Your 36 x 36 video switch has arrived

AT ANOTHER OF the pre-show shows, we ran into a company called RTCcom, maker of video switches and converters. They had a single big box and some smaller ones, all of which did some pretty neat things.

The big one is called the digital Matrix Router, and the technology scales up to a 36 x 36 port switch. As you can see, you can install blades all over with three ports per, here they have mostly DVI installed.

You can put in DVI, HDMI or even Displayport if you choose, and it will convert between them and keep HDCP DRM infection compliance. There is no pricing yet, but there obviously will be when it comes out soon.

Next up is a much smaller box, or pair of boxes, that do HDMI over fibre.

It works like this: there is a transmitter and receiver box, each has an HDMI port on one side, a fibre out on the other. You can separate the two by up to a kilometer of cable, and it just works. It will send all of the HDMI signal, along with sound, and keep DRM intact. For those needing to keep your TV more than a Km away from your PC, this will not work for you.

In a similar vein, they have a bunch of DVI and HDMI over Cat5 boxes. They look just like the above box by instead of fiber out the back, they have Cat5. Useful if you have ethernet running all over your house and you don't want to rewire for HD video. µ