Atem Mini Switcher Questions

1st question: Wondering if i can take an hdmi from the atem mini to a smart tv that has preloaded videos on usb for an intro to a stream.
2nd Question: say i was to use the hollywood video transmitter on a run and gun camera and receiver over hdmi to the atem mini in the control room. Would that be a runable system? assuming there be no interference or dropout in the transmitter
3rd question: can i use an 150ft hdmi cable with this atem mini switcher? or do they have to be within a specific length?

Thanks for the help!

I wouldn't expect a 150 foot HDMI cable to be reliable with *ANY* equipment.

50 feet is considered the maximum reliable length for HDMI in general and I believe I have seen comments somewhere that BMD recommends not exceeding 25 feet.

HDMI maxes out at 50' and 9 out of 10 50' hdmi's that I have used did not work at all. Even right out of the box they didn't work. If someone is selling a longer than 50' hdmi there has to be some additional power source required to send it that far

Good luck with HDMI runs of 50'. You'll be lucky to have reliability at 25'.

And BMD ATEMs will not work with a HDMI cable longer than 15 feet. For long runs like 25-50 feet, yiu need to use a SDI feed.
Cheers

They're not guaranteed to work with it but based on experiment will. Depending on what we are streaming each week I've used 25ft and 35ft (RedMere) HDMI cables with no issue on the Mini. 150ft is a bafflingly long HDMI cable though. I'm surprised they even make cables that long. They must have inline boosters or something.

I just did a quick search and indeed the 150 foot HDMI cables I am seeing do incorporate inline signal boosters to cover that distance, and are accordingly directional (they only work one way). At least one that I am looking at the listing for even includes a USB power adapter to provide extra power to the signal booster in case the source device doesn't supply enough from its HDMI output. It is a $90 cable, so it may still be more affordable than doing the HDMI -> SDI -> HDMI converter series.

I might suggest using an HDMI/Ethernet extender. Cat6 cable is much cheaper and easier to work with.

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/667676-REG/Comprehensive_CHE_1_CHE_1_HDMI_Splitter.html

We used cheap, chinese, analog HDMI over Cat5 transmitters over 50m Cat6e cable for FullHD.
The analog ones have no latency and don't compress the signal. However they don't speak Ethernet,
so they can't be switched. They just use the cable.

The digital ones can run across a switcher because they compress the signal into an RTSP stream.
You can even record that stream from any PC or output it to multiple receivers on the network.
However that introduces latency, compression artifacts and looses 10 Bit color.

It's a cheap and easy alternative, if SDI is not available.

The digital ones can run across a switcher because they compress the signal into an RTSP stream.
You can even record that stream from any PC or output it to multiple receivers on the network.
However that introduces latency, compression artifacts and looses 10 Bit color.

Mind sharing what units you are talking about?? I only know about 1 unit that does HDMI trough network switches that is fairly cheap.. But they only carry on with HDCP.. And this is an issue in the Broadcast world..

In my experience this box has HDCP always on.. And if you feed it trough a SDI > HDMI, the TX only sends a BLUE image.
https://nl.aliexpress.com/item/32642150295.html

The chinese ones have no name and constantly changing "manufacturer" names.
Sorry, can't identify any model or brand.

That's a pity.. Would love to find out about other brands that do this "proper"

So what i now understand is, that an optical HDMI cable uses ethernet, and can only be used on a non internet "used" switch "box" ?

Just an FYI. I had a cheap $99 Chinese 150m extender that worked but pixelated and artifacted. Sent it back pronto.

EDIT: The extender I used had network capability but I never tried it because of the poor IQ.

Way to improve HDMI/USB C Video Quality

when connecting HDMI to Display (Full HD) picture is not sharp as ATEM TV Studio HD, ATEM Must match the video Quality of ATEM Family Devices

So what i now understand is, that an optical HDMI cable uses ethernet, and can only be used on a non internet "used" switch "box" ?

No. Optical HDMI cables are 1:1 cables but send the data internally optical instead of wires. This allow more more reach.

The above picture is a kind of HDMI streaming Lossless Motion JPEG box. That will work on a normal internal company network.

