Review: ‘Awesome’ New HDMI/Audio Switcher for Control4

Built for Control4 home automation systems, HydraConnect has high-end HDMI switching features offered by the “other guys” but provides unique twist with audio and CEC control.

HydraConnect HSS-1 HDMI/audio switcher with Control4 home automation processor and HDBaseT Cat 5 extenders

We have been blessed lately with a plethora of HDMI switchers that solve some of the worst deficiencies of HDMI: key limitations, switching lags, EDID support, and so many others. Indeed, I’ve written glowing reviews of some of them.

But for the most part they don’t solve a big problem that plagues home entertainment systems in general: pesky IR emitters and RS-232 contraptions on the A/V components themselves.

Start-up HydraConnect solves all of these problems with the new HSS-1 HDMI switcher ($9,000), shipping this year (specs below).

I discovered this awesome gem at CEDIA Expo 2011 in September. I almost passed it up – it was a strange-looking 2u blue box with two large fan vents on the front -- but I thought to myself that a box that ugly has got to have some good stuff inside! (Thankfully, the shipping model has a black case.)

Scoping out the rear side of the rack, I witnessed 8 HDMI inputs, 8 HDMI outputs, 8 analog audio inputs, 8 analog audio outputs, and a single Ethernet connection.

Even more curious was the Control4 HC300 home automation controller sitting atop the unit.

Being the huge Control4 fan that I am, who could I pass that up? I have tried many excellent switchers with Control4 and couldn’t image what another matrix could bring to the party. Now I know.

What I like about HydraConnect HSS-1: Audio & CEC

First off, let me say that this product is not integrated with HDBaseT, the one-wire Cat 5 technology found in some of today’s top switches. HydraConnect wanted to give integrators the flexibility to use existing HDMI cables, traditional HDMI extender baluns or HDBaseT extenders. The company does make its own HDBaseT extenders starting at $450 for the transmitter/receiver pair.

HydraConnect HDBaseT extenders

Having said that, not only does the HSS-1 appear to handle HDMI switching better than some of the others, it offers a couple of innovative, if not downright unique, features.

First is the built-in analog audio matrix. HydraConnect addressed a major request of most Control4 users with this its independent 8x8 audio matrix that provides 1:1 ratio volume control. This feature has become pretty common for full analog switches but not so much in HDMI switches. Generally, we’re forced to use a third-party switch or an amp with built-in switching at a high price.

Second, and most interesting, the HSS-1 takes advantage of the much-maligned (and rightfully so) HDMI Consumer Electronics Control (CEC) protocol, which enables A/V control via the HDMI cable.

HDMI CEC is built into virtually all HDMI-enabled devices, but it seems no one uses it and most integrators despite it … for good reason. Many CEC functions are not supported by the HDMI components and/or the controllers; there may be little interoperability between components and controllers; and it can generally confuse the system.

For those reasons, most of us integrators make sure CEC is turned off on every device in an HDMI distribution system. In this case, however, CEC actually works and it works well.

The Virtues of CEC

The effective use of CEC in a distribution/control system allows integrators to scrap ugly IR emitters, toss out cumbersome RS-232, and save a few ports on their network switch by controlling devices with CEC.

HydraConnect accomplished this by creating some "generic drivers" for TVs, DVDs, and AVRs. Inside the switch driver is the ability to create a number of virtual IR ports, so the Control4 system thinks it is using IR.

Here are my thoughts on each driver type:

TV Control
TV control is a no brainer. In most cases we only need ON and OFF. If this is your scenario you are in luck. Go ahead and yank the IR emitter now. However, if you need volume control and MUTE be careful. Toshiba seems to have some of the few TV sets that support these functions over CEC, although I have found that the new Sharp 70- and 80-inch displays also support these functions. Check out HydraConnect's HDMI CEC Compatibility Chart.

