# Sending video signal through a couple of walls.



## gafftaper (Jan 2, 2014)

I have a lovely large screen HD TV out in the lobby of my new theater which is wired into the building wide announcement network, and not to my on stage camera. About 40' away I have access to the video feed at my stage manger rack. The problem is there are several concrete walls in between. Installing conduit and punching holes through the walls would get really expensive quick. Is there an HD wireless transmitter capable of going through several layers of cinderblock?


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## Footer (Jan 2, 2014)

Is there cat 5 anywhere close to both places? 

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## MNicolai (Jan 2, 2014)

I don't imagine you'll find a more inexpensive solution than drilling into concrete. It shouldn't be that expensive, particularly if you have access to a hammer drill.

If you hired this out to a contractor, figure most of the final bill would be for the time the contractor spends pushing a drill into the wall.

Don't get me wrong, there are still expenses in conduit, conduit hangers, and firestop (if any of these walls are fire walls), but if you do it internally, I bet it'd be less than the cost of a quality wireless solution, and nothing comes to mind that would get you 40' through concrete.

If you have an existing CAT5E infrastructure, you could potentially route the signals around without making new penetrations into concrete, but you'll still spend a good chunk of change on a quality transmitter and receiver.

You may just want to call an electrician and see what it'd cost. It's probably not as bad as you think.


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## gafftaper (Jan 3, 2014)

The Cat5 is an interesting idea. There are data ports all over the place I just have no idea where they go to. I'll have to ask around to see if there's a patch bay somewhere not too far off that I could use to make point a go to point b. If it's close this could be a simple solution.

Note: It's not through 40 feet of concrete. It's forty feet away and there are two or three concrete walls in between, some cinder block some appear to be poured, but it kind of depends on which way you go. I'm now thinking with a little bit of creative cabling and a hole punched in one cinder wall, I could get it down to having a transmitter on one side and a receiver on the other side of the same solid pour wall.


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## Footer (Jan 3, 2014)

gafftaper said:


> The Cat5 is an interesting idea. There are data ports all over the place I just have no idea where they go to. I'll have to ask around to see if there's a patch bay somewhere not too far off that I could use to make point a go to point b. If it's close this could be a simple solution.



Follow that cat5. Odds are there is a patch panel in a wiring closet somewhere that you can patch accross. It will be at least 300' away from your booth, so there is a start at least. Talk to the IT guy. Then just buy some balums and go at it.


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## derekleffew (Jan 3, 2014)

Footer said:


> ... It will be at least 300' away from your booth, ...


Did you mean to say, "It will be a maximum of 300' (100m)" away from your booth?


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## porkchop (Jan 5, 2014)

I've seen wireless HDMI equipment but from what I've heard it only works well within line of sight and everything I've seen is mid-consumer grade at best.


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## porkchop (Jan 5, 2014)

derekleffew said:


> Did you mean to say, "It will be a maximum of 300' (100m)" away from your booth?


Derek you should know anything useful that you need will be AT LEAST 300 ft. away from where you need it to be.


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## Lextech (Jan 5, 2014)

porkchop said:


> Derek you should know anything useful that you need will be AT LEAST 300 ft. away from where you need it to be.



Well, at least 25 feet more then the cable you are carrying or the max length of transmission of the device you want to use. Over CAT 5, 300 feet is about it for the video extenders I have seen. When we tied our three theaters together we used fiber. Much better range.


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## derekleffew (Jan 5, 2014)

What I was getting at was max. length of CAT5 is 100m (330ft.) without hub/switch/booster in line.


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## Footer (Jan 5, 2014)

derekleffew said:


> Did you mean to say, "It will be a *maximum* of 300' (100m)" away from your booth?




derekleffew said:


> What I was getting at was max. length of CAT5 is 100m (330ft.) without hub/switch/booster in line.



Yup. I mis-typed. I never do that.


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## gafftaper (Jan 5, 2014)

I've got a nice clean signal to the SM panel, and plenty of room to put in some sort of booster or whatever I need to split it off and run it wherever.


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## zmb (Jan 6, 2014)

gafftaper said:


> The Cat5 is an interesting idea. There are data ports all over the place I just have no idea where they go to. I'll have to ask around to see if there's a patch bay somewhere not too far off that I could use to make point a go to point b. If it's close this could be a simple solution.



Are you lucky enough to have a "lighting network" that's separate from the main building network? If so, it would likely terminate in the dimmer room and you would be able to patch it as needed without going through your district's IT department. I've seen this with both Strand and ETC installs where they get separate wall plates that have a DMX connection and a locking Ethernet connection.


