Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide © 2009 Crestron Electronics, Inc. 15 Volvo Drive Rockleigh, NJ 07647 800.237.2041 www.crestron.com HDMI™ and High Definition Multimedia Interface are trademarks of HDMI Licensing, LLC in the United States and other countries. All brand names, product names and trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide CONTENTS What is Crestron DigitalMedia™? .................................................................................................................................... 1 What is HDMI? ................................................................................................................................................................... 1 Advantages of HDMI versus Analog Interfaces ...........................................................................
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Output Cards ................................................................................................................................................................ 29 DM-MD8X8 Output Cards .......................................................................................................................................... 29 DM-MD16X16 Factory-Installed Output Cards ............................................................................................
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide What is Crestron DigitalMedia™? There's no question that the digital age is here today. Analog television is off the air; practically every device that plugs into a display has an HDMI port; the latest MacBooks® only provide DisplayPort outputs; laptops now include built-in Blu-ray players; and the latest video conferencing systems feature HDMI/DVI outputs exclusively. The products you're using now won't work for much longer.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Quality: Because HDMI is a digital interface, it has lossless transmission and provides the best video quality, unlike analog video. The difference is especially noticeable in low brightness scenes and at higher resolutions, such as 1080p. Digital video is sharper than component, and eliminates the softness and ghosting found with component. Small high contrast details, such as text, especially bring out this difference.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide This portion of the guide addresses the need for the move to HDMI and explains the new features that HDMI supports. We’ll demystify the “handshaking” that occurs between HDMI sources, repeaters, and displays, and explore the cause of some common problems experienced in the field.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide The complexity of HDMI becomes obvious when you compare HDMI cable to analog audio and video cables. Analog cables typically consist of one to three wire pairs, depending on the format, and they simply carry an audio or video signal (not both). In contrast, the HDMI cable consists of 19 wires, which carry high speed video, audio and other digital information. The digital audio and video data is encoded into three color channels and a clock channel.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide In the simplest installations, with one television and an audio processor, the EDID protocol works reasonably well. Multiroom installations, on the other hand, can quickly become problematic, with several televisions connected to several sources through one or more HDMI switches. The switches are responsible for collecting all of the televisions’ EDID and providing one unified version to the source.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide HDCP HDCP encryption is another complicating factor in HDMI installations. The HDCP system has two parts: 1. 2. Authenticates HDCP devices to make sure they are authorized to receive the content Encrypts the content to prevent interception during transmission Authentication ensures that all devices receiving the content are licensed and authorized. Only after successful authentication can the display output the audio and video streams.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Installers must be aware of KSV limit issues in any HDMI installation that involves more than one display. Be sure to research how your equipment handles scenarios that violate source KSV limits using the device list (page 42) and by testing devices in the field. Consumer Electronics Control (CEC) Each HDMI cable contains a communication link that enables devices connected via HDMI to talk to each other. This protocol is called Consumer Electronics Control (CEC).
