What if I have more than one item to plug into my DVI input? (1 Viewer)

[Mike:K]

Hello everyone,

I'm new to the forum, but I've gleaned TONS of information from here already that has made my home theater experience so much more enjoyable. Thanks to all of you who contribute here and offer information. Now to my question:

I have a HDTV with one DVI input. I have a DirectTV high definition receiver with a DVI output that I plug into the TV. I also have a Samsung "HDTV" DVD player that has a DVI output as well. When switching from TV to DVD, I'm always unplugging one DVD cable and plugging in the other, then back again.

I want the highest possible picture quality I can get in both instances, so it's worth it to me to switch them, but is there an easier way to go back and forth?

I realize that one possible solution is to watch one component through DVI and the other on component cables, but I really don't want to do that. My desire is to watch both through DVI.

Is there anything out on the market, i.e., a router of some kind that I can plug both DVI's into with one output into the TV? Or is there any other solution?

Thanks!

 

[Shane Morales]

There's DVI Switches. But they're pretty expensive: $300-$600 (or more). There's also DVI selectors, but they degrade the video so why bother.

Google: DVI Switch

Plenty o' links.

 

[Justin_D]

But DVI is digital, so how would it degrade quality?

 

[Shane Morales]

Here's what pacificcable.com has to say about switches vs. selectors:

http://www.pacificcable.com/DVI_Switch.html

 

[Scott*B]

I say hogwash. With digital you either have signal or you don't. Plain and simple.

 

[John Murawski]

This is a new DVI switch that is HDCP compliant and is relatively low cost.

Go to this location:
Since I do not have the 15 initial posts yet, just add the necessary ht_ p:/_ before the below and you will get there.

home.comcast.net/~skeeterj/mydirectory/DVI-2.pdf

 

[Iver]

John M, could you print out the relevant text? I don't feel patient enough to wait for my dial-up to sludge through a pdf file.

The notion of a switch being HDCP compliant is suspect. I would think a digital switch would either function correctly or not. It's not clear how it would have any effect on copy protection.

Likewise, one might wonder how a switch, as long as it functioned, would have a qualitative effect on the two voltage levels which represent 1's and 0's. But Pacific Cable does have an answer to that. Not sure if it makes total sense. It would be interesting to see an actual performance test to find out if their switch provides higher quality video than one of the other products.

Pacific Cable:



One possible solution to the single-DVI-input problem: products which combine two HD sources in a single unit such as LG's HD tuner/QAM tuner/quasi-HD-DVD player.