Offtopic – HDMI & USB over Twisted Pair

I wanted to be able to use my desktop computer which lives in my office, on the TV in the living room.

Long HDMI cables would involve me climbing around under the house, and making more holes in the walls, and most wireless keyboard/mouse combos wouldn’t reach that far and USB has a limit of 5 meters.

So instead I put together a rather simple solution that I’m quite happy with.

I ran a lot of Cat5 in the house a while ago, and I’ve got 4 Cat5e sockets behind the TV, and a patch panel at my desk.

I purchased online a HDMI over RJ45/Cat5e adapter, and a USB over RJ45/Cat5e adapter online, for about $5 each.

These are passive devices (baluns) meaning they aren’t converting anything to IP or Ethernet for transport.

This means no additional latency (beyond velocity factor of the cable and the distance, but I digress), so it’s not a remote-desktop experience, it’s like sitting in front of a screen, because that’s what it is.

Very happy with the results!

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