500ft runs of cat5e for s-video

I received my S-Video connectors this weekend . SUCCESS! Here are the results:


1. Cut a 20ft length of cat5 UTP.

2. Exposed about 2" on each end.

3. Punched down the wires per the color drawing on the connector YG Y CG C

4. Test Hookup: DVD S-Video Out -> 6ft S-Video Cable -> Connector -> 20 ft of Cat5 -> Connector -> 3ft S-Video Cable -> S-Video Input on front of TV


Noticed crappy picture (small wavy lines across the screen).


I took apart one of the connectors and noticed they don't connect Y(ground) and C(ground) to the outer portion of the S-Video cable. But, if I connect these manually the wavy lines go away. Actually, all you have to do is put one of the ground wires in the outer circle of the female jack before you plug the 6ft S-Video Cable in so it makes the connection.


On a 20 ft cable you really have to look hard to see a difference in picture quality. I would say most people wouldn't notice a difference. I will be making some longer runs soon and will post the results.

You are asking for trouble running video over CAT5. CAT 5 has an impedance of 110 ohms and is designed for a balanced signal. Standard video is 75 ohms and single ended. This is not comptable with cat5 or cat5e cable.


Leviton is doing a major dis-service to poeple posting this kind of information. Sure it will work meaning you will get a picture at the other end. B the quality will be very poor at 500 feet. Leviton's application may be geared to security cameras where picture quality is not as important.


Now they do make VGA monitor extenders that use CAT5 cable but that's different. These boxes converth the 75 ohm video to a balanced signal that is matched to cat5 cable. And even these suffer some loss.


I design television facilities as a living for the past 15 years, plus formal education in EE. Trust me, this will not work to your satisfaction in a HT system.

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Topaz:


Would you please explain specifically how you did this? Maybe post a picture? I'd like to try this, but I'm not exactly sure what you're saying to do.


Thanks and regards

BB80301

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I would run two RG59s or better yet RG6 and use 1 foot Svideo to BNC adapter cables. A company called Calrad makes these for abot $7.00 each. Remember that CATV RG6 cannot be soldered because of the aluminum shield.


But 500 feet is too long a run for any analog video without equalization. You really need an equalizing amplifier at the receiving end. This is a broadcast grade device and not cheap although you could probably get a good deal on EBAY Professional Video section. Remember for Svideo you would need two amplifiers. The C channel could just be a simple non equalizing DA and the gain used to boost the signal.


I know this solution is probably beyond the average HT enthusiast. But a 500 foot video run which is expected to producd good quality and not that commen either.


I did notice a passive (no power required) video and audio to CAT5 convertor box at Jameco electronics .com???. This device is most likely three transformers and uses three pairs of the CAT5. V,A1,A2. You could do Svideo with two of these boxes and two cat5 runs and have four channels of audio as a bonus.