Can We Skip DVI And HDMI?
ALL IT takes is one look at the dizzying array of available video source formats, delivery formats, and display formats to get a sense of the complexity we're often faced with in a typical pro AV project. Sometimes we have to do a lot of mixing, matching, processing, scaling up, converting down, routing, and switching to make a video system do what we want it to do.
Following this logic, it will also likely mean that storage, management, control, and delivery of high-resolution video over an IP network may become attractive enough to be a more common alternative to analog or current non-network digital video sooner rather than later. We have the technology for this to happen — almost.
There are still a lot of parameters that have to be just right for it to work at this stage. But perhaps at some point, we can leave HDMI for the desktop and use the network to deliver video instead. Maybe the network cloud that keeps showing up in AV system drawings really has a silver lining after all.
Tim Cape is a contributing editor for Pro AV and the principal consultant for Atlanta-based technology consulting firm Technitect LLC. He's an instructor for the ICIA Audiovisual Design School and an active member of the consultant's councils for both ICIA and NSCA. Contact him at tim@technitect.com.
