AJA announces T-TAP, the US$249 palm-sized, self-powered bridge from Thunderbolt to HDMI or SDI

TecnoTur on PVC by Allan Tepper

Is T-TAP appropriate to connect an HP DreamColor monitor?

As I have covered in great detail in several prior articles here in ProVideo Coalition magazine, the most complete and most reliable method of connecting your critical video monitor to your computer based editing system is via a professional a/v i/o interface, like those Thunderbolt models now offered by AJA, Blackmagic, Matrox, and now even MOTU. However, most of them are more than what many editors need today in the tapeless acquisition, file-based era. Often editors no longer require any audio or video input at all, since the material primarily arrives in file-based format. That’s why AJA decided to design and build a simpler, lower-priced, self-powered, output-only device called the T-TAP at NAB 2012. The outputs are SDI and HDMI. This article will cover all of the specs (even some vital ones that AJA hasn’t yet published), applications, recommended connections, and define whether the T-TAP is appropriate or not for use with HP’s DreamColor monitor.

T-TAP’s input

The T-TAP’s only input is Thunderbolt, and it is self (bus) powered. Since the T-TAP is a Thunderbolt end-point (termination), the T-TAP should be connect after all of the daisy-chainable (loopable) devices, like your Thunderbolt storage.

T-TAP’s outputs

The T-TAP has an SDI output and an HDMI output. Both outputs are potentially true 10-bit (which is sometimes expressed as 30-bit, since it is 10-bit per color channel). I say potentially true 10-bit, because —like with any such system— the monitor (processing + panel) must be 10-bit to take full advantage, and the source video must have been originally at least 10-bit (not derived from 8-bit).

Is T-TAP appropriate for the HP Dreamcolor monitor?

As I have stated in several prior articles, our beloved HP Dreamcolor monitor’s DreamColor engine is quite picky. It must receive a signal that is both true progressive (not interlaced and not even PsF), and RGB, not component (YUV). As of NAB 2012, the AJA website already listed the compatible framerates for the T-TAP, which fortunately include several that are true progressive. The T-TAP is actually capable of outputting sub-HD (i.e. standard definition 480i/486i derived from NTSC and 576i derived from PAL) and beyond HD (2K). However, below I’m listing only the HD formats with comments. read more...