Meet Cable of the Future: CAT5e/6 Cable [UPD]
Who knew? The best cable is the one that we already had.
Today, to hook up our home theatre equipment in the simplest, easiest way, we use HDMI to pass through both our 1080p video and the lossless audio. But HDMI isn't the only game in town, as there's DisplayPort looming on the horizon too.
Did you know that we already had a cable standard solution suitable for our HD needs before HDMI and DisplayPort hit? It's that cable that you've been using for your networking all these years.
HDBaseT Alliance, the cross-industry alliance formed to promote and standardize the HDBaseT technology, announced today its formal incorporation, founded by LG, Samsung, Sony Pictures Entertainment and Valens Semiconductor.
The Alliance also announced the finalization of the HDBaseT 1.0 base specification. The cornerstone of HDBaseT technology is 5Play, a feature-set that converges full uncompressed HD video, audio, 100BaseT Ethernet, high power over cable and various control signals through a single 100m/328ft CAT5e/6 LAN cable. HDBaseT has the bandwidth to support video resolutions such as full HD 1080p as well as 3D and 2Kx4K formats. HDBaseT is the first to provide all-in-one connectivity, making it possible for a single-connector TV to receive power, video/audio, Internet and control signals from the same cable.
HDBaseT enables a network of sources — such as digital video recorders (DVR), Blu-ray disc players, game consoles, PCs and mobile devices — to be connected directly to displays in multiple locations. For instance, a DVR can be connected to several TVs throughout the home. This form of networking, whether it is done by daisy chaining devices or through star topology, can be applied in both the consumer home and in B2B cases such as digital signage networking.
The HDBaseT Alliance anticipates products with embedded HDBaseT technology to be available in the second half of 2010, with the majority of adoption taking place in 2011. The specification will also be available for licensing within the second half of 2010.
UPDATE: Check out the chart below for a comparison of various interconnect technologies.
- Build Your Own,
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- hdmi ,
- displayport ,
- hdbaset
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That is great news for all us who had the luxury of running CAT5 in our homes.
blue wires strikes again!
tbh, i found that blue slightly annoying after all these years...there should be a rainbow version
The new and improved....wheel!!
Cool! Who would have known that our CAT5 cables would still be in great usage today.
I imagined that these would have been obsolete with newer cables by the start of the decade...guess not
I should probably buy reels of this stuff before companies like Monster and Belkin decide to charge 30x its actual value, and cause all the prices to go up.
I have a 100m box of cat5 cable in my PC room, YAY me!!!
I actually already have something like this from monoprice.. They have plates you can buy that require 2 Cat 6/5 cables for 20 bucks.. It can do 1080p+audio but not powering the tv and such.. But still I've never heard of this HDBaseT company.. I wonder how expensive their products will be.. For some reason I'm guessing it will be all proprietary.
I guess I just don
Err, sorry - not sure what happened there. Never mind!
I bought 1000ft boxed spool of Cat5E for $60 (I think) few years back and I still have quite a bit left...
I hope this will become standard instead of HDMI or DisplayPort...
but you'll wonder how long till Monster charges $200 for 15ft Cat5E cable when it's literally fraction of pennies per foot?
blue wires strikes again!tbh, i found that blue slightly annoying after all these years...there should be a rainbow version
actually there are other colors, it's just that blue is more common in pictures I guess
Cat5/6 for everything! Yea!
I look forward to the day when I can just measure out the exact length I need, cut, crimp, and hook it up. No need to make 5 trips to the electronics store looking for adapters.
Kinda makes sense really, CAT6 being used for Gigabit LAN. What's the bitrate of uncompressed hi-def video? A lot less than the capabilities of CAT6 and then some.
So, how long till we see graphics cards, monitors, TVs, DVRs, Bluray players with an RJ45 port?
I can't believe that they can run enough current through there to satisfy a TV.
We have cat 5e running all over the house. yay!
hmm.. One (old) cable to rule them all
I wonder what Toshiba gonna come up with now..
DARN! - I'm 6 years ahead of my time...all my friends thought I was *NUTZ* Cat6'ing every room in the house. I put 3x points in every room, patio, plus more spares in the ceiling - #24 in total.....and now its a standard! YESSSSSSS....BUT:
(Footnote: I'm just about to move out of this house now into a place without *any* networking.....*hangs head in shame*)
HDMI was only implemented to allow control by content providers and copyright holders. It is not a better technology for the consumer. It is a control technology for the MPAA.
Moving house soon, before I move I think I will take the opportunity to lay CAT5E or CAT6 to every room in the house under the floorboards and being the walls. I can buy 300 meters of the stuff, connectors, crimper, wall sockets for a snip over £50.
