Digital Signage Blog » video input

Techie Question: What is the best way to split your VGA signal?

DigitalSignageBlog — Mon, 18 Oct 2010 02:04:03 +0000

One of the challenges with splitting your VGA signal is the ability to maintain the video quality and aspect ratio of the original video source. There are a number of ways to split your VGA signal and the main purpose of doing so it to display the same video content across to multiple screens. This basically means a cost savings as you will only need to purchase 1 PC/digital signage player rather than having multiple players for each screen. The only limitation is distance, the VGA video quality degrades for longer distances.

Here, we will look at 3 ways of splitting up the VGA signal (assuming you just want to split 1 video signal to 2 screens):

2 way VGA Cable

When we used this we noticed that the quality was pretty poor. Especially when adding a second VGA cable you immediately notice a difference. No power is required hence the reason why the degradation.

2 Port VGA Splitter

Required power to be connected to it. For the video input it requires a VGA extension cable that has a male on one end and a female on the other. Better than the 2 way VGA cable but noticed fuzzy lines running through the screen and some ghosting.

Video Card with dual output (for PC’s)

You will need to find a video card that supports two VGA outputs. The Radeon x300 video card is one that we’ve tried and tested. Video quality was perfect or as good as the video card can output. The advantage of using this video card was that you didn’t need an additional power point and you are also able to change the video configuration to clone or extended.

For implementations of more than 2 screens then you will need to get a splitter that caters for more video output ports, there are many brands and model in the market but just make sure you test it before installing it at your clients sites.

Are there any other methods people have used to split the VGA signal?

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Post tags: 3 Ways, Additional Power, Aspect Ratio, Challenges, digital signage player, Distances, Dual Output, Extension Cable, Fuzzy Lines, Implementations, Output Ports, Port Vga, Radeon X300, Signal One, Vga Cable, Vga Signal, Video Card, Video Configuration, Video Content, video input, Video Output, Video Quality, Video Screens, Video Signal, Video Source

Inside the world of a Digital Signage Player

DigitalSignageBlog — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 06:03:25 +0000

This week, our team thought of doing something different from our usual postings – we decided to open up the NDSP-500 digital signage player and give you a brief look at what’s inside one of these players. The video is not of the greatest quality but it does give you an idea of the components inside a typical digital signage player and what connections are available. So here’s the video:

As you can clearly see, the unit is small… it’s smaller than half of an A4 paper. With this particular unit, there are several connectors at the front:

1. RS232 – this is usually to provide serial communications with another device. It can be used to control and manage an display screen – that’s if the screen supports RS232.
2. Secure compartment to store the SD card – it’s also a quick way to easily swap out the SD card without having to open up the box

At the back of the unit you will notice the following connectors:

1.Video output: the unit has these typical connections – S-Video Output/Composite Video and Audio, DVI, and VGA.

2. Video Input: Composite Video and Audio. With this particular unit you will be able to connect a video input source such as a DVD player, Foxtel, CCTV camera etc.

3. S/PDIF – for great audio quality

4. LAN port which support 10/100 Mbps

5. Two USB ports for connecting USB Storage

6. Power plug to connect the power supply. This power plug was different from other digital signage players we’ve seen in the past. It basically has a connector which allows you to twist and screw the power cable to the power plug.

Inside the player, all you will find is a circuit board, a frame for a small hard disk and several cables. As you can see from the video, you will not find a fan inside the player – this makes the unit very quiet when it’s turned on.

Would you like to see more videos? Let us know what you’ll like to see and we’ll try to get it done.

Feel free to submit your answer as a comment.

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Post tags: A4 Paper, Audio Quality, Cables, digital signage player, Dvd Player, Dvi, hard disk, Input Source, Lan Port, Ndsp, Pdif, Postings, Power Cable, Power Supply, rs232, S Video Output, Sd Card, Serial Communications, Usb Ports, video input

Digital Menu Board – without the menu

DigitalSignageBlog — Sat, 28 Mar 2009 03:00:06 +0000

I was walking past a sushi takeaway restaurant yesterday and noticed that they were using digital signage for their menu board so I stopped and had a look at how it was implemented. They had three 32″ LCD screens with rotating menu items and the design of the menu was quite impressive but not the solution. Let me explain.

At the front of the restaurant there are 3 32″ LCD screens. Each one of them displayed menu items except for the first one. This one actually had the message “No Video Input” and for most of us we know what this means. My guess is that the device connecting to the screen was either damaged or wasn’t turned on. Now most likely if the other two were on the the first unit would most likely be damaged.

So what happens here, two of the three screens were only displaying the menu so what happens to the menu items listed in the first screen. I quickly looked around to see whether there were any other signs of a menu list… and I couldn’t find any.

So now the restaurant only has two thirds of a menu and in my point of view the business may potentially lose customers if this continued.

In this particular case, what would you have done differently if you were the consultant or installer of this particular restaurant? We definitely know that if the menu system is a critical part of the overall running of the businesses we would had a backup plan or strategy to overcome this issue. For example, we would have installed a system that would allow the restaurant owner to quickly switch the templates (via a USB numpad keyboard) so that all the menu items would be rotated on the 1 screen – basically in this case it would be shown to 2 of the three screens. Otherwise, if the LCD screens had a SD card reader, using static images to display the menu items. This would have been better than displaying the “No Video input”.

In this particular case, what would you have done differently if you were the consultant or installer of this particular restaurant?

Feel free to submit your answer as a comment.

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Post tags: backup, digital menu, restaurant, strategy, video input