Video Signal and HDMI extender

[Donald]

The church has one professional quality TV camera about 75' from the production booth. The others are closer. Currently they use HDMI extenders and CAT5E cable. The CAT5E does not pass at 1000Mb but does at 100Mb. So bad cable or connectors. And should be CAT5E.

I am told the better way is to get HDMI extenders that use SDI cable. I don't think they need to do compression.

Being a computer and network guy I don't know a lot about video signal.

I must be only one in Sussex County DE with a Fluke network cable analyzer. Must be a lot of untested marginal network cable being installed.

 

[John Galt]

I just switched over to HDMI 2.1 for my TV needs. While researching that I found this site and it noted that they make special HDMI cables for installing in walls in new construction. Sounds like this might fit your needs. Anyway the information was enlightening.

HDMI cables buying guide

How to choose the right cables to connect your gear

www.crutchfield.com

 

[Donald]

I just switched over to HDMI 2.1 for my TV needs. While researching that I found this site and it noted that they make special HDMI cables for installing in walls in new construction. Sounds like this might fit your needs. Anyway the information was enlightening.

HDMI cables buying guide

How to choose the right cables to connect your gear

www.crutchfield.com

A lot of the info I have found talks about HDMI cables used for playing video through a monitor.

My usage is from a video camera to a video switching console to Pro Presenter running on an iMac and onto an encoder and streamed to YT and Facebook.

 

[redhat]

HDMI over Fiber

I used these a lot when I worked in Healthcare Enterprise IT. I'd have a 300-400ft run of OS2 Single-Mode Fiber connecting a projector or very-very large display to the output of a Creston switcher. They work very well.

 

[redhat]

My info is a little dated (last org-wide refresh from 2019), but I always understood it as-

HDMI over CAT6 - good for short distances, (of course cable/termination quality which you've seen)
HDMI over SDI - good for medium distances, and or if re-using SDI infrastructure/professional broadcast environment or equipment
HDMI over Fiber - good for all plus can go the long haul

If you don't have existing SDI cabling/infrastructure or whatever your capture device on that Macintosh is doesn't have SDI, I don't think it's worth seeking it out.

 

[Donald]

My info is a little dated (last org-wide refresh from 2019), but I always understood it as-

HDMI over CAT6 - good for short distances, (of course cable/termination quality which you've seen)
HDMI over SDI - good for medium distances, and or if re-using SDI infrastructure/professional broadcast environment or equipment
HDMI over Fiber - good for all plus can go the long haul

If you don't have existing SDI cabling/infrastructure or whatever your capture device on that Macintosh is doesn't have SDI, I don't think it's worth seeking it out.

We currently have HDMI extenders over CAT5E. The cable fails at 1000Mb but passes at 100Mb. CAT5E should pass at 1000 MB. So it's marginal. We loose that camera from time to time and need to resync the HDMI extenders.

I believe it's 18.4 meters long.

We are going to pull something to replace the marginal CAT5E. Either CAT6 or SDI or fiber.

I assume with any of these HDMI extenders I just need a Tx and Rx to match the type of cable or fiber?

 

[Brons2]

We currently have HDMI extenders over CAT5E. The cable fails at 1000Mb but passes at 100Mb. CAT5E should pass at 1000 MB. So it's marginal. We loose that camera from time to time and need to resync the HDMI extenders.

If you have Ethernet tools try redoing the jacks. Cut off the existing RJ-45 ends and crimp new ones on. Sometimes that fixes things.

If you're dead set on pulling cable, I recommend the fiber. You'll never get electrical interference with fiber.

 

[redhat]

We currently have HDMI extenders over CAT5E. The cable fails at 1000Mb but passes at 100Mb. CAT5E should pass at 1000 MB. So it's marginal. We loose that camera from time to time and need to resync the HDMI extenders.

I believe it's 18.4 meters long.

We are going to pull something to replace the marginal CAT5E. Either CAT6 or SDI or fiber.

I assume with any of these HDMI extenders I just need a Tx and Rx to match the type of cable or fiber?

It depends, I am going blanket say Yes. Here's why. Some of our older Fiber HDMI extenders only require one LC to LC fiber patch cable as one of the extenders is TX and one is RX. So for some models, I did not need TX + RX cables... but we still pulled at least dual strand cables (usually quad strands of armored). Some models of extenders have SFP cages and take a transceiver.

For only about 60ft, just pull some new CAT6 and re-use your extenders. Yeah fiber is cheap but I'd bet you already got some copper on hand. That isn't a long run, plus you know what you're doing. Should work out fine.

 

[Donald]

It depends, I am going blanket say Yes. Here's why. Some of our older Fiber HDMI extenders only require one LC to LC fiber patch cable as one of the extenders is TX and one is RX. So for some models, I did not need TX + RX cables... but we still pulled at least dual strand cables (usually quad strands of armored). Some models of extenders have SFP cages and take a transceiver.

For only about 60ft, just pull some new CAT6 and re-use your extenders. Yeah fiber is cheap but I'd bet you already got some copper on hand. That isn't a long run, plus you know what you're doing. Should work out fine.

The church has a no ladder policy so I cannot pull cables that involve climbing a ladder and this will. They will hire a contractor.

