HDMI to VGA problem

[hartty]

Hi All,

Please could someone tell me what i am doing wrong.

My plan is to use my monitor for my Xbox, Ps3 and my pc so i bought the following.

1x4 port HDMI switcher
2xhdmi cables (for the xbox and pc)
1xDVI to HDMI (from my graphics card to the hdmi switcher)
1xhdmi to vga (from the hdmi switcher to the monitor)

Now i have been told that the reason its not working is because im going from digital to analoge but i have been doing that for years via the dvi-vga adapter that comes with the graphics card.

Please help

 

[richb93]

AFAIK its because HDMI uses only the same digital lines that DVI does, it doesn't carry across analogue support from DVI.

Your best bet would be to connect your PC via DVI and then have the HDMI going to switchbox then that to devices.

 

[Werewolf]

Yup

DVI had the option (not always used) for the connector to carry analogue as well as digital signals, and any Videocard that can use a generic DVI to VGA adaptor is actually using those analogue conenctions, so all the adaptor has to do is change the physical connection to one that is compatible.

HDMI is pure digital, to get it to do what you'd want would require an active adaptor to change the electrical signal from Digital to Analogue, and potentially cope with the HDCP encryption.
The first part is possible, although probably much more expensive and certainly complex than a DVI-VGA adaptor, the second part is something that is unlikely to happen as the idea of the HDCP encryption is to stop people copying the digital source to anything other than an approved device (converting it to analogue would make it very easy to copy).