HDMI Over Coaxial Another option for home networking If you're lucky enough to no longer be worrying about the speed of your broadband connection, you may still be concerned about the speed of your home network, particularly when it comes to shoveling HD content around the house. With that in mind, Gefen and Pulse~LINK say they're releasing the first consumer gear that allows users to transmit HDMI signals over coaxial using ultra-wideband. From the press release: "With the Gefen HDMI Over Coax Extender, which implements Pulse~LINK’s HDMI-Over-Coax technology, consumers can extend the reach of HDMI audio and video out of their family room or media room into any other room in their house,” explained Hagai Gefen, president and CEO, Gefen Inc. "They can enjoy true HD entertainment that is visually lossless, regardless of where their content source is located." Ultra-Wideband (UWB) is a radio modulation technique noted for its potential to offer blazing speeds at very short ranges (great for in-home HD distribution over wireless or coaxial). Pulse~LINK has been working on UWB hardware for some time, and recently conducted tests showing their gear may be able to achieve wireless speeds between 500 and 890Mbps. A Pulselink exec recently stopped by our news comments to explain why ultra-wideband is a big deal. Pulse~LINK has also tinkered with taking this idea outside of the home and onto cable networks. They had hoped to increase the bandwidth available to cable providers (to the tune of +1 gigabit downstream, 580 megabits upstream per node), but we've yet to see any cable operator sign on, given most are now focused on DOCSIS 3.0.
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  pnh102Reptiles Are Cuddly And PrettyPremium
join:2002-05-02
Mount Airy, MD | Just Ahead Of Our Time... Now that most of us have run HDMI and/or component cables through our walls!
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Only SHATNER is Kirk. | |
|  |  jester121Premium
join:2003-08-09
Lake Zurich, IL | Re: Just Ahead Of Our Time... You obviously forgot your sarcasm tag...
I can't think of any friends, neighbors, relatives, or colleagues who even knows what HDMI is. | |
| | | | I have an HDMI drop from the theater room (main source) closet to the living room PC, but there is no way to get a drop to the office or either bedroom. So I am VERY excited about this solution. But as it's coming right around CES 08, I hope this isn't just another "coming soon" product we'll see 3 years from now.
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Intel Quad Core QX6700 @3500Mhz/Asus P5N32-E SLI/4x 1024Mb Corsair/Seagate 750.10/PNY 7800GTs SLI/Silverstone 850W/Custom water cooler | |
| | | | | Re: Just Ahead Of Our Time... From the press release:
quote:
The Gefen HDMI Over Coax Extender is planned for release in April 2008 and will be available to consumers online at www.gefen.com or through an authorized Gefen reseller.
Only time will tell. April is not that far away. | |
| | | | | | Re: Just Ahead Of Our Time... said by Dan2112:From the press release: quote:
The Gefen HDMI Over Coax Extender is planned for release in April 2008 and will be available to consumers online at www.gefen.com or through an authorized Gefen reseller.
Only time will tell. April is not that far away. »www.dlink.com/products/?pid=547
"Coming Soon", since CES 2007.
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Intel Quad Core QX6700 @3500Mhz/Asus P5N32-E SLI/4x 1024Mb Corsair/Seagate 750.10/PNY 7800GTs SLI/Silverstone 850W/Custom water cooler | |
| | | | |  JammerMan79Premium,VIP
join:2004-05-13
Prince George, BC
kudos:10 | Re: Just Ahead Of Our Time... I have the older dlink dsm320 and it's awesome. | |
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| KearnstdElf WizardPremium
join:2002-01-22
Mullica Hill, NJ | i dont even use HDMI yet, though i do use component. all the same when on cable TV since it will never be 1080p for years to come.
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[65 Arcanist]Filan(High Elf) Zone: Broadband Reports | |
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| | Last Mile Solution? Maybe this technology will solve the "last mile" problem that Wimax was supposed solve. The non-FIOS telcos do Fiber To The Node (FTTN) and then UWB to the home... | |
| |  MchartFirst There.
join:2004-01-21
Gurnee, IL | Re: Last Mile Solution? This technology can not reach anywhere near the distances needed for the 'last mile'. | |
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Syian
join:2007-12-20
Gwinn, MI | Re : Last Mile Solution? well, that would really depend on the maximum range of UWB... and memory serving it's not all that long a range, making it a bit difficult to implement as a last mile solution.
course, i could be very very wrong. it's been known to happen. from time to time. | |
| | | | Re: Re : Last Mile Solution? said by Syian:well, that would really depend on the maximum range of UWB... and memory serving it's not all that long a range, making it a bit difficult to implement as a last mile solution. course, i could be very very wrong. it's been known to happen. from time to time. Not this time.  I could have sworn I read that UWB was supposed to work over a larger area, but Intel »www.intel.com/technology/comms/uwb/index.htm says 10 meters.
