System Setup
HDMI Setup
About HDMI
HDMI (High-Definition Multimedia Interface) is the newest interface
for audiovisual equipment such as high-definition television and home
theater systems. With 19 wires wrapped in a single cable that resembles
a USB wire, HDMI is able to carry a bandwidth of 5 Gbps (gigabits per
second). This is more than twice the bandwidth needed to transmit
multi-channel audio and video, future-proofing HDMI for some time to
come. This and several other factors make HDMI much more desirable
than its predecessors, component video, S-Video and composite video.
HDMI is an uncompressed, all-digital signal, while the aforementioned
interfaces are all analog. With an analog interface, a clean digital source
is translated into less precise analog, sent to the television, then con-
verted back to a digital signal to display on screen. At each translation,
the digital signal loses integrity, resulting in some distortion of picture
quality. HDMI preserves the source signal, eliminating analog conversion
to deliver the sharpest, richest picture possible.
HDMI supports standard video formats, enhanced video and high-defi-
nition. It is also backwards compatible with DVI (Digital Video Interface).
High-end graphics cards featuring a DVI port can connect to a HDMI
interface via a DVI/HDMI cable. This is simply a cable with a DVI con-
nector on one end and a HDMI connector on the other. As a rule, HDMI
cables should not run longer than 15 feet (5 meters), or degradation of
the signal could occur.
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