[REQ] A Newbie Guide to Virtualization, unRAID 64, and unRAID Distro


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I've been thinking about this and have a couple of questions for those of you using centralized end points.

 

1) Have any of you seen/tried video cards with dual HDMI out? Since I am thinking that HDMI is the only option for audio/video I don't want to tie up multiple PCI-E slots with video cards if I don't have to, but I don't know if ESX/Xen etc would recognize 2 HDMI ports on a single port as discrete and send separate video signals

2) How many cables do you need to run to each end point? And are they discrete as well? I am thinking if you need to do HDMI over Ethernet, and USB over Ethernet you need 2 cables, plus if you want just straight Ethernet (i.e. you have an XBOX attached to the same TV) then you potentially need a 3rd cable. Is there any way to put a hub on both sides for each requirement, or do you need to run 3 direct cables (HDMI to HDMI, USB to USB, etc).

 

As mentioned in an earlier post I have my house cabled, but most rooms only have a single CAT6 cable and I am trying to figure out if this is doable or not.

 

I don't currently do this so one of the experts can correct me if I'm wrong.

 

1) A card with dual-HDMI won't work as each instance of XBMC needs its own dedicated video card.  A card with dual-HDMI could, OTOH, serve the SAME XBMC instance to two seperate rooms/TV's.  Xen, ESXi, etc can only passthrough the entire card to a VM.  A card with dual-HDMI is a single video card with multiple outputs, not multiple video cards on the same PCB.

 

2) You would need a dedicated CAT6 for each HDMI.  HDMI over Ethernet is NOT HDMI via IP.  It simply uses the CAT6 cable (not connected to an Ethernet switch) as the transmission cable.  It should really be called HDMI over CAT6 cable.  There are HDMI-to-RJ45 adapters that must be used.  You would also need a second CAT6 in each room for any Ethernet devices.  If you had more than one Ethernet device in that room, you would need additional CAT6 drops or a switch.

 

Just for clarity, while I stated CAT6, CAT5e will also work for HDMI over Ethernet and gigabit Ethernet.

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You are correct dirty. Each GPU is treated as a single entity and can't divide up itself at a port level.

 

As for extenders it is possible over single cat6 but is comparatively very expensive when compared to a dual Cat solution.

 

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

Do you have any ideas how it would be done over a single cable? I have my house wired, but it's not easy to run a second cable to some of the rooms. If it's insane then I would just go with a local end point, but I would be curious on what it actually requires.

 

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You are correct dirty. Each GPU is treated as a single entity and can't divide up itself at a port level.

 

As for extenders it is possible over single cat6 but is comparatively very expensive when compared to a dual Cat solution.

 

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

Do you have any ideas how it would be done over a single cable?

Google: hdmi single cat6

 

tons of hits and reviews of the various solutions.

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You are correct dirty. Each GPU is treated as a single entity and can't divide up itself at a port level.

 

As for extenders it is possible over single cat6 but is comparatively very expensive when compared to a dual Cat solution.

 

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

Do you have any ideas how it would be done over a single cable?

Google: hdmi single cat6

 

tons of hits and reviews of the various solutions.

 

Sorry, I am trying to figure out how to extend both HDMI & USB for IR receiver over a single CAT cable (if possible).

 

I have 2 TVs I like to extend this to, but each room has a single cable installed.

 

Is that still what you are talking about googling?

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You are correct dirty. Each GPU is treated as a single entity and can't divide up itself at a port level.

 

As for extenders it is possible over single cat6 but is comparatively very expensive when compared to a dual Cat solution.

 

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

Do you have any ideas how it would be done over a single cable?

Google: hdmi single cat6

 

tons of hits and reviews of the various solutions.

 

Sorry, I am trying to figure out how to extend both HDMI & USB for IR receiver over a single CAT cable (if possible).

 

I have 2 TVs I like to extend this to, but each room has a single cable installed.

 

Is that still what you are talking about googling?

Nope, sorry, from the quote you responded to I thought you wanted a single cable HDMI solution.
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You are correct dirty. Each GPU is treated as a single entity and can't divide up itself at a port level.

 

As for extenders it is possible over single cat6 but is comparatively very expensive when compared to a dual Cat solution.

 

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

Do you have any ideas how it would be done over a single cable? I have my house wired, but it's not easy to run a second cable to some of the rooms. If it's insane then I would just go with a local end point, but I would be curious on what it actually requires.

 

This is a little expensive but looks fun!