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Crestron DigitalMedia solves this problem by offering special HDMI cards that will take in a multi-channel audio stream and output both types of audio for distribution. These special cards are noted by a –DSP suffix. Convergence HDMI enables computers to deliver premium media content, including high-definition movies and multi-channel audio formats.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Crestron DigitalMedia Crestron DigitalMedia distributes uncompressed digital audio and video signals over a choice of CAT5e/6-based twisted pair copper wire or duplex multimode fiber cable. A full selection of switcher input cards, transmitters, and room controllers (receivers), provides extensive connectivity throughout the installation, supporting a complete range of analog and digital signal types.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide USB HID Switch DigitalMedia lets you centralize all HD sources – not just television receivers and DVD changers, but also media servers, computers, and even video game consoles. Built-in USB HID (Human Interface Device) signal routing allows USB HID compatible keyboards, mice, and game controllers to be connected at each display location, extending their signals through to the centralized equipment via USB HID ports provided on select switcher input cards.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Built-in Ethernet Switch DigitalMedia also carries 10/100 Ethernet to each room controller, supporting streaming media for multimedia devices, or providing LAN connectivity for any room device that requires Ethernet or Internet access. Its Gigabit Ethernet connection to the external LAN helps maximize bandwidth for each network port.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Switcher Based Systems DM room boxes (both CAT and Fiber versions) come fully equipped with an integrated Ethernet switch, and a “spare” port is provided. In a scenario when the room box is connected to a DM switcher, this port can be used for connecting other Ethernet devices. In a point-to-point scenario, the Ethernet port can be used as an uplink to the main network.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Application Diagrams Residential Multi-Room Distribution Multi room distribution in residential environments involves the combining of several sources and format types to different makes and resolutions of displays. Crestron Digital Media enables the distribution, resolution determination and HDCP management across a minimal whole home infrastructure. DM allows a homeowner to play the content where they want it, when they want without comprising resolution.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Commercial Video Conference Room Video conference rooms require combining disparate media to be transmitted to a remote location and on multiple local displays simultaneously. All teleconference CODEC’s now provide an HD signal via HDMI with HDCP protection.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Commercial Small Room with Single Display An average simple presentation room is equipped with a single display and several analog and digital sources for the presenter, including a laptop port. In addition, the instructor has a local display to view their computer output. These smaller rooms usually have very tight space requirements for equipment in the lectern.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Commercial Conference Room with MPS, QM and DM Components With a number of input card options and room controller boxes Crestron Digital Media can be easily incorporated into existing Crestron Quick Media distribution systems. Integrating Digital media distribution into your existing topology provides access to High Definition content without having to rebuild an entire install.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Digital Signage System Digital Out-Of-Home advertising and information systems require dynamic high resolution graphics, glitch free switching and a straight forward topology. Crestron Digital Media provides the best method of content delivery in High Definition. Multi-source, multi-display HDMI distribution Long distance capability using CRESFIBER Source computer control via HID USB connection on any DM-RMC Check website (www.crestron.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Multi-Window Processing, Annotation, and DM Switching and Distribution Displaying and annotating multisource/multi-display HD content transmitted over HDMI can be complicated or nearly impossible as most systems cannot maintain HDCP across multiple points. Crestron DM combined with the DVPHD video processor provides HD multi-window processing, annotation and switching.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Large-Scale System Large scale distribution systems require switcher systems with the flexibility and power to manage multiple source and destination resolutions and HDCP keys. 16 input card slots (field upgradable) Two output module slots with up to eight outputs on each module (not field upgradable) Full audio and USB breakaway 7-space 19-inch rack-mountable Check website (www.crestron.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Design and Install a DigitalMedia System This section will take you though the four steps to successfully designing a Crestron DigitalMedia™ system. The steps are as follows: Step 1 – Selecting Wiring Type The choice of cable determines the output cards and room controllers. Step 2 – Select DigitalMedia Equipment Choosing the correct switch frame, input and output cards, and distribution boxes. Step 3 – Pre-wiring Notes and recommendations on wiring the system.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Table A CresCAT-D DigitalMedia Cable 1080i / 720p / 1080p 24Hz 45m (150 ft) H (Distance between repeaters) 60m (200 ft) 1024x768 75Hz 45m (150 ft) 60m (200 ft) 1280x1024 75Hz 30m (100 ft) 1600x1200 60Hz 23m (75 ft) 1920x1200 60Hz 30m (100 ft) 45m (150 ft) 1080p 60Hz 30m (100 ft) 45m (150 ft) Resolution 1080p 60Hz Deep Color H (Distance between repeaters) T (Total distance using up to three repeaters) 120m (400 ft) 45m (150 ft) 38m (125 ft) 30m (10
