srhamy Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 I am about to take the plunge and invest in A/V distribution. The background on my project includes: A central rack currently housing 8 sources (HC-300/1000,PS3,Sony BDP-CX7000ES 400 changer,TiVo Series 3, FIOS DVR, FIOS HD Box, Mac Mini HTPC, Vudu) with high likelihood of more to come. The rack is located in a closet in my theater room with a mid range 1080p projector to a 110" screen. Audio comes via a Denon receiver (already too low on inputs) to a 5.1 surround.I am planning on dragging needed cabling, as well as some future-proofing cabling, so I am not limited by pre-existing wiring constraints. I am going to be distributing to 4 places some likely > 100ft distance. and I am NOT looking for the theater experience (lossless audio, ultra high end lossless video) in the areas of distribution. There are 4 distribution points will include plasmas, and LED TV 42-50" with and 2 speaker audio zones. I had planned on dragging independent speaker cables to handle the audio not associated with a video source.Like many, I find myself unsure of the best technology to invest in. There are many ways to skin this cat...Component Matrix distributing via Component cablesComponent Matrix over Cat 5/6/7 + balunsHDMI Matrix distributing via HDMI cablesHDMI over Cat5/6/7 + balunsHDMI over IPOf them All I like the idea of HDMI over IP as it is scalable, and more than meets the need for my distribution locations. What I am not willing to give up by using the HDMI over IP technology is having anything less that the very best in my theater room. Currently it is only 5.1 sound, but I am probably going to add 2 speakers to make 7.1. I know HDMI over IP won't do 7.1. Reading the various threads it seems as through the general consensus is that higher end TVs and larger projection systems will bring the compression artifacts to light if using HDMI over IP.At this point I thought, well use HDMI over IP for the other rooms, and wire directly to the receiver in the theater room to maintain A/V quality. This seems problematic to me as none of my sources have 2 HDMI out, and simultanous HDMI and component output many times is disallowed.Next I thought, use component outputs from sources -> convertor to HDMI -> HDMI over IP, and save the HDMIs to go straight to my Home theater receiver. Obviously this adds minor costs (~ $60 per source for the convertor) , but his sure seems like a very roundabout solution. So am I correct that the only other way to meet my needs would be to use a Component matrix solution? I would appreciate any insight that others might have...Scott Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thecodeman Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 Dedicated sources in the theater, distributed video elsewhere. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nded Posted January 29, 2010 Share Posted January 29, 2010 I would advise you to use a 1x2 HDMI Splitter in the HT Room for the Blu-Ray player (and anything else you think is worth having a direct feed for sound and video). This would let you have your cake and eat it. You just attach an HDMI over IP Transmitter to the second output of the splitter, and then your sources in the HT room can still be distributed to all the other locations (present and future as your needs change). Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
3fingerbrown Posted January 31, 2010 Share Posted January 31, 2010 I would advise you to use a 1x2 HDMI Splitter in the HT Room for the Blu-Ray player (and anything else you think is worth having a direct feed for sound and video). This would let you have your cake and eat it. You just attach an HDMI over IP Transmitter to the second output of the splitter, and then your sources in the HT room can still be distributed to all the other locations (present and future as your needs change).This is an excellent idea. Is there a 1x2 splitter out there that can be automated/integrated with control4? Any recommendations/experience for anyone? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
srhamy Posted January 31, 2010 Author Share Posted January 31, 2010 Thanks Ed. I also like the idea of the HDMI splitters. I can't imagine anything special needed on the C4 front, its just another input. From my research, avoid the passive splitters. The powered ones are the way to go, and the prices can vary significantly from a $30 Monoprice one (http://www.monoprice.com/products/product.asp?c_id=101&cp_id=10113&cs_id=1011301&p_id=5418&seq=1&format=2) to a $250 Audio Authority one (http://www.audioauthority.com/product_details/1392A/Distribution/5/1). As expected they will be limited by the number of HCDP keys issued by the source, and therefore not always able to output simultaneous output streams. Some hardware will support a 2 simultaneous streams but can be quirky in requiring the devices be powered on in a certain order. Overall it seems like a try it and see solution, so I am going to start with the most economical option. Anyone who gas been down this road before and has some insight, I would love to hear from them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thecodeman Posted January 31, 2010 Share Posted January 31, 2010 I would advise you to use a 1x2 HDMI Splitter in the HT Room for the Blu-Ray player (and anything else you think is worth having a direct feed for sound and video). This would let you have your cake and eat it. You just attach an HDMI over IP Transmitter to the second output of the splitter' date=' and then your sources in the HT room can still be distributed to all the other locations (present and future as your needs change).[/quote']This is an excellent idea. Is there a 1x2 splitter out there that can be automated/integrated with control4? Any recommendations/experience for anyone?A splitter shouldn't need to be controlled. It's not a matrix, just taking one signal and duplicating it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