DVD/Blu-ray 
Who hates to see those ugly emitters on a nice finished rack? All standard CEC commands are supported in most of today’s Blu-ray players -- one less connection, one less wire, one cleaner-looking rack!

A/V Receiver
Here’s what it gets tricky. While some if not most of today's AVRs support CEC I do not think it is a viable solution if RS-232 or IP control is available. If either is available for two-way control, there is just too much to lose going the CEC route.

Direct commands to specific surround modes is lost, direct jumps to specific types of streaming media as in the new Sony 5700es will be lost, and true volume feedback to navigation is gone also.

So on the AVR side I would have to say CEC is just not ready for the big show. This is not the switcher’s fault, just a limitation of CEC in its current state.

Easy set-up but follow directions

The first thing to note about the HSS-1 is there are no front panel or buttons. Who needs ‘em? This switch is set up with an easy-to-use admin menu that is accessed from any Web browser. Set-up is fairly easy if you follow the directions.

But definitely do follow them. A few things to note:

• It’s very important to configure all devices as indicated in the HydraConnect CEC Compatibility Document.
• Ensure that all sources are displaying HDCP-protected content during the configuration process and that they are in PLAY mode.
• All cable and satellite boxes should be tuned to pay-per-view channels (you do not have to purchase a movie, just tune to the channel displaying the purchase screen).
• All A/V receivers should be configured so that the HDMI input which connects to the HSS-1 is shown on its front panel as the selected input
• All displays that have multiple inputs should have the input selected which has the HDMI cable connection.

[continues]

HSS-1 Features

Here is an overview, which probably sounds very familiar to those who currently enjoy the high-end HDMI switching features (instantaneous video switching, unlimited keys, etc.) offered by some leading CE brands.

• True 8X8 video and audio matrix with no HDCP key limitations on number of simultaneous displays
• Automatic EDID management ensures maximum video resolution and all audio format support
• Integrated CEC control for nearly all sources and displays eliminates most IR blasters and controllers
• Integrated IP support for DirecTV receivers to eliminate IR blasters
• FlashConnect ensures near instantaneous video switching and no picture loss when adding or removing displays to or from a video stream
• Supports HDMI 1.4a - 36/30/24 bit deep color (225 GHz), and EDID and CEC processing
• Supports all HDMI 1.4a pass through 3D formats; HDCP 1.4 compliant
• HDTV formats supported: 1080p/1080i/720p/576p/480p/576i/480i resolutions
• Supports all the latest HDMI audio formats including Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD
• On screen display shows users the shared status of any source
• Integrated stereo matrix switch and volume controls require only a low cost amp for whole house audio
• Full support for separate audio systems -- a theater can support 7.1 while other rooms support 5.1 or stereo
• A/V remix allows the viewing of one video source while listening to a separate audio source
• Reclocking for both inputs and outputs supports the use of up to 10+ meter HDMI cables (depending on cable quality and the mating equipment in the system)
• Fully integrated Control4 Composer support

Availability and Future Products

HydraConnect was founded by David Schanin and Tony Anzelmo, two microprocessor engineers that have Control4systems in there house. They thought there had to be a better way to handle switching, so they came up with this product.

Even so, the company will be coming out with drivers for other popular home control systems.

The HydraConnect HSS-1 will ship later this year. Units can be pre-ordered (with a $400 holiday savings) at store.thesohoshop.com, starting Dec. 3.

About Home Automation System Project Options

Are you familiar with the top Home automation system project benefits? These projects can include many specifications to meet with current cutting edge techniques. Facilities are developed and enhanced with top of the line remote controls and innovative items. You can plan a grandiose home improvement project to transform your home style. The best automation systems are part of our new era.

Smart homes are built with a unique approach. For instance, most automation systems include water level controllers and innovative night lamps. Appliances are part of a new dimension. The best part is, they can provide total security. For this, experts recommend using a Peripheral Interface Controller.

