Vidyo Wiki

Status 2016-09-08 [edit]

Following the upgrade during August 2016 of all SUPA sites' VideoConferencing suites, sites have reported at least two separate faults when connecting external sources to the Vidyo HD-230 via the supplied Extron HDMI switches.

Reported Faults

1. Apple Mac (OS X) laptops with native HDMI outputs

In this case, selecting the 'Laptop' input source results in the Vidyo display 'toggling' at a rate of ~0.5Hz - see:

Initial diagnosis with Ajenta and Edinburgh Learning Technology staff located this problem in the Extron HDMI switcher - bypassing the Extron and feeding the Mac's native HDMI output directly into the Vidyo HD-230 removed the fault. However, this is obviously not a sustainable solution.

Further investigation by Ajenta suggested disabling HDMI-CEC in the Vidyo HD-230: however, repeating the same test after this change failed to resolve the issue (further confirming the location of the problem in the Extron switchers):

2. Windows laptops with native HDMI outputs
Windows laptops also presented specific faults; either the displayed output showed the bottom ~10% of the display as blank or 'wrapped-around' from the top of the machine's display; or the displayed output failed to display at the correct resolution - see:

Temporary Workarounds

Christian Killow had previously recommended (in an email to each site's IT team) that each site purchase at least 1 each of the following adaptors to enable connection to the supplied HDMI input:

HDMI (F) / DP (M)

HDMI (F) / Mini-DP (M)

HDMI (F) / DVI-D (M)

HDMI (F) / VGA (M)

Edinburgh already had relevant adaptors in stock and confirmed they resolved the reported issues as below

1. Mac Thunderbolt (Mini DisplayPort) to HDMI Adaptor
Edinburgh have tested and confirmed that connecting the same Apple Mac to the Extron HDMI switcher via the HDMI (F) / Mini-DP (M) above reliable prevents the reported fault happening (at least, with Edinburgh's installation).