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## rsmentele (Jan 6, 2014)

If 330' is not enough, these extenders will send 1080p up to 450' ( I have tried as proof of spec)

http://www.fullcompass.com/product/409614.html


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## Lextech (Jan 10, 2014)

This just showed up for me: http://www.gefen.com/kvm/gtv-whd-1080p-lr-blk.jsp?prod_id=10922
Don't know anything about it but it says 100 feet wireless HDMI signal through walls.


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## gafftaper (Jan 10, 2014)

Thanks, let me know how it goes! 

I think I may have a solution. The guy who runs the video system that does all the school commercials (the one this TV is hooked into), thinks that if he add an encoder to the system he can stream video to any TV on the network. If all goes well, I may get this upgrade done for me without having to pay for it!


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## sk8rsdad (Jan 10, 2014)

If you are going that route you may want to look into http://zeevee.com. We acquired a ZvPro at the advice of @museav. After a few teething pains mostly to do with signal levels and our existing wiring are quite happy with the results. Make sure your HD TV is compatible. A QAM tuner is a must.

My only gripe is the cooling fan is the loudest thing in the booth.


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## pmolsonmus (Jan 23, 2014)

Pardon my ignorance but my understanding is that to run video through Cat5 you need a dedicated line separate from the network. I' m basing that on info I received when setting up a green room monitor. Willing to be wrong.
My initial easy solution would be to try an Apple TV -HDMI out to your set. Input could be from an iPhone, iPad or other device on the same network and using mirroring via airplay. Don't know if you have access. 

Phil


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## StradivariusBone (Jan 23, 2014)

I had a worship director at the church I part-time at want to use Apple TV for streaming video. It _worked_, but the audio never synced properly and the latency was very noticeable since the TV's were placed just outside the main part of the building in the surrounding hallways where you can hear the speaker through the doors. Frame rate at times was below 10. The bandwidth on the WIFI network was just not enough to accommodate the stream. We had three Apple TV's feeding from an iMac using AirParrot. I never explored it further because it seemed like a lost cause. My suggestion was to run Cat5 since there's plenty of hardware to use for that, but things were purchased before I could get involved. They no longer use display mirroring and just use the FlickR app to do a slideshow of events. 

If you've got Cat5/6 anywhere in the building you could patch it to where you need it. I just did something similar to move a router out on our catwalk and patched our GLD80 into it without running a ton of cable. I just patched the router into a wall plate, patched that run to a run that goes to our control booth and Bob's your uncle as the saying goes. As long as the run to the MDF isn't stupid long, it should work.


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## gafftaper (Feb 19, 2014)

Updated information and new questions. 

My camera goes into a Extron Distribuition amplifier in the control booth at the back of the theater. It then sends a signals 100=150' to three TV's in my green room. I get a really nice picture on these TV's. 

Part of the greenroom dressing room area is my office. There is a port on the wall of my office which appears to be one of these Extron VGA Extenders (it looks the same but there's no model information in the lower corner as in the picture). I'm told that this port is a direct line to the TV in my lobby which I am trying to get signal to. My predecessor put a splitter on the back of one of these Greenroom monitors, and installed one of these Sewell BNC to 15 pin VGA converters. He then ran a cable to the Extron wall port in order to get signal to the TV in the Lobby. I've set it up and it barely works the signal is really fuzzy and drops out, when you get a signal at all. 

So I have everything I need to make this work without punching holes in concrete walls. But I need to do some upgrading or tweaking to make it all work. If I'm reading everything right, that extra wall jack has an amplifier built in so I should be good to go from there back to the TV. My signal is boosted before it leaves that distribution amplifier. So I'm thinking my weak link is either the converter or i need to do some messing around with the settings on my Extron gear. 

Thoughts of what my next step should be?


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## Jay Ashworth (Feb 19, 2014)

Markertek should have some wireless HDMI, if you can handle their non-consumer pricing. I believe they'll also have HDMI-Cat5/6 baluns in their catalog.


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## Jay Ashworth (Feb 19, 2014)

If you lift the BNC off that Sewell converter that's patched to the Extender VGA in, and you hook the BNC to a composite monitor, what sort of picture do you get?

If it's decent, then yeah, something is probably misconfigured in the extender.

It's also possible that the converter is for some reason configured to run an unnecessarily higher scan rate than NTSC requires, and while the monitor will track it, it's mediocre at that scan rate, in which case, finding a way to lock the converter down to 640x480 would be your next move.

I assume the Extender has a matching unit near the remote monitor?

And where did HDMI go?


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## gafftaper (Feb 19, 2014)

Jay Ashworth said:


> And where did HDMI go?