Thank you ! i also see superspeed and 4K logo's with these kind of cables, or other vague terms, it's very confusing, when you're looking for what you think is the right thing...

the other solution is to use an hdmi -> sdi and back. the chinese make some that are "compatible" with hdcp

the other solution is to use an hdmi -> sdi and back. the chinese make some that are "compatible" with hdcp

Indeed "some"..... Chinese products are not that "known" for reliability, it's more of a gamble, than a good advice, you can take that gamble, because most of the time these products are cheap, but you don't have any guarantee from anybody, except, from an use case by somebody else, you need details in that case.

the other solution is to use an hdmi -> sdi and back. the chinese make some that are "compatible" with hdcp

Indeed "some"..... Chinese products are not that "known" for reliability, it's more of a gamble, than a good advice, you can take that gamble, because most of the time these products are cheap, but you don't have any guarantee from anybody, except, from an use case by somebody else, you need details in that case.

indeed.
this particular model has been working flawlessly for more than a year dealing with HD signals (1080p25) from my hdcp-affected set top box

IMG_8613.jpg (745.08 KiB) Viewed 7245 times

IMG_8614.jpg (966.71 KiB) Viewed 7245 times

Thank you for sharing this ! this is useful information.

I might suggest using an HDMI/Ethernet extender. Cat6 cable is much cheaper and easier to work with.

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/667676-REG/Comprehensive_CHE_1_CHE_1_HDMI_Splitter.html

You’re gonna want good cat6 for this, my church just switched to sdi. We had an issue where the static electricity from everyone standing up would glitch out the signal and the projectors would lose video.

I’m use direct burial cat6 whenever I do a cat6 video run, but sdi is definitely more reliable

I might suggest using an HDMI/Ethernet extender. Cat6 cable is much cheaper and easier to work with.

https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/667676-REG/Comprehensive_CHE_1_CHE_1_HDMI_Splitter.html

You’re gonna want good cat6 for this, my church just switched to sdi. We had an issue where the static electricity from everyone standing up would glitch out the signal and the projectors would lose video.

I’m use direct burial cat6 whenever I do a cat6 video run, but sdi is definitely more reliable

You’re gonna want good cat6 for this, my church just switched to sdi. We had an issue where the static electricity from everyone standing up would glitch out the signal and the projectors would lose video.

That has nothing to do with the quality of the cables and everything with proper grounding.
The device on one side and thus the shield of the cable should be connected to PE.

the other solution is to use an hdmi -> sdi and back. the chinese make some that are "compatible" with hdcp

Indeed "some"..... Chinese products are not that "known" for reliability, it's more of a gamble, than a good advice, you can take that gamble, because most of the time these products are cheap, but you don't have any guarantee from anybody, except, from an use case by somebody else, you need details in that case.

indeed.
this particular model has been working flawlessly for more than a year dealing with HD signals (1080p25) from my hdcp-affected set top box

IMG_8613.jpg

IMG_8614.jpg

This box wont work 1080P50/60 on an Atem. Wrong SDI chipset. This is the Security SDI transmitter that is not sending the Payload ID's for SMPTE Broadcast norm. So the Atem will not accept the 3G signals from this box.

This box wont work 1080P50/60 on an Atem. Wrong SDI chipset. This is the Security SDI transmitter that is not sending the Payload ID's for SMPTE Broadcast norm. So the Atem will not accept the 3G signals from this box.

ah. well, works for 1080i50, 1080p25 and 1080p29.97... so, good enough for me.
if you have a better reference, please share

If you use a Monoprice SlimRun optical cable, you can easily run that distance (similar to Redmere). They are directional fiber cables, not cheap, but available up to 330'. I actually just did a test with a Mini to confirm that it had no issues with it, did 150' input and 330' output to a DA and then to 2 separate monitors - no issues. I know, keep waiting for them to fail and we use them in a live staging environment so they are installed and taken out - not always nicely. We run them as backups for our SDI snakes.

If you think about buing very expensive calbes just to stay on HDMI,
you really should consider switching to SDI right away.

Hello all,

I recently purchased the mini and I love it! I read that usb-c to hdmi dongles don't work on the usb-c output, and understand why from message board posts. Has anyone found a workaround? I saw some videos of people using mini video monitors attached to the usb-c port, do some of these monitors have outputs that scale to an hdmi signal? Are there inexpensive ways to convert the usb-c webcam output to other formats like hdmi / sdi? Thanks everyone!

Ed

This might work:

I have hdmi cables that are 100ft long and they work fine. They only work one way though, meaning one side is input other side is output. Ive used them before. I even got a coupler so I can make 200ft and test it and it worked