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Seems like they have invented their own signaling standard. They claim to move uncompressed HD video, audio, 100 watts of power, 100mbs of ethernet, and "contro
by jws 16y ago
Seems like they have invented their own signaling standard. They claim to move uncompressed HD video, audio, 100 watts of power, 100mbs of ethernet, and "control signals" over the cable.
I initially assumed they were just using a protocol over ethernet, but it looks like they have something better worked out.
They don't get into details, but it looks like 10-20Gbps for the video data. The 100 watts of power is twice what can be achieved with Power-over-ethernet.
The visible fly in the ointment is looming confusion over internet ports and AV ports since they use the same connector.[1]
[1] And a thousand curses on the toad at IBM that used identical connectors for keyboards and mice but incompatible protocols. That was probably a 1 million man hour mistake.
- reitzensteinm 16y agoWhat gets me about the keyboard/mouse ports is that it took over ten years for them to get a colour coding standard! The green/purple spec came out in 99, by which time USB was already starting to take off.
- tomsaffell 16y agoFunny story: I was working on USB at IBM in '98, and because of the new green/purple color convention for PS2, the designers wanted to similarly color-code two of the USB ports green/purple. It took a little explaining, and pointing at the USB 1.0 spec to convince the design folks that it wasn't a good idea.
- astrodust 16y agoWhen people need to know where the "Any" key is, maybe having a suggested port for mouse and keyboard wasn't such a bad idea.
- pixelbath 16y agoDidn't Packard Bell invent the green/purple standard?
- jacquesm 16y agohttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PC_97 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PC_97
- Qz 16y agoThe visible fly in the ointment is looming confusion over internet ports and AV ports since they use the same connector.[1] No no no. This new method puts both on the cable simultaneously.
- jws 16y agoI believe there is 100mbps that can be split out to an ethernet, but I don't see any evidence in the current press releases that a regular old 100base-T phy device can be plugged into an HDbase-T socket. It would be nice though. Then I just have to not plug my AV gear into my 1000base-T network.
- zitterbewegung 16y agoWould this be a simple firmware or software upgrade or would this require new hardware for it to work?
- jacquesm 16y agoSince it entails serious changes at the hardware level firmware upgrades would not be enough.
- rdtsc 16y ago> The 100 watts of power is twice what can be achieved with Power-over-ethernet. If it is just passive power (not switched on based on some protocol interaction) it's going to be fun when people end up plugging this into their laptop's ethernet slot instead of its HD slot. "Try plugging into one port. If you see sparks and smoke come out, try the other port."
- nitrogen 16y agoEthernet is supposed to be AC coupled through transformers, so PoE which is DC doesn't (or shouldn't) affect non-PoE devices. The DC voltage is the same on both wires in a differential pair, so no DC current flows through the transformer's input coil either. PoE is extracted at the center tap of the transformer. If the designers of this new standard have any sense, they'll have done it the same way. So sorry, no fireworks today.
- rdtsc 16y agoThanks for explaining. I obviously didn't know how this is supposed to work.