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34 TELE-audiovision International — The World‘s Largest Digital TV Trade Magazine — 05-06/2013 — TELE-audiovision.com
tioned in a way that allows
pointing the remote control
towards it without having to
dislocate your arm.
Thanks to a very useful
LED on each of the two units
it is easy to check the oper-
ating mode of the tvLINK HD
at any time. If the LED flash-
es there is no connection or
the transmission unit does
not receive any AV signal. If
it lights up permanently an
AV signal is being transmit-
ted and is ready for use at
the reception unit.
Shortly after we had in-
stalled the tvLINK HD sys-
tem and turned on power the
two units began to establish
a connection via roughly 25
meters of coax cable, and
after only a few moments
the blue LEDs indicated that
all went according to plan.
When we then provided the
signal of our satellite receiv-
er to the HDMI input of the
transmission unit it was sent
immediately to the reception
unit and from there it was
passed on to the LCD panel
in our editorial office.
Since we never take our
job lightly, even the first
task we threw at the tvLINK
HD was one of the toughest:
We wanted nothing less then
flawless transmission of a
1080p Full HD signal – and
that’s what we got! Not for
a single second did the sys-
tem appear to be struggling,
and obviously this means all
available resolutions such
as 1080p 60Hz, 1080p 50
Hz, 1080p 24 Hz, 1080i 60
Hz, 1080i 50 Hz, 720p 60
Hz, 720p 50 Hz, 576p 50 Hz,
480p 60 Hz and 480i 60 Hz
will work in the blink of eye.
We know there will be read-
ers out there looking for a
drawback and many will like
to know what happens to
HDCP (read: copy-protect-
ed) content. We can put your
mind at ease: The tvLINK HD
will happily support HDCP.
We looked long and hard
at the output signal provid-
ed by the reception unit and
were unable to notice any
difference at all between the
original video and the video
transmitted via the tvLINK
HD system.
In order for all this to work
as brilliantly as it does, a
considerable amount of pro-
cessing power is required
in the transmitting unit for
compressing the original for-
mat into H.264/MPEG4-AVC,
resulting in a minor time lag.
In everyday use, howev-
er, this is irrelevant and the
digital receiver will also react
to remote commands with
hardly noticeable delay.
On the other hand, those
of you using the system in
connection with your games
consoles will find that the
controller in your hands
might not react as swiftly as
you are used to.
Speaking of remote con-
trols and controllers: The
IR transmitter and IR re-
ceiver of the tvLINK HD
system use the frequency
range between 34 kHz and
38 kHz which guarantees
compatibility with virtually
all standard remote controls.
We have a number of differ-
ent remotes lying around in
our test lab, and no matter
which one we tried they all
worked perfectly in combi-
nation with the tvLINK HD.
In contrast to HDMI sig-
nal transmissions via WiFi
maximum range is not such
a major issue with the tv-
LINK HD system. We used
almost 100 meters of coax
cable with reasonable qual-
ity in our office and did not
experience any interference
or dropouts. Signal switches
with two outputs also worked
beautifully.
One feature we cannot
praise highly enough is the
USB socket that is built into
both the transmission and
the reception units. It allows
users to load new firmware
right at the devices to make
sure added features and im-
proved functions are made
available as conveniently