Make Your Own

Believe it or not, many individuals are trying to build their own systems. Apart of geeks, all sorts of professionals are looking onto these automated solutions. It is a way to shuffle money around every month- it is a method to pay bills and saving. You can begin to look after your pocket by investing wisely. Consider backing up your laptop automatically.

Odds are you are not an avid listener when people claim computers tend to fail. You can plan a weekend project to begin by enhancing your computer performance. You can set up your friend’s computers to work just as yours, too. Share your perception. You can free yourself from concerns. Opt for innovative automated solutions that will bring ease.

Benefits

Today, Home automation system project ideas can bring plenty of benefits. Our modern society is evolving at an extremely fast speed. This is the ultimate convenience since it can help busy people with the most hectic shifts. In this sense, it is not imperative to spend plenty of time shopping for the best home appliances. Automation solutions have enough provisions to control each condition. A good example may be an air conditioning system that can work through a quality iron box. This device can be turned off after a specific period. The same applies to a TV with signal cuts, etc.

In addition, you can skip unnecessary local store runs with the top automation systems. You do not need to have paper towels delivered on a daily basis, but you can set up a specific schedule. This will allow you to save time and money. Unbelievably but true, even a cleaning sponge can bring you headaches! Subscription programs provide customers with the most innovative solutions. A smart schedule is at your hands. This will allow top organization without missing any detail. A proper focus will increase overall productivity levels. You can take your home systems to a different dimension. Follow steps and guidelines and get prepared for a new era.

A good home automation idea can help prevent frustration. For example, having a computer that backup’s important data and folders can help you avoid plenty of problems. Most automated systems allow people to opt for effortless solutions. If you do not want to spend time watering your plants, preparing food for dinner, within some other tasks, the best home automation system project will easily help you.

The Secret of BMW's Success

By Gail Edmondson At 4:00 p.m. on a Friday afternoon, when most German workers have long departed for the weekend, the mini-caf?s sprinkled throughout BMW's sprawling R&D center in Munich are jammed with engineers, designers, and marketing managers deliberating so intently it's hard to hear above the din. Even the cappuccino machine is running on empty. It's an atmosphere far more Silicon Valley than Detroit.

"At lunch and breaks everyone is discussing ideas and projects all the time. It's somewhat manic. But it makes things move faster," says BMW chief designer Adrian van Hooydonk.

The intense employee buzz at BMW is hot management theory in action. Top consultants and academics say the kind of informal networks that flourish at BMW and the noise and borderline chaos they engender in big organizations are vital for innovation—especially in companies where knowledge sits in the brains of tens of thousands of workers and not in a computer server. Melding that brain power, they say, is essential to unleashing the best ideas.

HANDS ACROSS DIVISIONS. "Cross-functional teams look messy and inefficient, but they are more effective at problem solving," says James M. Manyika, a partner at McKinsey & Co. in San Francisco who has studied the effectiveness of such networks. Companies such as BMW that leverage workers' tacit knowledge through such networks "are widely ahead of their competitors," Manyika adds.

BMW is one of a handful of global companies including Nokia (NOK

) and Raytheon (RTN

) that have turned to networks to manage day-to-day operations, superseding classic hierarchies. Those pioneering companies still turn to management hierarchies to set strategic goals, but workers have the freedom to forge teams across divisions and achieve targets in the best way possible—even if that way is unconventional.

And they are encouraged to build ties across divisions to speed change. "Good companies have this lateral ability to communicate across divisions and silos, not just up and down the hierarchy. That's what makes BMW tick," says chief financial officer Stefan Krause.

LIGHTNING-FAST CHANGES. Speed and organizational agility is increasingly vital to the auto industry, since electronics now make up some 20% of a car's value—and that level is rising. BMW figures some 90% of the innovations in its new models are electronics-driven. That requires once-slow-moving automakers to adapt to the lightning pace of innovation and change driving the semiconductor and software industries. Gone is the era of the 10-year model cycle.

