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HDMI should have been abolished in favor of DisplayPort ages ago. https://hackaday.com/2023/07/11/displayport-a-better-video-interface/ https://hackaday.com/20
by DidYaWipe 2y ago
HDMI should have been abolished in favor of DisplayPort ages ago.
https://hackaday.com/2023/07/11/displayport-a-better-video-interface/ https://hackaday.com/2023/07/11/displayport-a-better-video-i...
There are a couple of video cameras and viewfinders (particularly from BlackMagic) that have emerged in the last couple of years using DP.
- gjsman-1000 2y agoDisplayPort never caught on in the home entertainment market - have you ever seen a DisplayPort TV? And why would there be one, when everyone’s happy with HDMI? DisplayPort, for most intents and purposes, has lost the format war. You buy a laptop - it’s HDMI on the side, not DisplayPort. You buy a monitor - DisplayPort is never an exclusive port on any model, but HDMI is.
- bpye 2y agoThat’s not really true. Any device with USB-C video out is using DisplayPort, not HDMI. HDMI alt mode exists, but AFAIK never shipped in any products.
- gjsman-1000 2y agoIf it’s not the physical connector, is it even worth calling DisplayPort? It might as well be called something else, that happens to run over a DP connector or a USB-C connector. It’s winning in a spiritual sense where nobody intuitively knows it’s DisplayPort.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- p_l 2y agoIt's worth it because it matters to simple cases of normal user needing a converter dongle. Passive USB-C DP-altmode to DP cable are easy to acquire, cheap, and work fine. USB-C -> HDMI is usually expensive because nearly nobody uses HDMI as alt-mode outside few old devices so you end up with frustrated users who try to buy cheaper converter and find out it does not work.
- morsch 2y agoLooks to me like USB-C/HDMI cables are in the 5-20 EUR price range, about the same as USB-C/DP. I just got a new USB-C hub with HDMI port (4k@60) for about 15 EUR. Simple HDMI or DP cables (ie. same port on both ends) are available for 2-3 EUR, are there USB-C/DP cables in that range?
- immibis 2y agoI wish the opposite was easier to find, since I have one display device with only a USB-C input, and a desktop computer.
- bpye 2y agoI had this issue as well - Amazon (did?) have a bi-directional USB-C to DisplayPort cable [0], which works well for me. It looks like the 3ft one is still available. [0] - https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B081VK1KHV/ https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B081VK1KHV/
- ThatPlayer 2y agoThere is also MHL alt-mode over USB-C. MHL was a way to do video over microUSB at the time and I really can't figure out if any products released with USB-C MHL support either.
- p_l 2y agoHDMI replaced VGA as the "lowest common denominator port" for conference usage, not as major display tech. HDMI is also for various reasons very tightly bound with home entertainment ecosystem because the DRM is mandatory while it's optional in DisplayPort. Meanwhile DisplayPort has effectively won the format war for computer displays, and on all newer display connectors.
- gjsman-1000 2y ago> Meanwhile DisplayPort has effectively won the format war for computer displays, and on all newer display connectors. Not on this planet - for the highest end displays, maybe. Almost every small business and government office I see is still using VGA.
- p_l 2y agoInteresting, I don't think I've seen VGA anywhere outside retro setups or places that were setup once long ago and left like that. I think many people don't even know there was such a thing as VGA these days if they work in office. That said, HDMI 1.0 being DVI-D in different connector means conversion to VGA is very easy, as DVI-D stream is essentially VGA data minus DAC step (including vsync blanking and overscan).
- ThatPlayer 2y agoI'd say not even the highest end displays. I'm using HDMI 2.1 on my RTX 4080 because it has more bandwidth than the DisplayPort 1.4 ports on this graphic card. It's a similar port selection on even the highest end monitors: 40 Gigabit/s HDMI 2.1, or 26 Gigabit DP1.4. I'm unable to find a single DP2.0 monitor.
