I am using Kinivo Wireless HDMI to deliver FIOS cable signal to the room that has no cable wiring. To add an outlet in that room requires to run visible wires and that is not something I wanted to do. I am using a dedicated cable box in a room with a cable outlet to transmit the signal to another room.
The ease of initial connection between the HDMI transmitter and the HDMI receiver depends on the distance between the two units. I have tested two configuration. First, when both the receiver and the transmitter were right next to each and then the second configuration when two units were in the rooms on different floors. When the units were far away from each it required two people to turn the transmitter and receiver units on at the same time otherwise they could not connect. I describe my experiences below in more details.
The first thing I did to test whether wireless HDMI works at all is to connect Kinivo HDMI transmitter to my cable box and attach the receiver to the TV right next to it. Prior to this test the cable box was connected directly to the same TV. All devices (cable box, tv, and the two Kinivo boxes) needed to be turned off, connected and then turned on. After a brief pause a Kinivo LED light turned from red to blue and the TV was displaying the broadcast. I did not notice any degradation of the picture.
The second stage of the test was to attach the receiver box to a TV in the room without a cable outlet. The receiver is located on the floor below the transmitter and about 20 feet away. Again, all devices had to be turned off and turned back on. Note that everything (cable box and two HDMI boxes) had to be turned off and turned on at the same time. If I turned on the cable box and the transmitter, ran downstairs, and turned on the receiver they did not connect to each. My husband and I had to coordinate turning on the receiver and the transmitter at the same time.
The final step was to get the remote working. The Kinivo receiver (the box that is attached to the TV) has IR sensor which transmit the signal to the Kinivo transmitter. The Kinivo transmitter has a IR transmitter which forwards the signal to the cable box. For this to work the IR transmitter needs to be position in front of the IR sensor of the cable box. At the moment I have it dangling from a pencil taped to the cable box and working on a more elegant solution. With the IR set up, I could use my cable remote operating the TV connected to the HDMI receiver.
Some restrictions: the cable box's digital rights allow only one device to be receiving the broadcast. If you attempt to turn on both TVs (attached directly or with a use of an HDMI splitter) the cable box detects interference and turns off. I am using a dedicated cable box and that works.
So what's the bottom line for this particular use? It works, but establishing communication between the two units is difficult when the units are far away from each other and requires two people. If this was a one time thing I would have thought it was pretty good. Unfortunately when the cable box turns off (say time out overnight) the communication between the units needs to be established again so it ranks "okay" for me this specific use of it. It works but not cumbersome as I can't do it on my own.
However, when the two devices are near each other (say transmitting from your camera to TV or from a Blu-Ray player to TV) wireless HDMI works very well. So this brings me to overall rating of 4 stars. When you decide whether this set up would work for you consider the distance between the two units as part of your decision.
You can find it on Amazon by following this link.
Ali Julia review ★★★★☆
No comments:
Post a Comment