Question Can I totally go wireless with my laptop+monitor workstation?

[Battousai01]

Hi guys, I am currently setting up my workstation to totally go wireless (except for the power cord). My setup is that I have a laptop, external keyboard, mouse, speaker and monitor. I want to achieve an almost wireless setup for these components.

For keyboard, mouse and speaker that is easy I can just get a wireless keyboard and mouse and a bluetooth speaker. However for the monitor, I am still using an HDMI cable. Is there a way to use a wireless connection between the laptop and the monitor that is comparable to the performance of the physical cable?

Also, on a separate note, is there a wireless device that can transmit 4k resolution or atleast 1440p with 100hz resolution from laptop to monitor wirelessly?

My goal is to eliminate all the cables connecting from my laptop to all these peripherals.

Thanks in advance!

 

[fralexandr]

Best Miracast and Screen-Mirroring Devices 2019

Want to get your smartphone, tablet or computer content onto a TV screen? These products wirelessly transmit video from your gadgets to the TV.

www.tomsguide.com

How to use Miracast to mirror your device’s screen wirelessly on your TV—even 4K

Everything you need to know to figure out device support between newer and older devices, and setting it up with Windows or Android devices.

www.pcworld.com

If you are on ios you'll want to look into airplay

Use AirPlay to stream video or mirror the screen of your iPhone or iPad - Apple Support

Use AirPlay to stream or share content from your Apple devices to your Apple TV, AirPlay-compatible smart TV, or Mac. Stream a video. Share your photos. Or mirror exactly what's on your device's screen.

support.apple.com

If you use a smart TV/display it may already support these, otherwise you'll need to buy an adapter.

 

[Viper GTS]

None of these solutions are stable enough or performant enough to replace a wired connection to a display.

If you insist on this your best bet would be to find a laptop that can be powered by USB-C and a monitor with USB-C input/power output. Single USB-C cable from PC to monitor would be your only connectivity.

Viper GTS

 

[Battousai01]

Thanks for the replies, so just to confirm those wireless solutions are inferior to the wired HDMI connection? and no current wireless solution can match the quality of the wired solution?

 

[Viper GTS]

Correct. Wired will always be better.

Wireless is always for convenience, in the case of wireless display think things like presentations in conference rooms. Ad hoc, low bandwidth, great for simple things where quality and reliability are distant priorities vs convenience.

For perspective, current generation HDMI does up to 18 gigabit for 4k full chroma. What's the fastest wireless standard you're aware of? And what do these wireless solutions actually link at PHY rate?

Viper GTS

 

[Battousai01]

Hi Viper GTS, just a follow-up question, logically, we have wifi 802.11ac running at speeds up to 7Gbps, wouldn't it be enough to connect a display and a device wirelessly with a quality that is almost the same as cable connection?

One other argument is that if we are able to stream and watch 4k videos or stream games off the internet using wireless connections from a router with superb quality why cant we connect two devices (a TV or monitor, and my laptop or desktop) wirelessly within the network and display it with the same quality as if it is wired.

 

[Viper GTS]

There's a number of issues here. FIrst, the simplicity of cables is a huge positive in this - One end connects to a source, the other to a sink. Other than relatively minor negotiation (resolution, HDCP, etc) it for the most part just works - If you correctly connect everything you can expect it to work perfectly. Until you get into really long cables or weird EM situations interference, signal strength, etc are a non-issue. These are desirable qualities.

The second issue is that the streaming you are referring to is for video. We have highly advanced compression methods for video that produce impressive quality with shockingly little bitrate. Netflix 4K etc all exist because of these technologies. However - All video compression works by exploiting quirks of the human eye/brain interaction and throwing away portions of the data stream that we are less sensitive to (ie we won't miss it). This works really, really well for video but far less so for the other things that monitors are called on to do:

How Modern Video Compression Algorithms Actually Work - Make Tech Easier

Modern video compression algorithms aren't the same as the image compression algorithms you might be familiar with. Here's how video compression works.

www.maketecheasier.com

This compression absolutely brutalizes things like text. Modern operating systems are very good about manipulating sub-pixels (ClearType, etc) to make text appear smooth. Chroma subsampling destroys this:

Chroma Subsampling: 4:4:4 vs 4:2:2 vs 4:2:0

What is Chroma Subsampling and where is this visible? Chroma subsampling is a type of compression that reduces the color information in a signal in favor of luminance data.

www.rtings.com

Click the examples and make sure you view them full size to see the effect.

Finally, no matter how fast wifi gets a wired connection will always be faster. You will never, ever see 7gb/s wireless data in practice today but there are likely hundreds of millions of 18gb/s capable HDMI links in use in the world. Wifi performance that drops off dramatically with a myriad of environmental issues including common things like active device count. Wireless spectrum is shared, so YMMV in the real world.

So in short:

1) Wires are so simple and reliable
2) Video compression sucks for anything that isn't video
3) Even when wireless is good enough (great for presentations!) wired is better, and generally speaking cheaper/more reliable/simpler to implement

Hope this helps.

