a bar wants to stream our local university football games to 9 Samsung TVs. Currently there is no distribution system. Only individual DTV receivers at the rack and ethereal SDI extenders. Games are available on ESPN 3, and the university has some subscription service available online (web browser). Ignoring the question of what is legal in a commercial environment for now, Is there any way to send one stream to multiple displays? It doesn't have to be all 9 if that makes it any easier. :)

Are they smart TV's Samsung has an App for some regions. Otherwise, Check Roku. You could put a roku box behind each tv I suppose.


the legal issue really does need to be addressed as when you log into ESPN, they will know if its a commercial account or not.

Samsung doesn't have the ESPN app on "newer" model tvs. These were installed in December and fit that "newer" category. I thought about multiple roku's, but I doubt the network could handle that many video streams.


As for the legal issue, yes, we will address that. But the first issue is finding if there is even a viable way to make this happen. And for the record, we are pretty sure using the roku ESPN channel is not legal for commercial use. At least that is what DTV told us.

You state there is no distribution system, then explain the SDI distribution system in the next sentence.

What is the source? Laptop? Convert the HDMI/Display port to SDI and send it.

Roku probably has a streaming app for this! Then just dump the Roku on your ethereal m3b!

RG6 makes a pretty robust distribution system. ZeeVee has modulators. If you have actual video, would that work for you?

m x n HDMI matrix and a single input stream?

JAP could do this, but it will require throwing out your SDI boxes, pulling CAT-x to the TV's, and a real network.

There are 9 TVs, 9 DTV boxes, and 9 sets of Ethereal SDI extenders. Explain to me how I send 1 laptop signal to 9 different HDMI extenders?

If I had m3b that might be an option. But that's not what we are using. Did I list something incorrectly?

Sure. But that would be a hell of a lot more money than the current setup. Originally when we met the owner and discussed the design, we discussed a distribution system, or dedicated sat boxes for each tv.

Well, the obvious answer would be a1x10 HDMI splitter...


[Link: siig.com]

there doesnt seem to be a way to stream to 9 TV's simultaneously. Not reliably anyway, so the next best thing would be a Matrix. Since there's Coax in place, and your familiar with Ethereal, Take a look at this solution...

9 CS-HDM3BRX1 Receivers
with
10 CS-HDM3BTX1 Transmitters


Or maybe just switch over a few TV's to start. Quite the flexible and expandable system.

Even if you could get 9 devices, 1 at each TV, you will run into sync issues. I hooked up 2 Apple TVs for a client last week so he could watch the BSU opener which was exclusively on ESPN3. After configuring things, and testing the streaming, the 2 were between 5 and 15 seconds "off". This could be a bad thing if you A. Have more than 1 TV in view of an audience at any given time, or B. touchdown happens on TV X, and the crowd goes nuts, while people viewing TV Y are wondering WTF just happened. :) Not to mention there may be concurrent stream limits for the ESPN app. I only tested 2 simultaneously on the same account and it worked fine. 3 might be a no go. I have no idea what the fine print says...I just clicked "agree". :)

M3B looks like a winning upgrade. If they are not wanting to pay for it, they do not really want to watch that stuff. :P

Look at it like this:

When you had the discussion about the different ways you could do a system for them, they chose the cheapest route. And it was a be all/end all setup with no expandability.

Now they want to add to the system. They should have took your advise to start with and went with the expandable system.
Now they will have to pay for a redesign & installation. There really is no way around this. They chose this path, either they pay or they don't play.

They are lucky that a system like Ethereal's exists to help with a cheaper solution.
Until they want to do video walls, PiP, audio breakouts, etc... Then another system redesign & installation with a full matrix or JAP setup will grab at their checkbook.

If they don't know what they really want to start with. And can't be bothered to put in the effort to think about it ahead of time, then this is what they get.

Thanks. I was trying to figure out if I was missing anything. Looks like I wasn't. Unfortunately, this system was installed before the m3b was an option.

"we dont need a matrix" is client speak for "we really do need a matrix".