 

http://www.octavainc.com/HDMI_Matrix_HDbaseT_HD4xSTPMX_over%20CAT6.html

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Sorry, I am trying to figure out how to extend both HDMI & USB for IR receiver over a single CAT cable (if possible).

 

I have 2 TVs I like to extend this to, but each room has a single cable installed.

 

Is that still what you are talking about googling?

 

Please take a look here:

http://www.pulse-eight.com/store/products/104-usb-hdmi-cec-adapter.aspx

 

I think this solution would work in your case. You wouldn't need USB cable for your remote, controlling the xbmc but use your tv remote instead.

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You are correct dirty. Each GPU is treated as a single entity and can't divide up itself at a port level.

 

As for extenders it is possible over single cat6 but is comparatively very expensive when compared to a dual Cat solution.

 

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

Do you have any ideas how it would be done over a single cable? I have my house wired, but it's not easy to run a second cable to some of the rooms. If it's insane then I would just go with a local end point, but I would be curious on what it actually requires.

 

This is a little expensive but looks fun!

 

http://www.octavainc.com/HDMI_Matrix_HDbaseT_HD4xSTPMX_over%20CAT6.html

 

Wow... all for the low, low price of $1875. Nice, but for that price I think I could rip out my drywall and re-cable the necessary rooms and still have a ton of money left over.

 

 

 

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Sorry, I am trying to figure out how to extend both HDMI & USB for IR receiver over a single CAT cable (if possible).

 

I have 2 TVs I like to extend this to, but each room has a single cable installed.

 

Is that still what you are talking about googling?

 

Please take a look here:

http://www.pulse-eight.com/store/products/104-usb-hdmi-cec-adapter.aspx

 

I think this solution would work in your case. You wouldn't need USB cable for your remote, controlling the xbmc but use your tv remote instead.

 

This looks pretty cool, and for $50 it's definitely worth a try. Thanks for the suggestion.

 

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Wow... all for the low, low price of $1875. Nice, but for that price I think I could rip out my drywall and re-cable the necessary rooms and still have a ton of money left over.

 

But that's also a 4x8 matrix switch.  Very pricey but would be awesome to have.

 

There are cheaper options to do a single HDMI over a single CAT6.  Still somewhat expensive, but not $2k expensive.  Here's a $190 example.

 

http://www.monoprice.com/Product?c_id=109&cp_id=10110&cs_id=1011012&p_id=8122&seq=1&format=2

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Wow... all for the low, low price of $1875. Nice, but for that price I think I could rip out my drywall and re-cable the necessary rooms and still have a ton of money left over.

 

But that's also a 4x8 matrix switch.  Very pricey but would be awesome to have.

 

There are cheaper options to do a single HDMI over a single CAT6.  Still somewhat expensive, but not $2k expensive.  Here's a $190 example.

 

http://www.monoprice.com/Product?c_id=109&cp_id=10110&cs_id=1011012&p_id=8122&seq=1&format=2

 

The benefit of the other solution offered is it includes USB:

 

http://www.pulse-eight.com/store/products/104-usb-hdmi-cec-adapter.aspx

 

You can use the single device to manage the remote as well as HDMI, instead of just HDMI. Since I only have a single CAT6 run to the bedrooms this looks like a better solution.

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Although have never personally tried the hdmi extenders over cat6 I am sure the quality would degrade big time.

 

They shouldn't. I think HDMI is only good for 50 feet or so before degrading, and anything over that you need to use CAT5/6 to extend. I don't know how they boost the signal, but CAT is the only way to get a quality signal over that distance.

 

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Although have never personally tried the hdmi extenders over cat6 I am sure the quality would degrade big time.

I have personally tried them, and no, the quality is just fine, as long as you don't try to push more data than the extender is rated for. If you are trying to push high res with a cheap extender, you will see issues. The cheap ones run 720p and 1080i just fine.
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The benefit of the other solution offered is it includes USB:

 

http://www.pulse-eight.com/store/products/104-usb-hdmi-cec-adapter.aspx

 

You can use the single device to manage the remote as well as HDMI, instead of just HDMI. Since I only have a single CAT6 run to the bedrooms this looks like a better solution.

 

You do realize the pulse-eight only does HDMI-CEC between the HDMI source and the TV, correct?  It does not do HDMI over CAT6. 

 

You would need the pulse-eight at the source side, connected to the PC via HDMI and USB, then HDMI out of the pulse-eight into a HDMI over CAT6 converter (like the one I linked), to the other HDMI over CAT6 at the TV side, then HDMI out from the converter to the TV.  And that's assuming the converter would pass HDMI-CEC (although I see no reason why it wouldn't).