- p_l 2y agoIIRC main difference was that DP1.4 at 26gbit was more than enough to drive 4k displays
- ThatPlayer 2y ago
- dcan 2y agoI would argue the opposite - DisplayPort has won the computing format war, especially on laptops. Most laptops will have at least two USB-C ports with DisplayPort tunneling. Most business PCs have only DisplayPort connectivity, with the assumption that you'll buy a DisplayPort to HDMI adapter (if you have an older monitor that only supported HDMI). True, we will never see them on the TV, but on the computer it is all DisplayPort.
- gjsman-1000 2y agoIf you buy a ThinkPad, an IdeaPad, or a MacBook Pro, what port is on the right side?
- blueflow 2y agoI just checked my thinkpad fleet, excluding VGA: one has no extra video port, one has HDMI, and 4 have displayport only.
- p_l 2y agoThinkpads will usually have multiple DisplayPorts (some as alt-mode on USB-C), and 1 HDMI for use with roach-motel-quality conference room setups.
- burnerthrow008 2y agoMy MacBook Pro has one HDMI and one DisplayPort on the right side. The left side has two DisplayPort and a MagSafe. Edit: And a MacBook Air would have just the two DisplayPort on the left with no HDMI, plus headphone jack on the right.
- Gigachad 2y agoThe MacBooks HDMI port is also just a usb device internally. Utilising DisplayPort alt mode.
- dathery 2y agoWhy do you assert that everyone is happy with HDMI? It has a lot of problems even before we get into the technical details. For example, it is so secretive and closed that the HDMI forum won't even let AMD implement HDMI 2.1 in their Linux driver: https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/02/hdmi-forum-to-amd-no-you-cant-make-an-open-source-hdmi-2-1-driver/ https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2024/02/hdmi-forum-to-amd-no...
- gjsman-1000 2y ago[flagged]
- dathery 2y agoWhy would a random small business owner have opinions about DisplayPort vs HDMI...? I do not think that is a very useful benchmark for evaluating technology standards, and it is kind of a conversation killer to use it to avoid engaging with specific technical points people are bringing up in reply to you. This is a technical discussion forum, after all.
- unclad5968 2y agoBy that logic HDMI would never have gotten popular in the first place. No small business owner ever cared about what cable they connect to their TV as long as they have access to it.
- Yeul 2y agoWasn't the DRM black box the whole reason why HDMI exists? Like I personally don't give a shit about that but content distributors do.
- jsheard 2y ago> DisplayPort, for most intents and purposes, has lost the format war. You buy a laptop - it’s HDMI on the side, not DisplayPort. The laptops USB-C ports probably speak DisplayPort though. There was another USB-C alt mode which carried HDMI instead but that spec was abandoned, DisplayPort is the de facto standard USB-C video protocol now.
- badlucklottery 2y agoYeah, DisplayPort "lost" w/r/t the connector but it seems like DP-over-USB-C is the way forward. Being able to put video, audio, power, and USB connectivity over one relatively common connector seems like the obvious choice.
- kccqzy 2y agoBesides DisplayPort over USB-C that people have already mentioned there's also eDP which is basically the standard for connecting a laptop's screen to its GPU. You buy a laptop, regardless of what external port it has, DisplayPort is used on the internal display. And since most laptop users don't regularly connect to external displays, one can certainly say that the usage of DisplayPort here far eclipses HDMI.
- immibis 2y agoI'm seeing less and less HDMI ports on computer monitors, graphics cards, projectors, etc. Since IIRC they charge a royalty per port, this makes a lot of sense. I buy a laptop - it's USB only. No HDMI, DisplayPort, VGA, headphone jack or anything else. When was the last time you bought one? I buy a desktop graphics card. 1 HDMI - for compatibility, you know - and 3 DisplayPort. The HDMI is port number 2. Last time I used a projector it was DisplayPort or VGA. I brought brought both kinds of adapters just in case. My newest monitor has power input, DisplayPort and VGA. No HDMI.
- Gigachad 2y agoDisplayPort in a way won. USB-C video is DisplayPort. And the HDMI port on your laptop is just an internal USB adapter for DisplayPort alt mode for hdmi.