3fingerbrown Posted February 1, 2010 Share Posted February 1, 2010 Some splitters, such as this Gefen model, say they only do 5.1 audio.http://www.gefen.com/kvm/dproduct.jsp?prod_id=8475The Audio Authority model will do 7.1 audio, however:http://www.audioauthority.com/product_details/1392A/Distribution/5/1So I guess you just leave this splitter on 24/7 and it splits the signal into two? Not the most elegant solution, but it would work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
srhamy Posted February 3, 2010 Author Share Posted February 3, 2010 I was looking through the blackwire designs site and it says that the best JAP HDMI over IP solution can do with audio is stereo. Kevin, at BWD, confirmed this by email saying that there has been a problem with the 5.1 audio spec'ed previously. Can you comment Ed? This would probably be a dealbreaker for me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nded Posted February 4, 2010 Share Posted February 4, 2010 Last week we uncovered a documentation mistake in the audio chipset information for HDMI over IP. This happened when the engineer who documented the audio chipset misunderstood Dolby PL audio to mean the same thing as Dolby Digital audio (mostly a language translation error and an honest mistake). Essentially it comes down to saying that the HDMI over IP devices support distributing PCM 2.0 and Dolby PL. They do not support distributing the distinct 5.1 and 7.1 audio in the HDMI signal. The installer who helped us track this down notified us that his Audio receiver was detecting Dolby, but they weren't hearing 5.1. We anticipate a relatively small objection (yet probably a very vocal minority), as most of the installers we have encountered continue to distribute the audio independent of the video, so they weren't even paying attention to the audio coming out of the HDMI over IP receivers. For customers/dealers in need of 5.1 or 7.1 audio in the main Home Theater room we continue to advise them to connect the audio output of the surround sound capable sources directly to the AVR in the room, and then use HDMI over IP to distribute the signal to all the other non-surround capable rooms in the home.Before anybody asks, YES, we are exploring the possibility of using a different audio chipset to integrate in the future that might be able to support the surround sound audio function. This would be a hardware change, not a firmware change.In Scott's situation (the OP), the desired results can still be achieved using HDMI over IP. As he mentioned in the first post, the 4 distributed zones outside of the HT are using 2 speaker audio zones. If his installation is like practically all the other C4 installations we've encountered, he is planning to use the C4 audio system to distribute the audio to the in ceiling speakers independent of the video. That leaves us with the issue of how to get 5.1, or even better 7.1 audio to the Home Theater room. While some dealers are connecting the surround sound sources directly to the HT AVR in the rack, there are plenty of users just like Scott who don't have enough inputs on their AVR to handle all the surround sources. This is where one very creative C4 installer thought "out of the box" and realized he could use an inexpensive 1 X 12 RCA switch to connect the coaxial audio output of his sources to a single input on the AVR. The switch he chose has IR control, so his macro to change video sources will also flip the coaxial audio to the correct source. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
akg4y Posted February 5, 2010 Share Posted February 5, 2010 So, essentially, if you have a situation like me where you have multiple HD sources (satellite receivers, Apple TV, Xbox, blu-ray) in a central location, and you want to distribute to places in the house that have 5.1 or 7.1 audio with independent receivers (not just R/L audio) then the JAP solution will not work unless you now install something to convert digital optical audio to coaxial audio (for devices that dont have a digital coax out) and then input all of the digital coaxial outputs into the RCA switch, and you have to have an RGB or digital coax run from the distribution location to each of the theater locations, correct?Man thats a huge bummer. For people that have already purchased this with the assumption that digital audio was being distributed will they be getting the hardware exchanged for free when the true digital audio solution is developed? Will the change require a decrease in video quality to make up for the increased audio bandwidth required? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rayk32 Posted February 6, 2010 Share Posted February 6, 2010 Just ordered my Just Add Power stuff from Kevin at BlackWire. He was very helpful and definitely lived up to his reputation in the C4 community. I haven't set up a 5.1 or 7.1 home theater yet, but hopefully JAP will have the problem mentioned above corrected by the time I'm ready.Here's the list:7 - JAP transmitters (HC300, 2 - DirecTV receivers, 2 - AppleTVs, Samsung Blu-ray, Netgear EVA9150)4 - JAP receiversDell 24 port switchComponent-to-HDMI converterC4 driver Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
C4CPA Posted March 9, 2010 Share Posted March 9, 2010 rayk32How is your Just Add Power set up working? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.