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide DigitalMedia Cable This cable is specially engineered for DigitalMedia by Crestron. Up to two patch panels may be used on any DigitalMedia Cable run, but they must use shielded connectors rated for CAT6a. Because the “D” video cable is shielded, it must be terminated using shielded RJ45 connectors provided by Crestron (DM-CONN). These connectors can be terminated without any specials tools; all that is needed is a wire cutter. Refer to Data Sheet Doc.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide CresFiber™ Crestron makes available a multimode fiber solution for DigitalMedia called CresFiber. It contains four strands of 50 micron multimode fiber for long distance transmission inside a single jacket. Two strands are used for DigitalMedia and the other two strands are available for redundancy and expansion. DigitalMedia fibers use high performance OM3 cores with an EMB rating of over 1000MHz-km at 850nm to achieve long transmission distances.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide To calculate the distance that a DigitalMedia fiber transmission can be run, divide the bandwidth rating of the fiber by the DigitalMedia bandwidth. NOTE: Maximum distance is 1000 ft. Example: Corning® infiniCor600® has the following bandwidth ratings: 500MHz*km @ 850nm and 500MHz*km @ 1300nm. How far can you send DigitalMedia over that fiber? NOTE: 1,000 feet is the maximum distance. 850nm: 500MHz*km / 1200MHz = 416m (1365 ft) 1300nm: 500MHz*km / 150MHz = 3.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Wiring Connection Example of copper and fiber room controller wiring connections to a DM-MD8X8 Switcher. Check website (www.crestron.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Step 2: Select DigitalMedia Equipment Switcher Chassis There are two DigitalMedia switcher card frames available, 8X8 and 16X16. Each switcher permits inputs to be cascaded up to four additional switchers, increasing the number of available outputs in the system. For example, using five DM-MD16X16 switchers in a system permits a total of 80 available outputs.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide DigitalMedia Switcher Input Cards - Local Sources All input cards provide an HDMI “loop output” for switcher expansion. DMC-HD Includes HDMI 1.3a input, RCA analog audio output (which breaks out the embedded HDMI audio to feed a multi-room audio distribution system), and USB HID port (passes a remote mouse/keyboard signal to the source device, i.e. computer, game console, etc.). DMC-HD-DSP Includes HDMI 1.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide DigitalMedia Switcher Input Cards - Remote Sources DMC-CAT Receives a DigitalMedia signal from a DigitalMedia transmitter via CAT5e/6 or DigitalMedia Cable. Includes DigitalMedia input ports, and RCA analog audio output to break out audio embedded in the DigitalMedia signal. DMC-CAT-DSP Receives a DigitalMedia signal from a DigitalMedia transmitter via CAT5e/6 or DigitalMedia Cable with internal DSP processing to enable simultaneous 7.1 and 2-channel audio output.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Output Cards A complete selection of cards is offered to allow numerous combinations of DM (DigitalMedia) and HDMI outputs on a single DM-MD chassis. DigitalMedia output boards are available in three types; DM output cards hold two boards, any two boards may be combined per output card. Refer to the following tables for part numbers and available board combinations. Both CAT (twisted-pair) and fiber DM output types are available.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Online Configuration – A convenient on-line program is available to make switcher system configuration simple: www.crestron.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide DigitalMedia Room Controller DM-RMC-100 and DM-RMC-100-F DM-RMC-100 The DigitalMedia Room Controllers feature a low profile design, perfect for installation behind flat panel displays and above ceiling mounted projectors. The DM CAT version (DMRMC-100) mounts on a standard 2-gang or 4 in electrical box, and extends approximately one inch from the surface.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide DMCI DigitalMedia Card Interface The DMCI is a 1/2-space rack-mountable enclosure designed to allow the use of a single DMC-Series DM Switcher Input Card to support a variety of interface functions. The DMCI is a perfect companion to Crestron HD-MD8X1 and HD-MD8X2 QuickSwitch HD™ HDMI switchers, allowing virtually any AV source to be connected and routed through the switcher as a fully-digital HDMI signal.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide DMCI in an Example System DMCI/DM Input card set provide analog video to HDMI conversion DMCI/DM Input card set extracts audio from HDMI signal and provides volume control DMCI/DM Input card set provides DVI with balanced audio input for an HDMI switcher System maintains HDMI fast switching with full HDCP compliance DM-TX1-1G and DM-RX1-1G The DM-TX1-1G is a single-gang DM-Compatible HDMI transmitter. The DM-RX1-1G is a single-gang DM-Compatible HDMI receiver.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide DM Transmitters DM transmitters provide the ability to add remote sources to the switcher system via DM cables and DM-CAT or Fiber Cards. DM transmitters may be used in conjunction with DM switchers, repeaters and receivers.