BARRACUDA - Linedoubler/HDMI Switcher

INPUTS:

2 Composite Video
2 S-Video
2 Component (SD/HD) or SCART RGB
6 stereo audio inputs
4 HDMI 1.3

OUTPUT:

HDMI + optical audio

LEARN MORE about the Barracuda:

Why do we launch this unit ?

We finally decided to create this product because we have seen
the TV market to develop backwards considering picture quality.
A few years ago the deinterlacing was a very important factor and
products were positioned how well they did the pull down and video
deinterlacing.
No question this is past, only very high end products still deliver
a good picture quality especially with SD video broadcast.
Cheaper LCD or plasma designs use taiwanese single chip design
that deliver very poor video performance both for Video and Film footage.
DVD players with progressive outputs and good built in deinterlacers can
compensate for this but the satellite picture quality is very poor.
Almost everybody is watching a lot more TV broadcasts than
DVD movies, why should you not want your TV picture look equally good

Considering that the SPATZ BARRACUDA can deliver the same picture
quality for SD sources from satellite receivers as a progressive DVD player it
was logical to start offering a product that can make your picture look the
best technically possible.
The next idea was to make a product that can convert all your sources to a
single HDMI cable including audio.
One wire to the display - that is what we are offering.
The following detailed explanation will give you an idea what we had in mind
when we designed this unit.

1.Analog video and stereo inputs:

Not everybody has the latest top notch satellite receiver with HDMI output.
In Germany e.g. there is very little HD footage so 99,9% of the customers are watching
SD broadcasts from PVRs that either have a Component or RGB SCART output.
BARRACUDA has 2 of these inputs including a stereo audio input. This will be deinterlaced
to 576p and the display will perform the upconversion.
We are also taking care of your old VCR and Camcorder signals like composite or S-Video
in a way that we have chosen the best video decoder chip that you can buy today.
It has a 3D adaptive comb filter and many other broadcast level decoding capabilities,
be not surprised when you cannot tell the difference between S-Video and Component.

2. Why no scaling engine ?

We have made several tests and figured out that altough the deinterlacing of
most displays is very poor, we got excellent results for scaling. So why should
our customers pay for scaling when not necessary.
HDMI input signals of any kind including 1080@24p are passed unprocessed to
the HDMI output. Analog video inputs are deinterlaced to 576p for PAL and 480p for NTSC,
a world wide standard that any display or projector that is HD compatible can handle.

3. HDTV compatability

The Barracuda is fully HD compatible both analog HDTV and digital HDTV can be
either switched (HDMI) or converted (YPrPb) to HDMI.
Especially in USA, satellite receivers with component output are very common, so
we decided to put in a high quality AD converter for HD signals up to 1080p.
The HDMI inputs are HDMI 1.3 specified so they can handle any signal up to
2,25 Gbps.

4. AUDIO INs and OUTs

The BARRACUDA is really an integration product for most living room setups
making an AV receiver obsolete if you want to use integrated speakers of
your display.
Typically these integrated stereo speaker setups do not really need to be digital,
so we decided to offer easy to connect stereo audio inputs that are still the standard on any
source equipment.
The HDMI output will carry these converted stereo audio signals and feed them
to the display. This has a high WAF (wife acceptance factor) as you will virtually need
only one remote for selection up to 10 sources. No need for switching video and audio
seperately.
The audio inputs have adjustable memorizable level settings for your analog source equipment.
You also might find the seperate optical audio output very helpful. It carries the digital version of
the analog 2 channel audio of the active input.

5. Why no OSD for the HDMI inputs ?

The cost effective design of the BARRACUDA focussing on image quality and functionality
led us to the decision to have no OSD adjustment for the HDMI input signals.
So if you want to make changes to the Setup or configuration
you will have to choose any of the 6 analog inputs to see the OSD on the screen.

6. Input switch and 7 segment display

If you had to setup AV equipment more often in your life, you sure agree it is very
annoying if something is not working right and you do not even know the status of an unit.
Therefore we decided to invest in the cost for a front button switch that will cycle through
all inputs and a display that will actually tell you which input is currently selected.
The display may be turned off when everything works fine, so you are not disturbed by the light
it is emitting.

7. RS-232 Contorl and firmware updates

In a fast moving market like the home theater and TV business it might be necessary
to upload a new firmware in the unit. This is most of the time required when somebody
else did not do his job right.
Another purpose of the RS-232 control input is the remote control capability through
systems like AMX, CRESTON or RTI, just to name a few, that will allow you to control
the Barracuda remotely.

8. Enhanced EDID management

Because of numerous problems with EDID and the wrong interpretation or implementation
of source and display equipment we have decided to invest in a dual EDID configuration setup.
The Barraucda will allow to have seperate EDID setups for Video and PC that can be configured
for each of the 4 HDMI inputs seperately.

To learn more about the powerful EDID generator check out the manual of
the HDMIFIX that is explaining in detail what can be done.