Now automakers must ram innovation into high gear to avoid being overtaken by the competition. That's especially true in the luxury-auto leagues, where market leaders must pulse new innovations constantly onto the market, from podcasting for cars to infrared night vision systems.

By shifting effective management of day-to-day operations to such human networks, which speed knowledge laterally through companies faster and better than old hierarchies can, BMW has become as entrepreneurial as a tech startup, consultants say. "Not many large companies take on lateral communications the way BMW does. It's a knocking down of barriers, like Jack Welch did at General Electric (GE

) to make a boundaryless corporation," says Jay Galbraith, a Breckenridge (Colo.)-based management consultant.

MOBILE-PHONE MESSAGES. BMW's ability to drive innovation even pervades its marketing division. "People talk about innovation in products, but what's underestimated is innovation in processes and organization," says Ernst Baumann, head of personnel at BMW, which has its share of radical new ideas.

To reach a younger crowd of potential buyers for its new 1 Series launch in 2004, BMW used mobile-phone messages as the main source of buzz, directing interested people to signups on BMW's Web site for pre-launch test drives in August that year—something unheard of in the industry at the time. The experimental tactic worked: BMW sparked responses from 150,000 potential customers—and sales of the 1 Series took off when it was launched in September, 2004.

In 2001, BMW stunned the advertising world by investing ad spending normally set aside for Super Bowl spots in short films that had nothing to do with telling consumers about its cars. The slick, professionally made films were pure entertainment, like its series of short films, The Hire, starring Clive Owens, and they cost a bundle: $25 million.

BALANCING ACT. The risky bet triggered serious consternation at BMW's Munich headquarters. "You have to worry when your marketing team goes into the business of making films," says Krause, who noted that Internet-driven businesses were imploding left and right in 2001. Given those conditions, "Who cares how many clicks you get."

Few large companies are willing to embrace the lack of organizational clarity and nebulous structures that drive innovative ideas. At most companies, headquarters would have put the kibosh on the short-film idea, which has since been widely imitated. Researchers say most experiment with networks on a small scale and very few use the practice to full effect since doing so means an uncomfortable balancing act between hierarchy and discipline on one hand, and free-wheeling networks that can veer toward near-chaos.

But for innovation-driven companies, networks that enable entrepreneurial risk-taking are a silver bullet. "The ideas are richer, they implement more effectively, and there is less resistance to change," says Rob Cross, assistant professor of management at the University of Virginia.

IDEAS FIRST. How does BMW manage discipline with creativity and keep the anarchy of networks from careening out of control? Workers at the Bavarian automaker are encouraged from their first day on the job to build a network or web of personal ties to speed problem-solving and innovation, be it in R&D, design, production, or marketing. Those ties run across divisions and up and down the chain of command.

When it comes to driving innovation, forget formal meetings, hierarchy, and stamps of approval. Each worker learns quickly that pushing fresh ideas is paramount. "It's easier to ask forgiveness for breaking the rules than to seek permission," says Richard Gaul, a 33-year veteran at BMW and former head of communications at the $60 billion automaker.

BMW's complex customized production system, the polar opposite of Toyota's (TM

) standardized lines, is easier to manage if workers feel empowered to drive change. Like Dell Computer (DELL

), BMW configures its cars to customers' orders, so each auto moving down the production line is different.

FORGET OLD-SCHOOL RIGIDITY. Making sure the system works without a hitch requires savvy workers who continually suggest how to optimize processes. "Networks can do things that hierarchies cannot, because hierarchies lack the freedom. With a network you get the powerful ability to leverage knowledge quickly to bear on solving problems," says Karen Stephenson, management consultant and Harvard professor. "A network is the only way to effectively manage BMW's kind of complexity."

By contrast, companies that don't have lateral nimbleness are crippled in fast-moving technology-driven industries. Rigid hierarchies that stifle fresh ideas and slow reaction times are one problem facing General Motors (GM

) and Ford Motor (F

).