If we did fiber it would need to be pre terminated as I doubt the contractor has the tools to install the fiber ends.

I think I SDI is easiest.

I was going to get new HDMI extenders anyway.

It's not really a $$ thing. The church just spent $180K for new stage lighting.

 

[mk378]

Hire a contractor once to install singlemode fiber and by replacing the end equipment it can carry any standard that will exist in the forseeable future.

 

[redhat]

Hire a contractor once to install singlemode fiber and by replacing the end equipment it can carry any standard that will exist in the forseeable future.

I would vouch for the same. Any contractor will easily give you a distance. Buy +5ft length and have them run. Coil up any extra. For OS2 it will never matter.

 

[Donald]

I would vouch for the same. Any contractor will easily give you a distance. Buy +5ft length and have them run. Coil up any extra. For OS2 it will never matter.

My Fluke measured the distance of the existing CAT5E cable. I have run fiber outdoors but not at this church.

 

[mk378]

You can go to a site like fiberstore and order a custom cable pre-terminated. Get the pull loop on one end. It is not expensive at all to add more length, there is nothing worse than coming up short. Coil up the excess in a hidden space such as above the ceiling. This also give some flexibility to change the layout later.

 

[redhat]

You can go to a site like fiberstore and order a custom cable pre-terminated. Get the pull loop on one end. It is not expensive at all to add more length, there is nothing worse than coming up short. Coil up the excess in a hidden space such as above the ceiling. This also give some flexibility to change the layout later.

Love FS.com. They make it so easy. Their transceivers have been in my Aruba’s for years now at a fraction of the cost from HPE.

 

[Brons2]

Love FS.com. They make it so easy. Their transceivers have been in my Aruba’s for years now at a fraction of the cost from HPE.

Do they do Cisco? I got a quote for 40 Cisco branded fibre-channel transceivers recently for a cool $6K. Ridiculous. The Dell branded optics on the other side of the switches (VxRail, Unity storage) cost $527 shipped to my desk. Same quantity.

 

[redhat]

Do they do Cisco? I got a quote for 40 Cisco branded fibre-channel transceivers recently for a cool $6K. Ridiculous. The Dell branded optics on the other side of the switches (VxRail, Unity storage) cost $527 shipped to my desk. Same quantity.

Yes they do. I have the best luck in my case entering the JLxxxx HPE number that I’m requiring and they will show you their compatible offering. Have them in two newer Aruba Instant On 1930 switches and also one in my Ubiquiti EdgeRouter X SFP. All working flawlessly for years now.

I do still believe in the old “nobody ever got fired for buying Cisco” but their pricing and renewals just stink. Long story short, last org I was at, previous network admin OK’d UCS blades certified as VMware vSAN ready nodes. Renewal time the pricing was disgusting and the support was awful. Trying to get drives replaced or memory replaced under RMA/support took weeks and many rounds of the “reseat and pull and reinsert game”.

Cisco routing and switching… even APs… cool. But I still prefer my PowerEdges.

 

[Brons2]

Yes, "nobody ever got fired for buying Cisco" is real in my industry vertical and many others. I personally don't care, have replaced Cisco everywhere I've gone at every possible opportunity. Others have really only followed me on the firewall front though, ASAs were replaced en mass in the last 10-12 years with Palo Alto Networks NGFWs. I was pretty early on the curve with that one, but now Palo's support is pretty high dollar also.

My immediate prior gig, I displaced Palo 5060s with big Fortinet boxes and I was pretty happy with them. My boss encouraged me to look at them, this was back in 2020/2021 and I was pretty hesitant at first but after seeing they had come so far and they were in the leaders' quadrant on Gartner, I gave them a look. Went ahead with the purchase, for the 4 big boxes and 3 years of support up front, saved us half a million dollars over buying 4 5260 series Palo boxes with associated support.

 

[Donald]

We are a medium size church will all Unifi hardware. 10 access points. Maybe top out at 100 users.

 

[redhat]

Yes, "nobody ever got fired for buying Cisco" is real in my industry vertical and many others. I personally don't care, have replaced Cisco everywhere I've gone at every possible opportunity. Others have really only followed me on the firewall front though, ASAs were replaced en mass in the last 10-12 years with Palo Alto Networks NGFWs. I was pretty early on the curve with that one, but now Palo's support is pretty high dollar also.

My immediate prior gig, I displaced Palo 5060s with big Fortinet boxes and I was pretty happy with them. My boss encouraged me to look at them, this was back in 2020/2021 and I was pretty hesitant at first but after seeing they had come so far and they were in the leaders' quadrant on Gartner, I gave them a look. Went ahead with the purchase, for the 4 big boxes and 3 years of support up front, saved us half a million dollars over buying 4 5260 series Palo boxes with associated support.

Have heard a lot of great about Palo Alto. Never had the opportunity to work with them. The places I was at were so brainwashed into SonicWall being the one and only was astounding.

 

[Pew]

Have heard a lot of great about Palo Alto. Never had the opportunity to work with them. The places I was at were so brainwashed into SonicWall being the one and only was astounding.

Our NSA2600 just went EOL and we can't even renew services like the CGSS or other non-cloud based licenses anymore.....not to mention we've never been able to get more than 3-5Mbps over VPN.