dkoemans

banmojo

Back in the day (analog NTSC) Coax (or as most people thought of it, Channel 3) was the worst possible way to move a signal from a home video device to a TV, since that analog signal had to get so modified and tangled up in order to fit it all into one TV channel.

Now, however, with digital broadcasting, Coax really needs to be enthroned as THE method of moving a signal from various devices to TVs.

Right now, if you want to hook up a TV to your BluRay or Computer, you have to hook up either 1 VGA cable and one to 6 audio cables, OR 3 Component cables + 1 to 6 Audio Cables OR 1 HDMI cable with 0 to 6 audio cables.

The HDMI option sounds good on the surface, until you learn about all of it's distance-based limitations. It's very hard(expensive) to send HDMI long distances (more than 10 feet) with reliability. Then, on top of that, it's extremely expensive to split HDMI to several systems.

Digital (ATSC, in this case) transmission solves most all of that. Now you can send video in full HD throughout all the same old wires already in your house. You only need 1 wire, not 2-8 to each TV. It encapsulates Dolby 6-channel Audio and MPEG2 HD video all-in-one. You can split the signal using the same old-fashioned splitters and signal amplifiers you used to have for normal Cable TV and antennas. Your whole house can enjoy full HD with just 1 cable.

The only caveat is that the video MUST be MPEG2. That means the pure, uncompressed HDMI/DVI that comes out of your computer/devices would have to be converted to a lossy, compressed format before being distributed. Purists will see this as a negative. However, MPEG2 HD sure does look good, and that slight drop in quality is certainly worth it for me to have all the other conveniences.

Even that downside could be greatly improved if they would just offer a device that took the ALREADY MPEG2 compressed sources from your device (BluRay is sometimes MPEG2, all American TV broadcasts, and most cable & satellite broadcasts are MPEG2) and simply modulate them to the ATSC RF signal without having to go through an HDMI (decompression) back to MPEG2 (re-compression) stage.

That's the dream for me. This device is a good start, but a device that would either take any HDMI and turn it into ATSC or even better, a device that would take pure digital files and transcode or just inject them into ATSC RF signals would be the dream come true.

As to the cost, for converting any high-res analog signal to a compressed HD MPEG2 and then modulating that into an RF signal, I'd fully expect a cost of $500. I'm sure it could be cheaper, but economies of scale would need to come in.

So close.

sideshowralphwiggum

chumpzilla

ParJoe

Certainly a product like this can be built, but it is going to be within a hundred or two of this products estimate, and would not have the snazzy software to go along with it. If I actually watched programming on multiple TV's and had the money, this would be a very attractive possibility.

Monty

I think the ZeeVee hardware provides a better solution by sending HD over existing wiring as a one to many solution at less cost. If they manage to develop a successful UI (a la TiVo), that'd be gravy.

The more I think about the potential of a unit like this, even as just distribution hardware, the better it seems. Heck, just give me the modulator feature with HDMI or component and digital audio input, and I'd be interested.

lutton

guitarmunkey05

OG512

takemetoyourtoaster

guitarmunkey05

homerjay

It's sorta like a DVR meets cable box meets home media player, except some features might need refining, namely:

- perhaps wireless connectivity? so no need to USB connection to PC? I guess wireless video would be good too, but I believe wi-fi has the tendency to drop packets.
- why not HDMI connection to PC?
- 5.1ch decoding should be included too

The idea of using the remote to control the app on your PC is neat.

Is it buildable? Definitely. You will need the following:

- VGA -> HD converter module
- Coax transmission module
- Serial controller (with USB support)
- Remote control transceiver kit

That's just a skeletal outline. I have no idea how much this would cost, but here in Australia, I estimate it would be somewhere in the vicinity of $300 USD.

MeeM