Viper GTS

 

[Battousai01]

There's a number of issues here. FIrst, the simplicity of cables is a huge positive in this - One end connects to a source, the other to a sink. Other than relatively minor negotiation (resolution, HDCP, etc) it for the most part just works - If you correctly connect everything you can expect it to work perfectly. Until you get into really long cables or weird EM situations interference, signal strength, etc are a non-issue. These are desirable qualities.

The second issue is that the streaming you are referring to is for video. We have highly advanced compression methods for video that produce impressive quality with shockingly little bitrate. Netflix 4K etc all exist because of these technologies. However - All video compression works by exploiting quirks of the human eye/brain interaction and throwing away portions of the data stream that we are less sensitive to (ie we won't miss it). This works really, really well for video but far less so for the other things that monitors are called on to do:

How Modern Video Compression Algorithms Actually Work - Make Tech Easier

Modern video compression algorithms aren't the same as the image compression algorithms you might be familiar with. Here's how video compression works.

www.maketecheasier.com

This compression absolutely brutalizes things like text. Modern operating systems are very good about manipulating sub-pixels (ClearType, etc) to make text appear smooth. Chroma subsampling destroys this:

Chroma Subsampling: 4:4:4 vs 4:2:2 vs 4:2:0

What is Chroma Subsampling and where is this visible? Chroma subsampling is a type of compression that reduces the color information in a signal in favor of luminance data.

www.rtings.com

Click the examples and make sure you view them full size to see the effect.

Finally, no matter how fast wifi gets a wired connection will always be faster. You will never, ever see 7gb/s wireless data in practice today but there are likely hundreds of millions of 18gb/s capable HDMI links in use in the world. Wifi performance that drops off dramatically with a myriad of environmental issues including common things like active device count. Wireless spectrum is shared, so YMMV in the real world.

So in short:

1) Wires are so simple and reliable
2) Video compression sucks for anything that isn't video
3) Even when wireless is good enough (great for presentations!) wired is better, and generally speaking cheaper/more reliable/simpler to implement

Hope this helps.

Viper GTS

Thanks Viper GTS for the reply and for the information. Yes, I agree with you on the points you have raised, but I still am keen on seeing wireless technology to improve further in the near future where it can achieve almost the same quality as cable does.

 

[Viper GTS]

Thanks Viper GTS for the reply and for the information. Yes, I agree with you on the points you have raised, but I still am keen on seeing wireless technology to improve further in the near future where it can achieve almost the same quality as cable does.

Everybody wants that, but it will never be a reality. We are fighting physics here - The cable will always be better.

Viper GTS

 

[Battousai01]

Hi guys, I have just built a new rig but I would like to know if it is possible to automatically connect it to a wireless display upon turning it on?

I noticed that you will always need to have a monitor wired first then right click on the desktop then select "Display settings -> Connect to a wireless display" then you will manually select the wireless display on the right side of the desktop.

Is there a way to just automatically display to a wireless display upon bootup of the PC?

 

[Viper GTS]

Have you tried stuff listed here?

c# - Autoconnect to MS Wireless display on Windows 10 - Stack Overflow

Viper GTS

 

[mindless1]

... I still am keen on seeing wireless technology to improve further in the near future where it can achieve almost the same quality as cable does.

Which would be a waste of money and electricity since the monitor doesn't need to be significantly mobile during use, and lower performance, visually inferior. Why suffer only negatives for some idealism about not seeing or having to plug a cable in?

What is displayed on a monitor is far more clutter than a cable going to it. Plugging a monitor in is far less effort than now nearly a year later still writing posts about it. Of course that is only my opinion, but it seems more productive to appreciate and leverage existing tech, than to chase a rainbow when there is not a pot of gold at the other end.

 

[Battousai01]

Have you tried stuff listed here?

c# - Autoconnect to MS Wireless display on Windows 10 - Stack Overflow

Viper GTS

Thanks Viper GTS, let me look into this.

Which would be a waste of money and electricity since the monitor doesn't need to be significantly mobile during use, and lower performance, visually inferior. Why suffer only negatives for some idealism about not seeing or having to plug a cable in?

What is displayed on a monitor is far more clutter than a cable going to it. Plugging a monitor in is far less effort than now nearly a year later still writing posts about it. Of course that is only my opinion, but it seems more productive to appreciate and leverage existing tech, than to chase a rainbow when there is not a pot of gold at the other end.

Thanks mindless1, I totally understand what you mean and yes, I completely agree with you. What I wanted to achieve is more of a convenience in moving around with as little wire as possible, and I also wanted to showcase a nifty thing of having a super compact ITX rig without wires, but at the moment I know I cannot get away with being totally wireless as you will always have a power cord to consider. So this is more of me thinking of a concept of having a super compact ITX rig that I can just carry around and instantly connect to wireless displays. Previously what I am dreaming of being able to do is built a compact ITX rig with built-in batteries just for a hobby or a challenge.