and more.

There are USB bridge cables for connecting devices, but hardly anyone uses them and I can't say how well they work. Ethernet is much more common and safer, so I'd stick to that. That said, if you'd rather not run a cable, you might look into options to use Ethernet over coax if you have TV outlets in both rooms... or Ethernet over powerline, since you obviously have power outlets in both. In either case, you would need to buy an adapter for each end to convert the Ethernet to coax/power. You can find them on Amazon by searching for "ethernet over coax" or "ethernet over powerline." If you have a choice, Ethernet over coax might be better, since there'd be less chance of interference, but either should work.

Got it

Again, thank you very much!