The Bluetooth people look like they are going to migrate to UWB also: »www.wimedia.org/en/index.asp | |
| | |  PolarBear03The bear formerly known as aaron8301Premium
join:2005-01-03 | Re: Re : Last Mile Solution? Yes, from what I've read, UWB is about throughput, not range. | |
| | | | | Actually, Intel is partially right and partially wrong. 10 meters is just a nice round number and the range is really more a function of the data rate - but they are referring to UWB wireless in any case - not over coax.
Over coax, the range is hundreds of feet. This is independently verified in a report that was published by EETimes last month. You can access the report by independent test house "Octoscope" if interested on Pulse~LINK's home page. | |
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 bewaleKillemallPremium
join:2000-08-08
Royal Oak, MI | Hmmm... I see the obvious benefit of this solution for people that already have existing coax infrastructure. But, how does the bandwidth/picture quality of this compare to existing HDMI-over-dual-CAT5 solutions... or HDMI-over-fiber? e.g. for the new home builder or someone remodeling where all three options are a choice?
I'd assume one advantage of using coax is the inherent shielding the coax has vs. twisted pair.... not sure how necessary that is in a typical residential house though.
Also curious about his 4 * 35Mbps comment. I know several people playing Hidef over 100Mbps.?
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"In a world of compromise, some don't." | |
| | n0ym
join:2004-12-21
Rockville, MD | Re: Hmmm...
I see the obvious benefit of this solution for people that already have existing coax infrastructure. But, how does the bandwidth/picture quality of this compare to existing HDMI-over-dual-CAT5 solutions... or HDMI-over-fiber? e.g. for the new home builder or someone remodeling where all three options are a choice?
Assuming they can handle the bandwidth, I would imagine this comes down to the price, as either of the other solutions at this point are not cheap at all.
Also curious about his 4 * 35Mbps comment. I know several people playing Hidef over 100Mbps.?
Considering the full bandwidth of HDMI 1.3 and later is higher than 10 Gbps, I'm not sure, either (even the bandwidth of HDMI 1.2, which can handle 1080p at 60 fps, exceeds 4 Gbps).
Compressed high def video can certainly be handled by conventional fast ethernet (or gigabit ethernet). But that's not what's sent on HDMI. Unless they're compressing the signal on the fly? In which case, I'd think they would run into trouble with the encryption, unless the compression is somehow lossless... | |
| | | beaups
join:2003-08-11
Hilliard, OH | Re: Hmmm... my question exactly. uncompressed video, which HDMI is carrying, could not be run on the bandwidth of this product. So there is obviously some recompression happening which, in my opinion, destroys the product. I don't see any way it could be lossless considering we are talking around 50:1 compression | |
| | | n0ym
join:2004-12-21
Rockville, MD | Ah, OK... Answering myself...
I'm not sure either why you'd need 4 times the bandwidth for pause/rewind, etc. My understanding is that streaming compressed high-def video requires anywhere up to about 35-40 Mbps (can be handled by 100 Mbps ethernet), and software packages like MythTV can do pause, etc. I've never heard anything about multiplying the bandwidth for such functions, although I could see some sort of frontend-handled fast-forward/rewind seek function requiring higher streaming bandwidth.
I suppose it all depends upon how the function is implemented. | |
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 wruckman Ruckman.net
join:2007-10-25
Northwood, OH | Nice Most people have coax already in their walls so this should be perfect for most people. Maybe you could even shove it out your home coax to a neighbor too. hehe. | |
| | | fiber... or we could just use fiber optic lines in our own house? seems more logical... already do it for sound systems... | |
|  GeekGirl1Premium
join:2007-01-28
Morrisville, PA
kudos:2
4 edits | Yet Another Standard? This is a transmitter / receiver pair (with an IR remote in the opposite direction). Putting the pulsed carrier at 4 GHz should be well above anything on coax. If it's the same version as in the report (see below), there's an issue with length. Also, you're running near the maximum usable frequency for cheap coax (moding).
Cost for this product?
The cable industry already provides for sharing of TV signals over coax, called MOCA (Multimedia Over Coax). Verizon FiOS has implemented a solution with their home media DVRs. Standard Def only, but it's a cut into the market share.
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Wireless Version:
I just took a look at the full test report from the URL in their press release: »www.pulselink.net/press/pr-dec13-2007.htm. There's too much marketing hype. 4.1 GHz band only, BPSK pulsed carrier modulation.
Look at Figure 14. The Belkin F5U302 can do 35 MBps until about 20' from the transmitter. If 1080p needs 35 Mbps, this will do just fine.