 

If you were to use a pulse-eight ONLY, you would need an HDMI cable in the walls between sounce and TV, which is exactly what you were trying to avoid.

 

TL;DR: The pulse-eight only allows you to control the PC source from your TV remote.  It DOES NOT do HDMI over CAT6.

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Although have never personally tried the hdmi extenders over cat6 I am sure the quality would degrade big time.

I have personally tried them, and no, the quality is just fine, as long as you don't try to push more data than the extender is rated for. If you are trying to push high res with a cheap extender, you will see issues. The cheap ones run 720p and 1080i just fine.

 

This is exactly what I meant.

I used to run 20m HDMI cable (Van Den Hul) and was surprised that even this 20 m are degrading the picture quality visibly. It was more noticeable on non-compressed Blu-ray content while the 720p/1080i was just fine. That's why I was thinking that the cat6 extenders can't be better than a high-end graded HDMI cable but obviously I am wrong. 

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This is exactly what I meant.

I used to run 20m HDMI cable (Van Den Hul) and was surprised that even this 20 m are degrading the picture quality visibly. It was more noticeable on non-compressed Blu-ray content while the 720p/1080i was just fine. That's why I was thinking that the cat6 extenders can't be better than a high-end graded HDMI cable but obviously I am wrong.

 

It's likely because the extenders are powered, so they are amplifying the signal.  This is what lets them go a further distance without a lot of degredation.

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The benefit of the other solution offered is it includes USB:

 

http://www.pulse-eight.com/store/products/104-usb-hdmi-cec-adapter.aspx

 

You can use the single device to manage the remote as well as HDMI, instead of just HDMI. Since I only have a single CAT6 run to the bedrooms this looks like a better solution.

 

You do realize the pulse-eight only does HDMI-CEC between the HDMI source and the TV, correct?  It does not do HDMI over CAT6. 

 

You would need the pulse-eight at the source side, connected to the PC via HDMI and USB, then HDMI out of the pulse-eight into a HDMI over CAT6 converter (like the one I linked), to the other HDMI over CAT6 at the TV side, then HDMI out from the converter to the TV.  And that's assuming the converter would pass HDMI-CEC (although I see no reason why it wouldn't).

 

If you were to use a pulse-eight ONLY, you would need an HDMI cable in the walls between sounce and TV, which is exactly what you were trying to avoid.

 

TL;DR: The pulse-eight only allows you to control the PC source from your TV remote.  It DOES NOT do HDMI over CAT6.

 

I did realize I still need a CAT/HDMI cable converter on both sides, but are you saying that even with this the pulse-eight solution will not do what I want it to? I wasn't 100% from reading the description, but thought it was a good fit.

 

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I have a 50ft run of HDMI and the picture looks as good as when I had a 9ft run.

 

Agreed. This isn't something unique to us here in unRAID.

 

If you Google, you will thousands of users who are successfully doing 100+ feet runs with the right HDMI and CAT-6 cables (without losing picture quality or using signal extenders).

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I can't say whether or not it will work. Hopefully someone here has used both products together and can report whether not not it was successful. That said, I can't see any reason why it shouldn't work.

 

If no one can say for sure, the quickest way to find out is give it a shot and see.

 

Agreed. I just ordered one, but since it's shipping from the UK to Canada it looks like it won't arrive until the end of the month.

 

I will post back once I've played with it and let people know if it's a worthwhile solution.

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You are correct dirty. Each GPU is treated as a single entity and can't divide up itself at a port level.

 

As for extenders it is possible over single cat6 but is comparatively very expensive when compared to a dual Cat solution.

 

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

Do you have any ideas how it would be done over a single cable? I have my house wired, but it's not easy to run a second cable to some of the rooms. If it's insane then I would just go with a local end point, but I would be curious on what it actually requires.

 

This is a little expensive but looks fun!

 

http://www.octavainc.com/HDMI_Matrix_HDbaseT_HD4xSTPMX_over%20CAT6.html

 

Wow... all for the low, low price of $1875. Nice, but for that price I think I could rip out my drywall and re-cable the necessary rooms and still have a ton of money left over.

 

Still inexpensive if you compare to similar solutions from AMX or Crestron.

I might give this a try and report.

 

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going a vm route.. and now people are running sab on their unraid box and lets say sab is extracting a 1:1 bluray (50gb).. that can be quite taxing on the hd/cpu/memory. wont it negatively affect unraid? wont it kill the cache drive speeds/space/etc?

 

also, can the vm run off its own hd so you segment those read/write hits from the rest of the unraid os?

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