# Home Theater flickers and dies.



## Orthelan (Jan 19, 2008)

I am new here so I hope it is alright if I ask a question right off the bat. 

I have a Home Theater PC hooked up via a DVI - HDMI adapter to a Onkyo TX-SR805 AV receiver, the receiver is then hooked to a Panasonic PT-AX100U via 50 ft. of HDMI cabling. 

Now here is the issue and I have been working on it for about a year now. 

When I turn on the PC it brings up my BIOS boot screen and then run Windows Vista and goes right to the desktop. The computer runs well until I start to move the mouse. The screen will flash blue (I assume the projector lost signal) and then when I stop moving the mouse it goes back to the desktop. Then as soon as I run the program the signal loses completely and I have to restart the computer to get it back running. 

The first build I did was not as hefty, a 1.8 GHz core 2 due with a 7600gt card and two gigs of ram. I thought maybe the computer was underpowered so I tried that for half a year. This ran Windows XP MCE

Then I build another computer, a 2.4 GHz Core 2 quad processor with a 8800gts card and two gigs of ram. This still has the same issue. This one runs Windows Vista Ultimate. Each computer works on a monitor which I set the resolution to 1280x720. 


Now that I know the computer wasn't underpowered I'm looking at different causes.

Maybe the DVI-HDMI adapter (I can't say what kind of DVI it is) does not support the digital output of the cards. 

Maybe I need to install a HDMI amplifier to get the signal to cover 50 ft. 

Or the AV receiver is jumbling up the signal somehow.

At the moment I am completely at a loss for the solution. 

Thank you for any help or wisdom you may be able to shed on this problem.


----------



## yustr (Sep 27, 2004)

First of all, welcome to TSF. :wave: No problem asking questions, that's what we do here - help each other with issues...

If I understand your setup correctly, you're using the Onkyo to switch HDMI feeds and then send it out to the projector. I'm not an expert in projection systems but my guess is that the Onkyo has a momentary pause in signal that your projector senses as no signal and goes into sleep mode. 

I'm a firm believer in eliminating causes. Here's one thing to try; take the Onkyo out of the loop, route the HDMI directly from the PC to the projector. If it still exhibits the behavior then at least you know its not the receiver. 

Then look to the cable. 50 feet is a long run. Most sources (I Googled it) talk about 15M being the max. So you're right about at it. An amplifier might do the trick. 

Then I'd look to the projector. Is there a setting that tells it how strong a signal to expect. A pause delay time? Or something similar? 

Then lastly the PC. There may be a pause when switching output sources in the vid cards. The good folks in Hardware can address this if you get this far.

Probably not much help. Let us know how your testing goes.

And again, welcome to TSF - the best place on the net. Feel free to browse around and jump in when you can. We don't have many PCHT contributors so your's is a fresh look at the passion that connects us.

yustr


----------

