Valve Responds To Steam Machine's HDMI 2.1 Display Support Controversy [HW support is there, but "The HDMI forum" doesn’t allow with OpenSource drivers]
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Length matters on most cables, USB, FireWire, HDMI, DisplayPort, etc. The question here is if all of the features translate properly. Not all passive adapters are equally capable, and this is true for a few standards/cable types.
Both HDMI and display port are at their core, data cables. As long as the noise is low enough to maintain bandwidth, it’ll be fine. The cables them selves don’t have any intelligence to determine one feature over another.
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Both HDMI and display port are at their core, data cables. As long as the noise is low enough to maintain bandwidth, it’ll be fine. The cables them selves don’t have any intelligence to determine one feature over another.
That makes this situation/discussion really strange then.
Because if an adapter from DP to HDMI fixed this driver issue, Valve would know and would just include an adapter in the box. Right? There wouldn’t be these statements from Valve without mentioning the obvious solution?
I’m not sure we are on the same page about what the core issue is with suggesting an adapter will address concerns over HDMI 2.1 and 2.2 features on Linux/Steam Machines.
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How does a subscription compare to TV purchases?
How does it not? It’s a withheld purchase (AKA “voting with your wallet”)
How does that one instance of politically driven consumer action equate to “every time ever”?
It doesn’t and wasn’t supposed to. The last part did.
Have you heard of Nestlé? People have boycott them forever and they still exist.
They obviously don’t or they wouldn’t exist.
They obviously don’t or they wouldn’t exist.
Got it, so in your case, if it applies to your argument, it’s possible and works “every time ever”, and if it goes against your argument, it doesn’t exist and no one is boycotting.
You are not arguing in good faith, and only want to be right in this instance.
I’m sure you’ve never bought a display, GPU, or computer with HDMI, and I’m sure you’ve advocated for your friends and family to stop buying anything with HDMI certification. Right?
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Length matters on most cables, USB, FireWire, HDMI, DisplayPort, etc. The question here is if all of the features translate properly. Not all passive adapters are equally capable, and this is true for a few standards/cable types.
A lot of my friends have said they prefer girth, fwiw.
Jokes aside, that’s a good point. HDMI/DisplayPort, like USB, pass digital signals over many small cables in a bundle. With how much data uncompressed high res images consist of, I doubt there’s a lot of redundancy or parity the way there may be for Cat6 cable using TCP. At a certain point, without a powered repeater cable, the image will probably not work (or not reliably). Idk if that would appear as “no signal” or dropped frames, though.
Passive adapters don’t have much power to work with for signal processing… Idk how different the image signals themselves are between HDMI and DisplayPort, but I know from working with EDIDs that there’s many optional modes and features for both, like multiple audio/videos streams (3d video, surround sound, hdmi arc), different colorspaces, HDR and VRR. I’d be surprised if any passive HDMI-to-DP adapter supports more than the most common modes and features.
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That makes this situation/discussion really strange then.
Because if an adapter from DP to HDMI fixed this driver issue, Valve would know and would just include an adapter in the box. Right? There wouldn’t be these statements from Valve without mentioning the obvious solution?
I’m not sure we are on the same page about what the core issue is with suggesting an adapter will address concerns over HDMI 2.1 and 2.2 features on Linux/Steam Machines.
It makes sense to start a PR war over it, trying to fix HDMIs open source policy.
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“Vote with your wallet” is not ancap propaganda. “Abolish all money” is.
Edit: read it wrong. In my defence cap and com do sound pretty similar. And I think when I read this comment I forgot they existed which is what those oxymorons deserve.
You’re saying “'Abolish all money” is anarcho-capitalist propaganda?" LOL, that’s significantly stupider than anything I ever expected to read. Congratulations.

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It makes sense to start a PR war over it, trying to fix HDMIs open source policy.
That’s true, I’m only questioning anyone saying “just use a DP adapter!”
You’re totally missing my point here.
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The movie studios. As the person above said, the HDMI consortium (owned by movie studios) is focused on protecting their members IP rights from pirates. HDMI has built in DRM, that could be removed from an open source driver.
so what you’re saying is we need to make hdmi driver patches to allow direct file saving from video streams?
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so what you’re saying is we need to make hdmi driver patches to allow direct file saving from video streams?
Well, one of the master keys leaked about 15 years back. A researcher posted a paper back in 2003 or so that outlined a method of finding a master key that was likely used by the people who made the release. It was a fun time to be on the internet, the people came together and said, yeah fuck those corpos and everyone reposted the key to every form of social media possible. I knew someone with the key tattooed on their arm (as part of their piracy themed artwork, I used to have pictures)
Now, that particular master key was patched out with a compatibility breaking upgrade, specifically 2.1 of the standard, which was proven to be broken in 2012, but there was less coming together to share it the second time, or the third for 2.2 of the standard.