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide DM-TX-300 DigitalMedia HDMI, DVI + Component Transmitter The TX-300 allows any common AV signal over a single wire (video, RGB, DVI, HDMI, DisplayPort (multimode), and the HDMI or DVI input). It supports USB keyboard and mouse and provides an Ethernet port. This combination enables the DM-TX-300 to replace three traditionally separate pieces of equipment – the analog video extender, digital video extender and USB extender.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide DM-MD6X1 Transmitter The DM-MD6X1 is a low cost digital video distribution system designed for a small conference room or classroom. It can replace three different products: analog video extenders, digital video extenders and USB extenders. It has a variety of input formats built into the unit enabling you to get all your analog and digital signals into the system without any DM cards.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide DM-MD6X1 Example Application Diagram Check website (www.crestron.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide DigitalMedia Repeater DM-DR Reproduces signal for error-free delivery with DigitalMedia Cable. Up to three repeaters can be installed in a given signal path.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide HDMI Switchers HD-MD8X1 and HD-MD8X2 QuickSwitch HD switchers from Crestron enable high-performance HDMI signal selection with groundbreaking new features designed by Crestron to deliver trouble-free, low-latency switching of all your DVD and Blu-ray Disc™ players, HDTV receivers, media servers, game consoles, multimedia computers, surround processors and high-def displays. The HD-MD8X1 model features eight HDMI 1.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Step 3: Prewiring HDCP Wiring Notes When HDCP is not used, there are no midpoint limitations inherent to DigitalMedia (as with QuickMedia®). When HDCP is used, too many hops in a single signal path (source to sink) can create potential HDCP problems. The maximum number of hops is six (i.e., source to wallplate to switcher to receiver to display is three; DM repeaters and DM receivers are not added to the count). Contact Crestron Sales Support Services for design support.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Step 4: System Commissioning The commissioning process tunes the system for optimal performance. Commissioning may be done from the front panel of the DM switcher or using the Wizard in Tool Box. The DigitalMedia system works out of the box to route any of the sources to any display to test the signal flow. Once all of the equipment is installed, the system requires commissioning which tests the integrity and capabilities of cable, sources and destinations.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Appendix A - The Device List HDCP Limits in Source Devices All HDMI sources that utilize HDCP limit the number of devices that may be connected at any given time. An important aspect of HDCP is its use of “keys” to manage the handshaking that occurs between any two devices.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide DigitalMedia Source Testing The Crestron DigitalMedia solution tests each source HDCP limit when the system is commissioned. It allows the installer to limit the number of zones for each source to minimize the number of connected devices. Potential problem areas are pointed out by the DigitalMedia system. Installation problems can be avoided by selecting source equipment that have greater HDCP limits and designing around any low HDCP limit sources.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Device List as of 5/29/2009 The following is a list of the devices Crestron has tested, and the maximum number of devices each supports.
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Glossary Video Resolution Terminology 1080i An HDTV standard that specifies an interlaced resolution of 1920 x 1080. 1080p 1080p refers to the 1920x1080 “progressive scan” HDTV format. 1080p is currently the highest resolution in the HDTV standard. 480i 480 interlaced; a form of standard definition digital television (SDTV) that approximates the quality of analog television but not considered high definition television (HDTV).
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Video Display Terminology Aspect Ratio The ratio of width to height in a video picture or other graphic image. Traditional U.S. TV broadcasts and computer monitors feature a 4:3 aspect ratio; HDTV has a 16:9 ratio. 16:9 Sometimes expressed as 16 x 9 or 16 by 9 (known as 1.78:1 in the film world).
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide DVI Digital Visual Interface; a digital interface specification created by an industry consortium, the Digital Display Working Group. This universal standard for connecting flat panel monitors is also used for data projectors, plasma displays, and digital TVs. Using a DVI connector and port, a digital signal sent to an analog device is converted into an analog signal (if the device is digital, such as a flat panel monitor, no conversion is necessary).
Crestron DigitalMedia™ Design Guide Encoding Terminology AC-3 This digital surround sound format for home audio is called Dolby Digital in theaters. It is a 5:1 format, with six separate audio tracks. AC-3 has been chosen as the official sound format for digital TV and is commonly used to encode DVD soundtracks. Authentication Authentication ensures that digital data transmissions are delivered to the intended receiver. Authentication also assures the receiver of the integrity of the data and its source.
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