2-room setup

TL;DR: 2 rooms, desktop wants to be controlled from and display to both rooms, both rooms need to be compatible with Mac, Win10, and Win11, multiple adapters will probably be needed, and I need a 50ft run of both negligible latency USB connection and high-data-rate video.

Specific questions are at the bottom.

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Hi there! I’m looking for what will probably be 2 different KVM switches and I would love some pointers on which ones to pick!

Office:

  • 1x 4K/120 monitor (HDMI, DisplayPort inputs)

  • 1x ultrawide 2560x1080 monitor (HDMI, DisplayPort inputs)

  • 1x ultrawide 2560x1080 monitor (HDMI only)

  • 1x desktop computer (1x HDMI, 3x DisplayPort, 1x USB-C, plenty of USB-A, Win11)

  • 1x Mac Mini M4 (1x HDMI, 3x Thunderbolt, 2x USB-C)

  • Sometimes, work laptop (HDMI, Thunderbolt, Win10)

  • Sometimes, MacBook Pro M2 (Pro) (HDMI, Thunderbolt)

  • Peripherals (keyboard, mouse, webcam, microphone, printer…)

Living room: (~50ft cable run from office)

  • TV receiver 8K/60 4K/120 (HDMI only)

  • Sometimes, work laptop (HDMI/Thunderbolt, Win10)

  • Sometimes, MacBook Pro (HDMI/Thunderbolt)

  • Mouse and keyboard

  • I would like to have an HDMI and USB connection from my desktop so I can play PC games on the couch/TV

I’m leaning towards using one of the new HDMI 2.1 KVMs in each location, with things connected as follows:

Office:

  • KVM: HDMI21 4c2m

  • Console: Monitors 1,2 HDMI (DP alternative)

  • Console: USB 3 connected to peripherals hub

  • CPU1: Desktop, 2x DP—>HDMI, USB 3 —> USB C?, 1x DP—>HDMI direct to Monitor 3, 1x HDMI & USB C optical in wall to Living Room KVM

  • CPU2: Mac mini, 2x TB—>DP—>HDMI?, 1x USB C to KVM

  • CPU3: Hot-swap dock, ideally with 2x HDMI and 1x USB C out and 1x Thunderbolt/comparable in

  • CPU4: likely not used, possible second hot swap dock

Living room:

  • KVM: HDMI21 4c1m

  • Console: HDMI optical to TV receiver (~15ft cable run), Bluetooth KB/mouse adapters on hub

  • CPU1: HDMI input from Desktop, USB C optical output to desktop

  • CPU2: Hot-swap dock with HDMI and USB C outs, Thunderbolt/comparable in

  • CPU3: likely not used for the time being

  • CPU4: likely not used for the time being

Alternative configurations:

  • I could in principle use a DP14 4c2m in the office, with USB B computer connections instead of USB C eliminating a few adapters in exchange for lower display bandwidth

  • In the living room, I could use the USB C hub, with DP—>HDMI optical to the receiver, but this would be data only for CPU1 and I’d need to connect that HDMI directly to an additional input in the receiver, and then swap receiver inputs when switching devices.

  • Alternatively, I might be able to use the USBC/DP combiner at my desktop and only the bidirectional optical USBC for the 50ft cable run, meaning that Monitor 3 would get the native HDMI

  • In the living room, I could also use a USB-C KM switch and a stacked HDMI switch

  • In the living room, I could also also use a DP14 switch and optical DP/USB cables

As you can see, no matter which option I pick, things are somewhat messy. I’m curious which of the following are less messy in your experience:

  • USB 3 connection to HDMI21 KVM via USB3-USBC adapter and a collection of DP—>HDMI adapters, vs using a DP14 KVM with all of the correct end-to-end cable types with lower video bandwidth, vs something else

  • HDMI optical to KVM to HDMI optical to receiver plus a likely-bidirectional USB C optical run, vs likely-bidirectional optical USB C data only on the KVM input plus use of a separate receiver input, vs DP+USBC to bidirectional optical USB C, vs a different negligible-latency 50ft USB solution that I don’t know exists in conjunction with optical HDMI to the receiver

Should I go HDMI21 or DP14 in my office?

Should I go HDMI21 or USBC or DP14 in the living room?

What am I missing that would make this come together without a ton of adapters and chaos?

Thank you!

Edit: I was able to fix the first post, woo.

Having done a bit more research on the living room to desktop connection:

  • The Corning thunderbolt cables are, apparently, only compatible with Thunderbolt. I’m assuming this means that I wouldn’t be able to use the USBC combiner?

  • But… I have an ASUS motherboard (ROG STRIX B550-F WiFi) that’s compatible with their ThunderboltEx 4 expansion card, and takes Thunderbolt from the motherboard and DisplayPort from the graphics card to combine them.

  • Any ideas whether the USBC KVM will take Thunderbolt input, or it’ll tell the cable to tell the computer to fall back on USBC+DP?

  • If the latter is the case, presumably for maximum compatibility I would want a Thunderbolt4 hub, that feeds into an HDMI 2.1 hub? And to make things easier for laptop plug and chug, I’d probably want to use another copy or 2 for that.

  • This would also let me directly use the HDMI port on my desktop for Monitor 3.

One solution for USB4/Thunderbolt which I have found but not purchased yet: LONGON CABLE USB4 Active Optical Fiber Cable AOC USB4 Compatible with – LONGON CABLE TECHNOLOGY

  • 15 meters is just shy of 50 feet.
  • A big caveat is that USB 2.0 stops working beyond 15 feet. I’m not sure why they did not make it optical too.

Everything else I’ve seen is either Thunderbolt 3 or capped to 5 meters.

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Followon for the followon:

  • I’d like the living room setup to use a wireless keyboard and mouse because couch. (The office setup has a nice wired setup.)

  • I’m assuming that avoiding the hassle of Bluetooth is a good idea, so I’m leaning towards Logitech’s wireless receivers.

  • If I’m correctly reading between the lines, the Bolt uses a handshake process and then starts encrypting everything, so won’t reliably work for HID switching, and the Unifying doesn’t have that issue?

  • It also sounds like Unifying works more reliably on Mac, so since it’s being phased out it’s probably a good idea to procure ASAP.

Does this align with everyone’s experience?