But yes, if you wanted to code your own, you easily could. Just don’t share it or the sue happy corpos will come knocking.
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I’m not sure why people are so upset.
It’s a little annoying sure, but don’t these work?It has displayport already, the hdmi concerns are regarding its utility with a television.
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️ Well
️ I
️ don’t
️ care
️
️ Well
️ I
️ don’t
️ care
️Random clips on the web are DRMed these days, like news articles with an embedded video. Many CMSes just DRM all clips. Totally BS but I’ve seen the video frame staying black on a bunch of sites now.
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I just don’t trust the claims. Looks like mixed reviews on 2.1 features working.
I wonder what one should actually expect to work in a passive cable/adapter.
The signal quality can be flaky. You need a good, short, hdmi “8k” cable for it to work reliably.
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️ Well
️ I
️ don’t
️ care
️Random clips on the web are DRMed these days, like news articles with an embedded video. Many CMSes just DRM all clips. Totally BS but I’ve seen the video frame staying black on a bunch of sites now.
Then I won’t watch those, simple as. Plus, I’ve been running LibreWolf for like a year, whick blocks all DRM by default, and never in my life did I have issues playing a video. Even live videos from TV channels work 50% of the time.
Plex tv is the only one that seemingly requires DRM from when I looked into it. Didn’t decide to use it specifically for that reason.
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Then I won’t watch those, simple as. Plus, I’ve been running LibreWolf for like a year, whick blocks all DRM by default, and never in my life did I have issues playing a video. Even live videos from TV channels work 50% of the time.
Plex tv is the only one that seemingly requires DRM from when I looked into it. Didn’t decide to use it specifically for that reason.
Then I won’t watch those, simple as.
Doesn’t change facts for millions of others.
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HDMI requires a license cost, DisplayPort is free.
What advantage does HDMI hold over DisplayPort?
The HDCP encryption is why it’s used.
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All of these supposed advantages are solved by USB-C though. Even the length is higher (5m, I believe). I’d be fine if the DisplayPort connector is gone, but the actual standard is just better for most purposes.
Cec over USBC?
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Well, one of the master keys leaked about 15 years back. A researcher posted a paper back in 2003 or so that outlined a method of finding a master key that was likely used by the people who made the release. It was a fun time to be on the internet, the people came together and said, yeah fuck those corpos and everyone reposted the key to every form of social media possible. I knew someone with the key tattooed on their arm (as part of their piracy themed artwork, I used to have pictures)
Now, that particular master key was patched out with a compatibility breaking upgrade, specifically 2.1 of the standard, which was proven to be broken in 2012, but there was less coming together to share it the second time, or the third for 2.2 of the standard.
But yes, if you wanted to code your own, you easily could. Just don’t share it or the sue happy corpos will come knocking.
Huh I though that was hd-dvd
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Latency, desync, probably can’t do full 4k/120… just because something exists doesn’t mean it’s a viable solution.
“DisplayPort generally offers better support for high refresh rates and adaptive sync technologies, which can help reduce desync issues in gaming. HDMI can also support variable refresh rates, but it may not perform as well in high-end gaming setups compared to DisplayPort.”
“DisplayPort generally has lower latency compared to HDMI, especially in gaming scenarios, due to its design for high refresh rates and adaptive sync features.”
“DisplayPort generally supports higher refresh rates and resolutions, making it ideal for 4K at 120fps, especially in gaming setups. HDMI 2.1 also supports 4K at 120fps, but compatibility may vary depending on the devices used.”
Took a 1 minute search to find that out btw.
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️ Well
️ I
️ don’t
️ care
️Random clips on the web are DRMed these days, like news articles with an embedded video. Many CMSes just DRM all clips. Totally BS but I’ve seen the video frame staying black on a bunch of sites now.
How many embedded DRM-controlled news article videos are you watching on your living room tv though? PC monitors usually have native display port nowadays, no converters or HDMI necessary.
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That’s still a licensing issue: you’re not allowed to license from the HDMI consortium and then freely sublicense to all your users, which is what open source requires. Hopefully this eventually concludes in the end of relevance for HDMI and we can have a freer, and just better ecosystem in general.
Valve should ship it as displayport internally and bundle a free HDMI adapter that they sell in the store, that way it’s all open source and the HDMI issue is taken care of in the most flippant way possible.