Cheap Wireless HDMI Solution

This is a brief review of an awesome wireless HDMI alternative that we use.

My company recently moved into a new facility and at the same time we decided to replace our old projectors with LED tvs in our meeting rooms. However, we did not have a huge budget. We wanted something that looked and functioned well, but did not have thousands and thousands of dollars to spend on it. We settled on 65" Vizio TVs that were on sale for less than $1,000 at BestBuy. But now we had a bigger problem. We had two very large meeting rooms and a constant demand for our consultants to connect their laptops to the presentation screen to show the group what was on their monitor.

In the past, we had a separate laptop dock that they could plug into, and VGA or HDMI cable going to the project that was sitting on the table. Obviously, that was not going to work anymore, as the tv is about 15 feet from the conference room table, AND we didn't want an unsightly cord hanging off of the TV.

 So, I started looking at wireless HDMI solutions. First off, they were pricey, averaging $150 to $200. Secondly, they only allow one person to connect to the tv display at a time. Third, the biggest problem we ran into is that not all laptops have an HDMI port on it. So, how do you go about wirelessly projecting a signal from your laptop to a tv, WITHOUT using Plex, apps or tons of adapters and plugs?

Well, we found the answer to cheap wireless video streaming from a laptop to a tv. Its a simple box, created by a company I never heard of before called IPEVO. The box, called the IPEVO HD WPS which stands for IPEVO High Definition Wireless Presentation System, is a simple device that looks just like a router. In fact, it actually is a router, with a bunch more capabilities.

Basically, this little box, connects up behind your tv via HDMI or VGA (and 1/8" audio) and plugs into the outlet. It then creates a wireless access point that you can connect directly to from any laptop. Then, you install a very lightweight software client on your laptop, and boom, you can instantly project your screen and audio on your display wirelessly. It works very well, in fact, I was able to stream Netflix and youtube with very very little loss of video quality.

 But, let's say you don't want to connect to another router (we didn't), no problem!  The device can alternatively connect to your existing network through wifi, or through the included RJ45 network jack.   So, my staff, who is already on my building's wifi, can simply launch their software on their pc and from anywhere in the building start sharing their screen.  In fact, 4 people at once can share their screens in a four way split screen.

We've now had three of these units running on our network for a couple of months, and they are working out perfectly.  Even visitors can quickly through their presentations up on our tv's wirelessly without worrying about dongles, ports, adapters and cords to trip over.

When I originally discovered the  IPEVO HD WPS,I actually found a product from Blackbox that did all the same things, but did not have an HDMI port.  Worse, it was twice the price.  As of this writing, the IPEVO wireless video system is $199.00, I think its a steal.   What is odd is that the screenshots I've found of the blackbox unit look to be identical to the firmware on my IPEVO, making me think they are manufactured by the same company.

So, if you are looking for a great way to share multiple laptop screens at once on a tv or projector.  Or you want wireless HDMI and wireless VGA but don't want to deal with adapters, the IPEVO HD WPS is the solution for you.

for searchers:
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Chris Christie, Fast Food Warrior

Just a tiny bit of crappy photoshop work on top of a stock image that Chris Christie used at the RNC.  He should know better.

For the search engines:

Chris Christie Fast Food

Chris Christy Burger King

Chris Christie Eating

Chris Christie Fried Chicken

Comparing HTC Droid Incredible 4G LTE and Droid Incredible 2 and Droid Incredible 1: Operating Systems

For those of you wondering about the differences between the original Droid Incredible, the Droid Incredible 2 and the HTC Droid Incredible 4g lte, this post is for you.  There a bunch of reviews out there already telling people what the Incredible 4G does or does not have, but not many that are comparing how the HTC Droid Incredible 4G LTE stacks up against the prior phones in the Droid Incredible line up.

In case you missed it, see my earlier post comparing dimensions and sizes of the Dinc 1, Dinc 2 and Dinc 3 and my rant about why you should not compare this phone to the HTC One X or Galaxy S3. 

