Why is HDMI so Messed Up?

[Damion Chaplin]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.bluejeanscable.com/articles/whats-the-matter-with-hdmi.htm' target='_blank'>http://www.bluejeanscable.com/articles/whats-the-matter-with-hdmi.htm</a><br /><br /></div><i>"HDMI, as we've pointed out elsewhere, is a format which was designed primarily to serve the interests of the content-provider industries, not to serve the interests of the consumer. The result is a mess, and in particular, the signal is quite hard to route and switch, cable assemblies are unnecessarily complicated, and distance runs are chancy. Why is this, and what did the designers of the standard do wrong? And what can we do about it?"</i><br /><br />Blue Jeans Cable has a great editorial on why HDMI is so full of problems and some suggestions and solutions that would help fix it. For the end-user at home, it boils down to the fact there isn't much you can do aside from minimizing the complexity of your system. If you're wondering what the problem with HDMI is, give the article a read.

[Felix Torres]

The biggest problem I'm seeing people have with HDMI is that it doesn't seem to handle switching very well. This shows up in the well-known handshaking issues of the PS3 (and to a lesser extent, the 360 Elite) and the problems daisy-chaining devices through AV Receivers.

The core problem is that, as the article points out, they took a desktop PC tech designed to connect one video card and one monitor a couple feet apart and tried to use it for what is essentially a networking application.

Not much that can be done now; the standard is too entrenched so we're stuck with it. I'm guessing we'll soon start seeing a new generation of AV receivers and HDMI switchers and/or repeaters designed to spoof the HDMI protocols enough to let things work smoothly in real-world usage.
In other words, we the consumers are going to have to throw money at the problem. :-)

Anybody seen other problems with HDMI out there, beyond handshaking failures?

[Jeremy Charette]

Ah but Felix, you've forgotten one big issue with HDMI with regards to HDTVs: overscan. Until just a few months ago when some new models were released, almost all HDTVs overscanned the HDMI input, a holdover from the analog era. Overscanning a digital input defeats the purpose of going digital in the first place.

[bcre8v2]

From my perspective, I want HDMI (the standard AND physical cable) to evolve. A single cable vs. 4 separate cables is almost always better in my book.
(Pick any 4: VGA/DVI, R-L channel, Optical, Coax, S-Video, etc.)

Version 1.3 adds support for a mini-connector.
http://www.hdmi.org/
http://www.hdmi.org/learningcenter/hdmi_1_3_faq.asp

I thought switching and over-scanning were issues with the interpretation and implementation of the 1.0, 1.1, and even 1.2 variations between hardware devices. I understand that each HDMI version stipulates backwards compatibility, but that never guarantees future compatibility.
Manufacturers chose not to add firmware settings (or to offer upgrades) to the hardware to cut down on cost.

Is there anything better on the horizon?

-Steve

[Felix Torres]

Ah but Felix, you've forgotten one big issue with HDMI with regards to HDTVs: overscan. Until just a few months ago when some new models were released, almost all HDTVs overscanned the HDMI input, a holdover from the analog era. Overscanning a digital input defeats the purpose of going digital in the first place.

Agreed all the way.
Overscaning on HD content is brain-dead stupid.
But it is equally stupid on component as on HDMI.
Most sets that offer zero-overscan modes offer them on all modes and the ones that don't, overscan everything except VGA.
Which is to say its not really an HDMI issue but rather a display design issue. ;-)

The switching problems seem to be due to the fact that displays and sources don't always agree on when the video stream needs to be authenticated and how long to wait to get in sync. Most of the problems come with devices that restart the video stream while powered up; the spec just doesn't handle those things gracefully.

As for evolving the spec, that doesn't appear to be in the (video) cards. From what the article says, the issues are intrinsic to the cable *and* the protocol. Change both and you end up with something that is anything but HDMI.

That said, what reaction would Yet.Another.HD.Port standard draw?
I'm guessing torches and pitchforks... ;-)