HDMI/Component output switch

[jdport]

I'm not sure if this is the best forum to ask this but it's the only forum I visit that might be able to answer my question so I thought I'd give it a shot.

I currently have a 50" plasma HDTV in my living room, and a normal 32" CRT TV down in my basement. Normally my wife is upstairs watching TV on the "good" TV, so I would never get a chance to do any gaming on the xbox360 if I had it plugged in there. So, I deal with the standard definition on the normal TV in the basement and hook up the xbox360 there.

Now that the Xbox360 is going to be getting the ability to stream movies from netflix, as well as sometime in the future show blue-ray movies I would like to hook up the Xbox360 to the HD Television upstairs... but I don't want to have to unhook it and move it downstairs every time I want to play a game... so what I was hoping to do was to get a switch that could switch between an HDMI channel and a component channel. I'd hook that up to my Xbox upstairs on the HDTV and run a component cable down into my basement to hook up to that television. That way if we want to watch a movie or if nobody is watching TV and I want to play on the "good" TV I can output to the HDMI and be on the upstairs TV, and if people are watching TV upstairs and I want to play a game, I can just switch the output downstairs over the component output.

I have done a bit of googling and haven't found a switch like this yet, but I'm still looking. Does anybody know if such a switch exists? If so, would it introduce any video lag or anything that would impact the timing in games like Rock Band or Guitar Hero?

Thanks in advance.

 

[Viper GTS]

I think what you need is a 2nd XBOX.

Even if you did manage to find a workable video solution it would probably cost enough (and be enough of a pain in the ass) that you'd be better off buying another 360.

Besides if you're already moving controllers and discs is moving the xbox really so bad?

Viper GTS

 

[jdport]

I wouldn't be moving anything but controllers.... because the xbox would never move again.... and I could always buy more controllers later if that got to be an issue. In general though most gaming would be done downstairs... and media streaming would be enjoyed upstairs.. .so even moving controllers would be somewhat uncommon. Moving the xbox is a lot more of a pain, and potentially worse for the console.

A friend of mine does something similar with his PS3, but in his case he just needs an HDMI switch because both of his TV's have HDMI inputs. It works great for him. If this costs anywhere near as much as a second xbox, I wouldn't do it.

 

[nakedfrog]

Originally posted by: jdport
I wouldn't be moving anything but controllers.... because the xbox would never move again.... and I could always buy more controllers later if that got to be an issue. In general though most gaming would be done downstairs... and media streaming would be enjoyed upstairs.. .so even moving controllers would be somewhat uncommon. Moving the xbox is a lot more of a pain, and potentially worse for the console.

A friend of mine does something similar with his PS3, but in his case he just needs an HDMI switch because both of his TV's have HDMI inputs. It works great for him. If this costs anywhere near as much as a second xbox, I wouldn't do it.

I have a 5 port HDMI switch I got on ebay for $40, but I haven't seen one that does what I think you're looking for.

 

[Onund]

Probably an AVR could solve your problem. I haven't looked into AVRs in a while but it shouldn't be too uncommon for an AVR to have HDMI and component out. The main thing you might want to watch for is that the AVR can switch between HDMI and component. Some might only allow upward conversion and not allows HDMI in to go out on component, for instance. I really don't know. I'm assuming you're planning on running HDMI to the switch then HDMI to the plasma and component to the CRT?

At worst, you might have to toggle a setting on the AVR to select which monitor out to enable, but that should be easy to configure into a one touch button on a universal remote.

 

[herkulease]

have you tested to see if you can even hook up both hdmi and component cable at once. Its possible that the 360 only understands to output to either that a/v port or the hdmi port.

Anyhow its probably cheaper or atleast the difference is negligible if you pick up an xbox 360 arcade model instead. Its only 200 bucks. you can search for some deals like amazon last week or so gave lego batman with purchase.you can just sell the parts you don't need

I don't know the dimensions of your home and how you plan to run cables. But 100ft component cable plus audio is 66 dollars. an AVR that has HDMI pass through probably can't be found for under a hundred bucks.

 

[jdport]

Originally posted by: herkulease
have you tested to see if you can even hook up both hdmi and component cable at once. Its possible that the 360 only understands to output to either that a/v port or the hdmi port.

Anyhow its probably cheaper or atleast the difference is negligible if you pick up an xbox 360 arcade model instead. Its only 200 bucks. you can search for some deals like amazon last week or so gave lego batman with purchase.you can just sell the parts you don't need

I don't know the dimensions of your home and how you plan to run cables. But 100ft component cable plus audio is 66 dollars. an AVR that has HDMI pass through probably can't be found for under a hundred bucks.

The Xbox would only be outputting one... probably HDMI, though I suppose I could use component... but it would be sending its's HDMI output to the switch and then the switch would output either out the HDMI channel to the plasma TV or out the component channel to the CRT TV.. .depending on the switch position.

If it does get that expensive, I probably won't do it anyway.. it was just an idea I was looking at and hoping would work.

 

[erwos]

IIRC, the 360 will only output over HDMI or component, not both.

 

[Onund]

Originally posted by: herkulease
have you tested to see if you can even hook up both hdmi and component cable at once. Its possible that the 360 only understands to output to either that a/v port or the hdmi port.

Anyhow its probably cheaper or atleast the difference is negligible if you pick up an xbox 360 arcade model instead. Its only 200 bucks. you can search for some deals like amazon last week or so gave lego batman with purchase.you can just sell the parts you don't need

I don't know the dimensions of your home and how you plan to run cables. But 100ft component cable plus audio is 66 dollars. an AVR that has HDMI pass through probably can't be found for under a hundred bucks.

I don't have an xbox so I don't know how they work, if you have two in the same house can you share save game data between the two? I was under the impression that all that was stored on the internal drive.

Also, I don't know about jdport but I know some people are not always looking for the cheapest solution. Some people prefer the most elegant or functional. Besides, if he doens't already have some sort of AVR or surround sound capability, this may be a good time to upgrade 🙂