The What: Hall Research has announced the ECHO family, a series of extension products designed to allow a single HDMI 2.0 source to display remotely at up to eight different locations using HDBaseT technology.
The What Else: HDMI resolutions up to 4K UHD (4K60 4:4:4) can be extended up to 70m, while resolutions up to 1080p can be extended 100m over a single Cat-5e or Cat-6 cable. The ECHO family supports HDCP 2.2 and 1.4 content protection, as well as HDR10 high dynamic range video.
Related: Hall Research Launches 4K Video and USB HDBaseT 2.0 KVM Extender
In addition to HDMI extension, the ECHO family also extends RS-232 serial data, and bi-directional IR for control of remote devices. All senders include a local HDMI output, EDID routing control, de-embedded analog audio, and Power over Cable (PoC) to power remote receivers. The ECHO-4S and ECHO-8S have built-in HDMI splitters to extend a single video to four and eight receivers respectively, and have additional features including RS-232 and IR loop output for daisy-chaining Senders, and digital TOSLINK audio de-embedding.
The Bottom Line: The ECHO-RX2 receiver has a built-in HDMI splitter for connection to a secondary display, RS-232 and bi-directional IR for control, and de-embedded analog audio output. When used with an ECHO-1S, install the power supply at either sender or receiver—whichever is more convenient.
