Long video feed? (150 foot +) — Community

#1 May 27, 2010 at 10:47 am

I need advice on how to run a video feed to a projector in our auditorium ceiling. Thing is, it requires close to a 170 foot run.
This is beyond the capability of rapid run.
Could anyone advise on what sort of connection, wires, or system I should use to preserve video integrity over this distance? Is HD even possible? If not, I know this is an HD forum, but could you give me any SD insight, because I'm not finding much info even for SD.
~Brian

#2 May 27, 2010 at 12:56 pm

What type of inputs does the projector support? What is the native resolution? One option for SD would be to use cat5 or cat6 with baluns that convert from rj45 to S-video. Not sure if they'll go 170 feet though.

#3 May 27, 2010 at 1:22 pm

I am flexible at this point as to what inputs. I could go VGA, 5BNC, DVI, Component or Composite. I have read up on the Cat5 option. I have yet to talk to anyone who has personally used it... is it just as good? Any problems I should know about? I would prefer to use a HD signal of some sort, but at this point I am starting to see that I will likely need to settle for SD.

#4 May 27, 2010 at 5:38 pm

I used the cat5 with svideo baluns in my home theater with a 30 ft run and it worked fine once I got the proper RJ45 connections. The only thing I'm not sure about is the length limitation. The good news is it would be fairly cheap to try and even if it didn't work you could use the cat5 cable to pull a new cable.

HDMI or DVI might be possible with a repeater or two and a high quality cable but it will be expensive.

#5 Jun 4, 2010 at 3:35 pm

I recommend you do this project with HDMI so you are covered going forward. There are numerous products for this application. I just googled HDMI repeater and got lots of links!

My only concern for your application is that the projector is DVI. When you build this system I suggest you purchase an HDMI to DVI cable for the last run. Using an adapter will mess up the impedance matching and that may cause no picture or an intermittent picture. When the projector is changed out for new one with HDMI you simply replace that last cable!

http://www.bluejeanscable.com/index.htm provides HDMI to DVI terminated cables. I think they do custom lengths as well.