Wirelessly broadcast PC screen to multiple TVs?

November 16, 2009 1:25 PM

The easiest way to do this is to tell you what I need: I want someone to be able to work on a laptop and be able to broadcast the video information on the screen wirelessly to more than 1 TV. My question is - how?

Basically what I'm hoping to set up is a laptop/tablet PC with images that a person could manipulate. I want those manipulations to show up on a number of televisions. I do not need audio.

Its easy enough to do wired - there is an S-Video or HDMI out on plenty of laptops these days, so its no problem to split and run cables across a room to each television.

I need, though, a wireless solution. I have googled and found a number of these kinds of solutions but the quality appears questionable on some. The big thing is expandability - I want to broadcast the video signal to a handful of displays. Ideally the solution would be one broadcasting unit and the ability to purchase individual receivers.

Anyone have any experience with this that could give me any guidance? I should mention I'm in Canada - some devices that are available in the US or overseas are not approved for use here.

posted by neksys to Technology (13 answers total)

Could you broadcast the screen content to another computer with something like UltraVNC over a regular wireless network, then split that computer's output? If the latency is too high with VNC, I used RAdmin at a previous job and it was extremely fast.
posted by pocams at 1:47 PM on November 16, 2009

Response by poster: pcams - yeah, I've looked into that (or something similar) as an option, and it will work just fine. I prefer, however, having television screens for a number of reasons - most importantly, cost. You can get a good TV for a couple hundred bucks and there will be times when I will want the video broadcast to either a large TV or a projector or other such things.

In any event, thanks for the RAdmin link, I'm looking at it now.
posted by neksys at 1:52 PM on November 16, 2009

Maybe using a Slingbox and SlingCatcher?
posted by white_devil at 2:00 PM on November 16, 2009

For the previous I forgot to add in combination with a wireless bridge.
posted by white_devil at 2:02 PM on November 16, 2009

Response by poster: The Slingbox and Slingcatcher solution looks like it would work, but pretty complex for my uses. I really don't need to PVR whats going on and such. Keep in mind that this also needs to be portable - to, for example, be set up and taken down the same day, then do it all over again the next day, then stored for weeks.

Also, it would be set up in a space that isn't, you know, mine.

For clarification, I suppose I can say this is for use in a courtroom. Usually to provide an expert with an interactive display (a tablet PC) and the judge/counsel with a display of what the expert is indicating in real time. The ability to also use it for larger displays or projectors for jury trials needs to also be considered.
posted by neksys at 2:21 PM on November 16, 2009

A friend pointed me to this software. Install on your laptop and you can screencast to your TVs using a PS3. Supposedly versions coming out for XBOX 360 and Wi also. Just need to attach wireless router to your latop and have game machines connect wirelessly to that network. Probably pretty easy to redeploy after intial setup too.
posted by white_devil at 2:58 PM on November 16, 2009

Response by poster: DisplayShare looks pretty rad, actually. I'm unfortunately not about to bring in 3 or 4 PS3s hooked up to LCD displays into a courtroom, but for home, that looks really cool.
posted by neksys at 3:09 PM on November 16, 2009

This may work. Supports up to 3 remote devices. My last shot at this so good luck! Please post or memail me; I'm curious what you end up using.
posted by white_devil at 3:53 PM on November 16, 2009

If you don't already have the TV's, Panasonic professional (business grade) plasmas support a wireless presentation add-in blade, sounds like your exact requirements.

Wireless is over wifi and you can display on up to 8 TVs.
posted by wongcorgi at 4:03 PM on November 16, 2009

Response by poster: Wongcorgi - if only the pro line came in smaller form factors... carting around three or four 32 inch plasmas is fun and all. But thank you very much for the recommendation. That is obviously the way to go in the future and I'll have to put some serious thought into introducing this at some point - especially if ever available in smaller displays. Pricey, but then again, so is litigation.

white_devil - this is in the short term precisely what I am looking for. The lawyer in me shudders about the fact that the CRTC hasn't approved it but places are willing to ship to Canada... on the other hand, ideal solutions sometimes present themselves in less than ideal circumstances.

Thanks to all.

I will leave this question open for now because I am still interested in hearing additional ideas - maybe someone has a novel approach to my problem that I haven't thought of?
posted by neksys at 4:51 PM on November 16, 2009

Just a random suggestion... I'm not an AV expert by any measure... but maybe there's a Closed Circuit TV solution that might work? I'd assume there's a security company out there that knows how to broadcast video wirelessly to multiple monitors, right?
posted by mhh5 at 2:18 PM on November 17, 2009

a related angle to the CCTV approach... get a fancy baby monitor setup? I dunno if a camera aimed at the "source" computer would produce a good enough image, tho... but maybe try searching for "2.4GHz 4 Channel Wireless LCD Baby Monitor & Palm Camera Kit" -- or other wireless cctv setups...?
posted by mhh5 at 11:31 PM on November 17, 2009

Best answer: Aha... How about searching for "X10's Wireless Video Sender" -- good old X10... I think that should do it?
posted by mhh5 at 11:57 PM on November 17, 2009