Repeater system configurations

The BATC repeater controller is designed to be a flexible but basic controller and requires to be configured with audio and video switches to become a complete repeater.

This page shows some typical configurations.

Basic HDMI repeater

This example uses a standard seamless HDMI switcher with 4 inputs, one of which is the HDMI output of the controller RPi, controlled by Infra Red.

Experience has shown that although the switch is advertised as seamless, the switch between sources is not truly seamless. This glitch is enough to cause any encoder following the switch to hang up. This problem is solved by using another HDMI seamless switch (#1) as a buffer between our main switch (#2) and the encoder.

HDMI repeater with Quad view

In the above design, the controller HDMI output is connected to the main switch (#2), limiting the number of inputs available for recievers etc. One input on the quad view facility would also be used by the controller.

To increase the number of inputs, a 3rd HDMI seamless switch is connected to an input of the 2nd HDMI switch. The repeater controller IR commands for any of those inputs and the quad view are set to also include the command to set the 2nd switch to the correct input.

Additional inputs can still be connected to the spare inputs on switch #2 but will not be seen in the quad view.

Audio switching

In the basic configuration, all audio switching is by the HDMI switch.

When using a quad facility, most HDMI switches will only carry the main audio channel meaning audio from any other receiver is not heard making the multiple receiver quad view useless.

To overcome this, the BATC controller will also command an external i2c controlled audio switch. It has been designed to be used with this switch DATV repeater audio switch