Operating System
As you all know, all three Dincs use Google's Android operating system.
The Original Incredible maxed out at Android Gingerbread 2.3.4 (don't remember sense version, I think 2)
The Incredible 2 (as of this writing) is at Android Gingerbread 2.3.4  (don't remember sense version, I think 2) as well, but has some extra features over the original Inc
The Incredible 4G shipped with Android Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS) 4.0.3 and Sense 4

So what's the difference?
In real world application, the main changes from the Incredible 1 to the Incredible 2 where all extremely minor.  The processor and ram boost of the Incredible 2 made for a better experience, but overall the interface of the two units was extremely similar.  There were a couple of enhancements and improvements to the mail client in the Incredible 2, and it ironed out a couple of minor email and calendar bugs.  A big improvement is that it removed the annoying out of disk space bug that the Incredible 1 had.  The Incredible 2 offered more customizable screens and backgrounds, but overall, the OS and overall experience was incredibly (pun intended) similar. 
Now, how about moving from the Incredible 2 to the Incredible 4G?  Well, now we have some big differences.

• ICS manages memory and storage much better.  What does this mean to you?  It means that you dont' have to install a task manager to kill tasks just to speed up the phone (incredible one owners).  It means that you don't get the dreaded out of disk space message on the og Incredible (though that was solved in the Inc 2).  And for Dinc2 users, it means that the new operating system, combined with more ram and a better processor, absolutely flies.  I rarely see any lag on the phone.
• You don't have to Root the device to get rid of Verizon bloat.  Well, technically the Verizon bloat is still there taking up space, BUT you can disable it so that you do not see it in your menus and that it does not autostart.  So, slacker radio, Vcast, VZNavigator and all that other crap can be disabled from the application management screen in the Incredible 4G and you don't have to worry about it again.
• Email is improved yet again, with email grouping.  This means that you can delete whole groups of emails (from one sender) with just a couple clicks, which is really useful.  
• Huge improvements to the lock screen.  You can now set you lock screen to show you calendar appointments or the weather, and can also set it up with quick unlock settings so you can unlock your phone right into texts, email, camera or a web browser.
• The HTC Incredible 4G  has more background and color choices available out of the box compared to the Incredible 2.
• The camera on the Inc4G takes photos lightning fast compared to the Incredible 2.  I actually think the camera speed and focus was better on the original incredible than the incredible 2, but the incredible 4G is better than them both.  It is true though, the HTC One series with the discreet imaging chip, is better than the 4G Incredible.  Even so, you still take acceptable images at a fast rate, and you can take snapshots while video is recording.  The inc 4g also supports taking 1080p videos.  Not bad.

I'll add more to this list as I think of it.

HTC Droid Incredible 4G LTE - Not Everyone Wants a Monster Sized Phone.

It seems to me that the blogging and technology review community as a whole is doing a disservice to the HTC Droid Incredible 4G LTE with their constant comparisons to the Samsung Galaxy S3 and the HTC One series (which is NOT even available from Verizon).   I decided to do a series of informal posts with my experiences with the Inc 4G and provide comparisons to some of its older siblings, the Incredible 2 and the original competitor.

Just about every one of the tech blogs out there is repeating the same 3 things.

• The camera is not as good as HTC's One series, (Though the Verge says otherwise)
• The display on the Galaxy S3 and One X is bigger and brighter. 
• The processor is clocked faster at 1.5Ghz vs. 1.2Ghz on the Inc4G.  

They all then conclude that you should spend the extra $50 to get the Galaxy S3 on Verizon or the HTC One X on AT&T.  But, guess what?! Not everyone wants to carry around a phone that's half the size of a tablet or iPad and most people don't want to leave Verizon's superior coverage zone.

No, seriously, I don't care how thin it is, the Galaxy S3 (and even the smaller Razr phones) are just too big for me to comfortably keep in my pocket all day long.  Oh, and if you are concerned about 1.2 vs 1.5 processing speed, don't be.  There is no noticeable difference in real world application, and all of the benchmarks are only reporting 5 to 18% improvements theoretical speed.  Enough of that rant, back to the topic at hand, comparing the Droid Incredible 1, Droid Incredible 2 and Droid Incredible 4G.

I'll update this post with a link to each comparison as I publish them.

1.  Comparing the size of the HTC Incredible 4G LTE, Incredible 2 and Original Incredible
2. Comparing HTC Incredible 1, 2 and 4G OS and Sense improvements