No HDMI anywhere. To clarify the whole run... 
The camera , a fancy Sony robotic wall mounted security camera, has a bnc jack on the back. This runs 10' to an Extron splitter/amplifier. Those signals run to various TVs backstage 100'-150' away. We have a bnc splitter on the back of one of those TVs, plugged into the Sewell converter. Then 15'-20' of 15 pin VGA cable which plugs into the Extron wall plate/amplifier for a final 100' run to the TV.


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## Jay Ashworth (Feb 19, 2014)

gafftaper said:


> No HDMI anywhere. To clarify the whole run...
> The camera , a fancy Sony robotic wall mounted security camera, has a bnc jack on the back. This runs 10' to an Extron splitter/amplifier. Those signals run to various TVs backstage 100'-150' away. We have a bnc splitter on the back of one of those TVs, plugged into the Sewell converter. Then 15'-20' of 15 pin VGA cable which plugs into the Extron wall plate/amplifier for a final 100' run to the TV.



All the things I said earlier, plus unplug the tee from the TV: it and the sewall may be double terminating that run.

Pro monitors have a manual switch to lift the termination resistor inside, fixing this problem. If removing the T connector from the monitor fixes the signal at the other end of the VGA cable, this is your problem... and if you don't have the switch, you will need to replace the local monitor with one which does. Or, refigure the entire extra link.


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## Jay Ashworth (Feb 19, 2014)

Yup, I'm not crazy, your first posting said HDTV, and HD wireless.


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## gafftaper (Feb 20, 2014)

It is an HD TV and I originally thought that the camera was sending an HD image into the system. But alas once I got up to the camera and got to the amplifier on the back of the rack I found out it was just a bnc from the source.


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## Jay Ashworth (Feb 20, 2014)

Well, another possibility is that everything is working ok, and 350 line security cameras simply look $#!tty on 50" HDTVs.


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## michael.garofalo.796 (Feb 20, 2014)

gafftaper said:


> It is an HD TV and I originally thought that the camera was sending an HD image into the system. But alas once I got up to the camera and got to the amplifier on the back of the rack I found out it was just a bnc from the source.




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## venuetech (Feb 20, 2014)

Often there are penetrations through concrete walls for plumbing or conduits. there may be enuf room to share. use plenum grade cable.
It may be worth your while to explore a bit.


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## Chris15 (Feb 20, 2014)

Have you tried the old trick of a temporary cable out of the DA, across the floor, through the door and out to the lobby to check the base image quality?


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## gafftaper (Feb 20, 2014)

I just plugged a laptop into the wall mount Extron 15 pin VGA amplifier which goes directly to the TV. Unfortunately the TV only said it was unable to display that video format.

Anybody know why?


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## Jay Ashworth (Feb 20, 2014)

Sure. Cause ... well, actually, there's probably a couple of reasons.

Time to fall back on "diagnose it one step at a time". 

Will the laptop drive the HDTV directly? If so, reset it temporarily to 640x480 display size and confirm it still does.

Then move it to the other end of the extender, and see if 640x480 works from there, too. I don't know that we have any way yet to be sure your extender link is actually functional...

If you can get both of those working, then plug the Sewall converter back in, and try lifting the tee from the monitor, as I suggested above.

Note that the HDTV will likely *tell you* what scan rate it's at, when you first switch it to VGA input, so if they Sewall is at the wrong (too high) speed, you can find out -- although there may not be any way to change it.


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## gafftaper (Feb 21, 2014)

Thanks. I'll work on it tomorrow.


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## zmb (Feb 21, 2014)

On both Windows and Mac, you should be able to change the refresh rate and resolution independently. With everything between the computer and final source, your OS probably isn't going to recognize what's connected and not be able to auto-select best settings.

For my setup, I see that I have a "Thinkpad Display 1600x900" (Max Resolution 1600x900) and a Sync Master (Max Resolution (1680x1050). I can't set resolutions outside of what each one will support.

Do you see specific product names or something like "PnP Display" or "Generic Monitor" along with whole range of resolutions from 640x480 to 2560x1440?

Or if refresh settings aren't there, look under the vendor-specific software. I'm assuming this will be a school laptop with integrated graphics. Your window might not look the same as I just ran updates:

Generally, this can be reached by right-clicking on the desktop and selecting "Graphics Properties"

Or there's the possibility that the Extron system is manipulating the signal and just not switching to use the VGA input.


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## Dan0010 (Apr 5, 2014)

did you check the tv side. how is the tv connected? is it a rgbhv setup or just a composite? the other guy might have been using the extender to simply think that he can use the bnc to vga adapter.


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## Jay Ashworth (Apr 12, 2014)

So, Gaff; how did this turn out?


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