I don't like this at all. Cat5 is unshielded and susceptible to external interference. HDMI and Displayport are both shielded cables. The article doesn't specify what connector will be used, but if they use the RJ45 connector, that's a lot less robust than HDMI or Displayport. How many times have you broken the locking tab off an RJ45 connector? Happens all the time. Also going to only 8 wires in a Cat5 cable, that's not enough to carry video and audio channels on their own dedicated wires, so they must be using some kind of network protocol to encode all the data. You know the MPAA had a say in this, so this encoded data is also encrypted I'm willing to bet. Say good-bye to all your low cost splitters, breakout boxes, and accessories. This is going to make home A/V very complicated and very expensive for the consumer. Two thumbs down!!
I can't believe that they can run enough current through there to satisfy a TV.
I was thinking the same thing. I would hate to see the cost of the POE switch that can do that many watts in one port.
So you're saying I shouldn't get rid of my box full of 6 to 25 feet patch cords? That buying a 20$ 6' HDMI cable is actually a ripoff (I had a hunch)?
This is nothing but good news for everyone, except obviously for companies like Monster.
Happy to see groups working together on cable standards.
Time to run Cat6 in the house
Simply saying cat 5(e,6) is unshielded and therefore susceptible to interference is an extremely ignorant statement, especially since #1 it is not very susceptible to interference and #2 you can buy it shielded if you want to. Research twisted pair you may be in danger of learning something.
Also cat 5(e,6) can be bought in any color
This is a great idea but now we have to wait until consumer products are outfitted with RJ45 ports. Hope they schedule for late 2010 and 1H 2011 is true as I plan on redoing my home theater and building a new HTPC next spring.
Well, Denon manages to charge $499 for 1.5 meters already...
http://www.usa.denon.com/productdetails/3429.asp
erhm. Soo... this "group" is going to create something that already exists and charge a license fee for it? It's the classic middle-man scam I guess.
fficial&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&cid=8182847133907856812&ei=OzgzTKjgG4H98AaWjs38Ag&sa=X&oi=product_catalog_result&ct=image&resnum=4&ved=0CEEQ8gIwAw#">
fficial&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&cid=8182847133907856812&ei=OzgzTKjgG4H98AaWjs38Ag&sa=X&oi=product_catalog_result&ct=image&resnum=4&ved=0CEEQ8gIwAw#" title="http://www.google.com/products/catalog?q=hdmi+to+cat5&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US
edit:
oh well, guess thg can't handle links very well. search Google for HDMI to CAT5
Wow, how confusing will this get? "Hey which plug goes from the TV to the cable box? The little square one? Which little square one?"
It's nice that they have so many options running on one cable but what could the possible application be for all of these? Why would you need to haul internet or low power (there will *not* be enough to operate a TV over 19") if you are just sending video to a TV? Why would you need video hauled through the wire if you are using the internet and power for a cable box that makes it's own video?
How many people are going to spend thousands of dollars on these new devices and then thousands of dollars on wiring upgrades and a switchbox to make it all work? And then how long after that before the MPAA/others come down hard and say that these boxes don't have strong enough restrictions on them and blacklisting all the bluray players or cable boxes since HDCP isn't enforced?
This technology is Utopian, but I don't see it getting legs for a really really long time.
DARN! - I'm 6 years ahead of my time...all my friends thought I was *NUTZ* Cat6'ing every room in the house. I put 3x points in every room, patio, plus more spares in the ceiling - #24 in total.....and now its a standard! YESSSSSSS....BUT
well in their defense, 6 years ago you over paid for the cat6 cable. should have just used cat5e would have been much cheaper and still runs gigabit.
I have my doubts about future bandwidth needs. No doubt it is fast enough for a single component streaming to TVs, so long as all of the TVs display the same video stream. However, I doubt it will allow multiple streams to multiple devices in a network. Also, note that it only allows a 100 Mbps connection for normal / Internet connectivity. I also doubt the current capacity of PoE is anywhere near enough to power large TVs.
Don't get me wrong. I think it is a wonderful idea. But I think I will wait for Intel's Light Peak technology before I start laying cable.
I have my doubts about future bandwidth needs. No doubt it is fast enough for a single component streaming to TVs, so long as all of the TVs display the same video stream. However, I doubt it will allow multiple streams to multiple devices in a network. Also, note that it only allows a 100 Mbps connection for normal / Internet connectivity. I also doubt the current capacity of PoE is anywhere near enough to power large TVs.
Don't get me wrong. I think it is a wonderful idea. But I think I will wait for Intel's Light Peak technology before I start laying cable.