Surf the net on my tv

Noviceman

Hi Folks,

I've been trawling through the posts to find much useful advice, however I do have some specific queries, which i hope you may be able to help me with.

I'm wiring my house at the moment and I want to connect my laptop (study room) to tv (living room) directly, which will require a cable of about 15-20 metres. I was going to initially use HDMI, but i've been told this will not work properly at this distance, correct? Next option is to use vga and sound cables of same distance, would this work at this distance or would quality suffer?

Am i better off forgetting about conneting them directly and just use a mce like xbox 360 and connect to my laptop which runs media center via the LAN? Would I be able to use the remote on the xbox and basically use my tv as the monitor in this scenario?

Your thoughts much appreciated.

conax

Noviceman wrote:

Hi Folks,



I'm wiring my house at the moment and I want to connect my laptop (study room) to tv (living room) directly, which will require a cable of about 15-20 metres. I was going to initially use HDMI, but i've been told this will not work properly at this distance, correct? Next option is to use vga and sound cables of same distance, would this work at this distance or would quality suffer?

Am i better off forgetting about conneting them directly and just use a mce like xbox 360 and connect to my laptop which runs media center via the LAN? Would I be able to use the remote on the xbox and basically use my tv as the monitor in this scenario?

Your thoughts much appreciated.

20m is about max on HDMI, you can get longer leads but I dont know what they would be like on the higher resolutions.

you can run VGA that distance no problem with either an active or passive balum over CAT-5/6. dont forget that you would also have to have control over the laptop.

the Xbox will run media center over LAN and control it using the universal media remote.
Not sure about surfin the net though, I think you need some sort of patch for that.

Noviceman

20m is about max on HDMI, you can get longer leads but I dont know what
they would be like on the higher resolutions.

I know i can get the lead that length, but i've been told it won't propoerly at that length, unfortunately, I can't test it

you can run VGA that distance no problem with either an active or passive balum over CAT-5/6. dont forget that you would also have to have control over the laptop.

ok, now you lost me, active or passive balum over CAT 5/6, I was just literaly going to get a long vga cable, what do you mean by that statement.
As for controlling laptop, is it possible to get wireless remote or even wireless keyboard and mouse to work across two rooms?

8T8

It's possible to run the VGA signal (plus audio) over wired network cables, it is expensive though.

For wireless keyboard and mouse yes you can use more than one with your laptop but the range on most wireless keyboards/mice is quite poor you really would need to find something which is known to work well through walls.

The Xbox 360 as a extender is the simplest setup as all they have to be is connected to each other on a network wired or wireless and the console will act as an extender (a remote is available or just use the gamepad) however...

Currently the MCE extender mode has very limited codec support if your looking for XviD support and the like it's not there but to further twist matters Microsoft announced that v2 MCE extenders will have XviD support that are coming out this Christmas but no word on whether the Xbox 360 will get a dashboard update to match the features on the new extenders (codec licensing costs would mean they would have to absorb the cost unlike the new extenders which would have the license factored into the cost of the unit).

If you dont care about too much about video and this is just for pictures music the Xbox 360 should do the job fine. There are also transcoders available that re-encode XviD into WMV which is compatible but will not work in MCE extender mode you must use Xbox own UI video sharing feature.

The other option to to go get something like a TViX 5100 or Netgear EVA 8000 which are third party media streamers which pretty good codec support.

Noviceman

ok, thanks i think i might wait until the v2 mce, i don't have an xbox360, have the ps2, won't be in house until after xmas anyway, will just wire for VGA and sound at the moment and LAN obviously

conax

again with the VGA cable the quality on this run would depend on the resolution that you hope to run it at on the monitor side. 20m is long enough, and the quality at high resolutions and driving it over that length could be easily decided by the quality of the video card in your laptop (which you probably cant change).
so if you are going to run 20 meters get a good quality VGA lead as this would reduce the need for a VGA amplifier, which in turn would be more expensive than converting the VGA to CAT-5 cable (a passive unit costs around 120e a active balum is around 250e).
HDMI will work perfect (with a decent cable) at 1080p at 20 meters.

