Gefen says it’s figured out exactly how to move HDMI signals over the coaxial cable that already exists in many homes all over the world. The company plans to show the technology at CES next week that it says will ship in April. Gefen has been working on this tech that could make it much easier to move HDTV signals all over your house for a while, in fact, we saw a working demonstration of HDMI over coax at the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) convention last April. But there’s an added twist to this iteration that makes it a lot more convenient.
Home Theatre Scalers are simultaneously becoming less and more relevant in my eyes: they’re more relevant as more people own HDTVs, but less relevant as the HDTV buyers purchase other HD components. Still, the Gefen Home Theatre Scaler Plus will be a nice solution for some setups. The Mac Miniesque Gefen upconverts a small but decent selection sources to 1080p (2 HDMI and 3 analogue sources), but what we find most promising is its ability to upconvert game consoles. While there’s only so much improvement that upscaling can do, the Gefen Plus only delays the A/V signal by one frame, meaning that it’s viable to play SNES’ Super Mario World in semi-stunning 1080p. If you’re interested, the Gefen Home Theater Scaler Plus runs $US499. [product via slashgear]
Before you start smashing holes through drywall and turning your home theater upside down, you might want to take a look at this Gefen wireless HDMI extender, sending 720p or 1080i video up to 33 feet away and perhaps saving your marriage. This box looks a little different from the one we saw at NAB, and uses a wider frequency band, 3.1 to 4.8GHz compared to that 3.3 to 3.5GHz band we witnessed at NAB.
The downside?