Once giants like GM were king, dominating the market with their huge volume and purchasing muscle. Big is no longer the ticket to success, and the slow-moving bureaucracies that big companies are saddled with are now a major handicap. "Lean is passé. What is in is lean and agile: the ability to shift and adjust as circumstances in the market change," says David Cole, partner at the Center for Automotive Research in Ann Arbor, Mich.

KNOW THY CONSUMER. BMW managers, by contrast, even talk about the "physics of chaos" and how to constantly nurture innovation and creativity by operating on the very edge of chaos without getting out of control. "Discipline and creativity are not a paradox, there is a borderline case of self-controlling systems," says Gaul. "Where you break rules you have to be very disciplined." That's the industry's next kaizen—the art automakers will be forced to master in the 21st century.

The novel advertising scheme developed back in 2001 is a good example. Jim McDowell, then U.S. vice-president of marketing, was confident the project, dubbed "Big Idea," and kept under tight security in "War Room" No. 6 at BMW USA's Woodlake (N.J.) headquarters, would create just the kind of consumer buzz that BMW wanted—and would ultimately be more cost-effective for BMW than Super Bowl advertising. The idea was to give film directors a BMW car around which a compelling short film was to be made. Many of the tales centered on life-and-death chase scenes, but several were humorous or even melancholy.

McDowell figured if The Hire, took off and the films were downloaded from BMW's Web site by 1 million to 2 million viewers, BMW would chalk up the same number of eyeballs as a snappy advertising campaign aired during the Super Bowl, but would reach a higher percentage of BMW-type customers, progressives with a nose for cinema, technology, and high bandwidth. "If you really understand your consumer, you can be very clever about how to communicate. You can change the whole paradigm," says McDowell, who is now executive vice-president at Mini.

SNOWBALL EFFECT. McDowell didn't take any half-measures. He went after talented directors such as John Frankenheimer (The French Connection) and Ang Lee (Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon), and signed up stars such as Madonna, Clive Owens, and Gary Oldman—giving them complete artistic freedom, aside from the BMW model that starred in each film. No advance advertising heralded the Internet launch of the films.

The buzz started slowly with the first film but grew to avalanche proportions by the time Madonna's short comedy film about a cranky diva was released, overwhelming BMW's expectations and forcing the automaker to add servers as fast as it could.

But it didn't stop there. As the short-film gambit rocketed around the blogosphere, national TV broadcasters flooded McDowell's office with requests for interviews on CBS, Entertainment Tonight, and Fox News. The novelty of an automaker producing films fanned public interest and stoked downloads.

"EXPERIMENTAL ENVIRONMENT". After one year, the number of viewers who had visited BMW's Web site to download The Hire shot to over 21 million, and with three more films added in 2002, it rocketed to 100 million, sparking a Harvard Business School case study. One million enthusiasts ordered a DVD with all eight films.

McKinsey's Manyika, who has studied networks extensively, says knowledge forced through a company top-down drives "conformity, consistency, and efficiency." That's better suited to companies that make a standardized widget than a complex, electronics-driven product that requires constant innovation.

Companies such as BMW have to tap into tacit knowledge to spark fresh ideas. "It's more of a learning and experimental environment. It's building on what people know. It's learning instead of instruction," says Manyike.

HOW IDEAS TRAVEL. For academics and consultants studying the phenomenon of corporate networks, the most fascinating element is the "node" or the broker individual who can join two separate clusters with different pools of knowledge. Such a broker may have once worked in purchasing but now sits in R&D. As such, he or she can bridge the two worlds by "reaching across the white space of disconnected people," says Ronald S. Burt, a sociologist at the University of Chicago, who is studying the impact corporate networks have on performance.

That linkage speeds learning throughout companies—a vital tool to industries that should continually innovate. "People exposed to a diversity of information are at higher risk of seeing a new angle, a better way to frame ideas," says Burt. And companies that recognize and tap such social capital "have better growth rates and better patent rates. Formal structures decide who to blame. Informal structures decide how to get things done