The box behind every screen. Finding the matrix of your home.

Motivation for this project came from following frustrations:

1. When your PS5 is connected to living room TV and someone is watching Netflix on the same TV, but you really want to play Elden Ring.
2. Whenever you add a new device to your workstation, you have to re-wire the entire setup.
3. Regardless of your cable management skills, there will always be a spaghetti mess somewhere.
4. When you move to a new house, you have to disconnect everything, and then re-wire it all again.

What do a monitor and a TV have in common?

They are screens, and they both have HDMI inputs.

And what do input devices have in common? They mostly use USB or Bluetooth.

So why not centralize all HDMI sources and make them available to any screen in the house? Rhetorical question.

Finding the Matrix

In order to centralize all HDMI sources, there was a need for a device that any HDMI source could plug into, and that could route it further to any HDMI display.

Probably we all have heard of HDMI switches, but that is just multiple inputs to one output. That will not work, as we want at any time to be able to choose what source goes to what display.

    PC   ──────┐
               │    ┌───────────────┐
    PS5  ──────┼───▶│  HDMI SWITCH  ├───▶  Monitor
               │    └───────────────┘
    Xbox ──────┘

    many sources                          one screen

Matrix to the rescue. Not Neo, but a switch on steroids — any source, to any screen, at the same time.

    PC   ──────┐                         ┌───▶  TV
               │    ┌───────────────┐    │
    PS5  ──────┼───▶│  HDMI MATRIX  ├────┼───▶  Monitor
               │    └───────────────┘    │
    Xbox ──────┘                         └───▶  TV 2

    many sources                          many screens

The spaghetti has one address

Cable spaghetti will not be avoided, but it can be centralized. The next step was to build an address where all the HDMI sources would “live”.

My two cents

With the setup like this, nobody needs to negotiate over a screen. If you are in the middle of a game, and someone wants to watch Netflix, you can move your game to the next screen and continue.