This is just my opinion.

Noviceman

ah, so that goes back to my original question of using the HDMI cable of 20 metres. I was all set to use this and had one lined up for 200 yoyos, and someone told me (sales guy in Sony shop) that not a hope would it work over 15 metres and that I would need some sort of a booster across the cable. I'd love to test it, don't have cable and don't have tv.

Does anyone else beside conax have an opinion on this or has anyone got any experience on using a cable that length.

Conax, you say to use a decent HDMI cable, how can i tell if it's decent, I suppose i should really bring laptop to shop where i'm buying cable...

conax

I have been using Profigold HDMI cables without any problems. 20m meter costs around 190e + shipping.

15m wont work is google sales talk. originally with HDMI i can remember sales guys saying 2m was the max they would guarantee at high resolutions.

As for telling which cable is good from looking at it, impossible really but the cable should be relatively thicker than your standard 2-5m and you can generally tell by the weight if there is good screening and signal cables.
but the proof is in the pudding.

Now measure your HDMI run carefully, make sure that you have enough cable at both ends for connection. you probably know this but you cant cut off and re attach the ends (sorry, but I have seen it).
I have never tried HDMI longer than 20m but repeaters are available that allow the addition of a further 20m (never used these either) however I have put HDMI over CAT5/6 Ethernet/twisted pair countless times without any problems at 50 meters or even more I would say.

Wireless keyboards, these generally work well in open space but through a wall can be a different matter mouse can be jerk a bit, moving around with your body between the line of sight to the PC can drop signal and so on. but there are solutions to this as well.:)

Edit: changed over 20m to longer that 20m

Noviceman

great, am going to bring the laptop to the shop and check it out myself hopefully, wanted hdmi all along myself, have measured the length with my electrician and have allowed for connection length either side.. great the opp to do this while building..

Now as for controlling the laptop while in the other room, you say there are solutions to this aswell, it's a long way off for me, but would you care to elaborate...

btw, where would did you get the hdmi cables online, i have sourced one locally, but if it's not up to scratch, i will have to go online.

conax

the easiest way to remedy short range of a wireless keyboard (without modifying the keyboard) is to run a USB over CAT5/6 extender. this would involve running an additional CAT-5/6 to the room in question. This CAT cable can then be either terminated behind the TV or at another location in the room (or even adjoining room). your bluetooth wireless keyboard dongle then plugs into the adaptor which in turn connects to the CAt5/6.

Now this will give you an extended range of around 80m, but you cannot connect a USB HUB at this distance so it will only do for the dongle. If you want to connect a USB HUB you have to reduce the cable length to around 20-30m.

you can get the profigold from profigold direct I get them from Farnell.

Noviceman

ah, cool only need about 20 metres, so will go for usb hub and just wire for that, like the idea of usb over CAT5....

amazing what you can learn on these forums, thanks a mill conax

conax

the confusion there is my fault. The dongle can plug straight into the USB adaptor from the CAT5/6 cable.
The USB hub thing was:
if you wanted to connect additional items at a future date such as a USB printer or USB CAM etc in the room where the adaptor is, the longer the CAT5/6 cable it reduces the amount of USB devices that you can stick on the end of it.

mossym

there is a 20m hdmi cable for sale on adverts.ie in the electronics section, a pm to the seler would clear up whether it works or not.

also, i have a 12m cable from these guys

www.bluejeanscables.co.uk

and it works up to and including 1080p. i read somewhere all their cables are tested to 1080p 60hz. i'm happy out with mine anyway

witnessmenow

Just to suggest for your Keyboard and mouse problem, bluetooth keyboard and mouse. I have this one . Its range is unbelievable, I personally taught that no one would have a use for such range... but up steps you! Just tried it there through 3 block walls and a distance of about 15m still worked!