- BonoboIO 2y agoHDMI should have made it easy to see what cable is supporting what. The HDMI versioning chaos did not help. The worst is still USB 3.1 Gen 2.1 Hyper Giga Super Speed Mark II
- radicality 2y agoYeah I have no idea how normal non-tech people are supposed to make any sense of USB-C cables and device compatibility. Even us tech people find it difficult. Small rant - I have the M1 Max MacBook which comes with “USB4”. I remember at some point getting a SanDisk external “USB4” ssd which claimed 20Gb/s, you would think it should all work together. But no, apparently the ssd needed 3.2 2x2 support, which the Mac doesn’t implement, since it’s apparently only a optional part of USB4 spec… One other funny thing - Apple’s page for “Identify the ports on your Mac” has 5 separate entries that are all USB-C shape. https://support.apple.com/en-us/109523 https://support.apple.com/en-us/109523
- wtallis 2y agoThe simple but disappointing answer is that if you want a guaranteed level of functionality, you need to be looking at the Thunderbolt branding and ignore almost all the USB nomenclature. IIRC, the inability of some Apple Silicon machines to drive multiple external displays is why they're only advertised as "Thunderbolt" rather than TB3, 4 or 5: the specs are strict enough that even Apple can't cut corners without consequences.
- russelg 2y agoI don't think this is true. If you look at the M4 MacBook Pro spec pages, it says Thunderbolt 4 for the base model, and Thunderbolt 5 for the M4 Pro models... https://www.apple.com/macbook-pro/specs/ https://www.apple.com/macbook-pro/specs/
- wtallis 2y agoThe ones listed as "Thunderbolt / USB 4" ie. not Thunderbolt 3, 4 or 5, appear to be exactly the models that are limited to one external display (I'm not 100% sure about the iMacs). The models you mention with M4 and M4 Pro are all capable of driving multiple external displays, and the difference between TB4 and TB5 for those models is one of the maximum data rate (40Gb/s vs 80Gb/s with an asymmetrical 120Gb/s mode). But I've never actually read a Thunderbolt spec, so I can't be sure exactly what disqualifies those "Thunderbolt / USB 4" from being advertised with a more recent Thunderbolt version number.
- dweekly 2y ago"...this would align the new HDMI standard with the latest DisplayPort 2.1 technologies"
- ivewonyoung 2y agoDP doesn't have eARC for audio, that won't work.
- jeffbee 2y agoDisplayPort "fast AUX" stream is more than capable of returning audio or even video data to the "source" and some videoconferencing rigs even implement this. But I don't see why the industry would be motivated to adopt and consolidate around that standard when HDMI's bidirectional features already exist and are widely supported.
- jauntywundrkind 2y agoAux is its own channel. And one I seriously wish for better used! It seems to only be USB2 capable but even that is rarely implemented!! So sad. But one of the neat things about DisplayPort is that it's a a packetized protocol, that many streams can go over. Which is why there can be multiple daisy chained monitors! So hypothetically the computer could stream out all manners of high bandwidth data. It's been neat to see a USB4 adaption, where DisplayPort tunnels USB4 for data coming from the computer, and the aux channel is used as the 480mbit return channel. I don't really have any knowledge of why the aux channel is regarded as not capable of multi gbit/s, and maybe that's not even true. Given what a terrible inflexible trash porting of the past HDMI is though, sure makes me wish folks would do more with all the possibilities DisplayPort has. And it makes me really really wish consumer electronics would please please please offer some DisplayPort. Given that usb-c mandates DisplayPort as a required alternate mode video system, maybe possibly hopefully this will be some leverage that starts prying these HDMI rent seeker's stranglehold open.
- jeffbee 2y agoThe physical layers of everything are converging. The breakthrough we need is on the logical layer, with peers describing their capabilities and working out a sensible, predictable suite of resulting functions. Right now there are _zero_ conventions for what the DP Aux stream should do, so random member of the public has no expectations. HDMI for the most part does what normal people expect. USB has maybe a few too many possible outcomes ... for example yesterday I discovered that my Pixel phone was charging my MacBook, instead of the other way around. Unfortunately working out a set of norms and expectations that are useful to users is harder than just making bits go over wires.