One feature not mentioned in the report is the signal acquisition process. How long to lock / re-aquire? How robust is the receiver design to multipath? There's a reason the other protocols have lower data rates and use more complex modulation techniques.
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| | n0ym
join:2004-12-21
Rockville, MD | Re: Yet Another Standard? RG6/U is capable of carrying very high bandwidth signals - 3 GHz and up - but the losses increase substantially, of course. If they're putting a powerful signal on the line, it does stand to reason coax could be used (depending upon the length and the quality of the coax).
As you noted, cost of the product is an issue. Gefen's other solutions are pretty pricey.
Look at Figure 14. The Belkin F5U302 can do 35 MBps until about 20' from the transmitter. If 1080p needs 35 Mbps, this will do just fine.
Compressed 1080p can be sent over 35 Mbps. HDMI's bandwidth requirements are much, much greater.
What I'm waiting for right now is a cost-effective solution for launching and receiving HDMI signals over fiber (e.g. you string your own fiber throughout the house, then buy a HDMI-to-fiber transducer for transmitting the signal and a fiber-to-HDMI transducer for receiving, all for a reasonable price
Chips for driving fiber aren't all that expensive these days, and from what I've seen even multi-mode fiber could be used to carry HDMI signals over house-length fiber (no lasers necessary). | |
| | | GeekGirl1Premium
join:2007-01-28
Morrisville, PA
kudos:2
4 edits | Re: Yet Another Standard? said by n0ym  What I'm waiting for right now is a cost-effective solution for launching and receiving HDMI signals over fiber (e.g. you string your own fiber throughout the house, then buy a HDMI-to-fiber transducer for transmitting the signal and a fiber-to-HDMI transducer for receiving, all for a reasonable price [/BQUOTE :They already have one, but you need 1 Cat 5 and 4 fiber cables. $700 / box (define "reasonable" ). » www.gefen.com/kvm/product.jsp?prod_id=2484The selling point is "no new wires". I've got cable TV (Verizon FiOS) and OTA (Over The Air) cables run. Is this thing going to interfere with my existing TV picture quality? All I need is a splitter on each end of the coax to insert / extract the signal. Don't forget that the modulation sidelobes go well below 1 GHz. Putting the carrier at 4.1 GHz won't cut it with a 1.4 GHz modulation bandwidth. Hopefully, they've got good filtering (same for their receiver front-end). Also, it won't work through any type of cable / OTA distribution amp, so that limits the configuration. I'd like to give this product a chance, but I'd wait until the reviews come out with real-world testing. | |
| | | | n0ym
join:2004-12-21
Rockville, MD | Re: Yet Another Standard?
(define "reasonable" )
Yeah, that's kind of where I was coming from. For me, $700/box isn't reasonable, given the likely cost of components (they're not even multiplexing the signal onto a single fiber). Just need more competition, I guess.
I agree regarding the bandwidth limitations and potential interference with other signals carried on the line. | |
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 juiceleePremium
join:2000-12-04
Hacienda Heights, CA | How about a true HD slingbox device? Instead of using this coax tech...how about someone making a device with slingbox functionality that can send full 1080p video over gigabit lan? | |
| | | | Re: How about a true HD slingbox device? Yeah, i've been asking myself that question since hdtv first came about. It's really bs how there is not one consumer solution to transmit any higher quality than 480p over a network (except local broadcast and the new cable card but thats not what I mean). I want hdmi in and have it go to a Gigabit network so I can watch/record HD content of any type onto my computers. Is this really to much to ask of hardware designers out there? The cheapest/closest commercial solution I found was a QAM signal generator over coax for $20,000+. Your QAM capable tv tuner card would translate it to 1080i as if it was being broadcasted by your local tv station and bam, hdtv tivo from any source you'd like. But who wants to spend $20,000+ to get hdtv from any source onto their computers? Sigh... | |
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| | Perfect solution for me I have a 1 blue ray player with 2 tv's that have HDMI inputs, and 2 coax at each wall plate. The only downfall is you would have no control of Blue Ray player unless it had Blue Tooth controller like a PS3.. | |
| | Ulmo
join:2005-09-22
San Jose, CA Reviews:
 ·SONIC.NET
| Re: Perfect solution for me said by MOTO6809:I have a 1 blue ray player with 2 tv's that have HDMI inputs, and 2 coax at each wall plate. The only downfall is you would have no control of Blue Ray player unless it had Blue Tooth controller like a PS3.. For the cost of the coax-HDMI modems it seems to me you'd be able to throw in IR repeaters for a small percent of the HDMI modems. Hopefully they thought of that and include the IR package in the unit as well; it should have enough leftover bandwidth, after all, and the circuitry ought to cost less than the extra documentation costs it would incur, but everyone will want it anyway. | |
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