[0] https://wiki.sipeed.com/hardware/en/kvm/NanoKVM_USB/introduc...
[1] - https://openterface.com/
For just video (or w/ separate keyboard/mouse), the Genki Shadowcast devices work really well.
That seems to be what NanoKVM-USB does. But GLI Comet seems to be KVM-over-IP?
(Of course you could use the Cube on a crash cart, too. Just like you can use the butt of a screwdriver to hammer a nail.)
I also have a PiKVM with the switch for network level access which works really well too.
Yes, they're terrible, but...
> latency, poor video quality
For a crash cart? Who cares. For everything else...
> Are there any known-working good adapters for VGA for these?
No, you're AOL.
Would it be handy to have this all in one cable on both ends? Sure, absolutely, that'd be killer. I personally don't think it's too big of an ask to use two cables in an installation or recovery case though, and if your devices only have USB-C ports for video out, an active USB-C to HDMI via DP-Alt cable can be had to meet that need.
I keep one in my tool bag and I've been meaning to buy a second one for a dedicated crash cart.
I can't speak to the Kiwi or the Openterface as I haven't tried those.
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/genki-studio/id6466343285
I don't know how Orion compares.
The home page says the one-time IAP unlocks 'AI-powered 4k upscaling', which sounds useful.
To what end? For displaying on a tablet only? Does it provide screen capture to save that 4k version?
Cheap USB capture devices usually support a maximum of 1080p@60Hz output. If you buy a random '4k' USB capture device, it probably supports up to 4k input but then scales it down to 1080p for output.
So perhaps 4k upscaling on the ipad will make the image look better.
This page https://obsproject.com/forum/resources/capture-card-document... warned me about it, but I haven't seen any updated info on the newer AVermedia or Magewell interfaces, for instance https://www.magewell.com/products/usb-capture-hdmi-4k-pro This gives 4k60 4:4:4 only on the loop-thru output, higher resolutions require 20GBps USB 3.? but my Mac only goes to 10. I'd need Thunderbolt capture which start around $1000 https://www.bhphotovideo.com/c/product/1500555-REG/blackmagi...
I'm using an Elgato CamLink 4k at 1080p60 for now & I'm wondering if the awful mouse feel in Linux (with a Mac for display) is maybe due to delay. Going to get a cheap-ash monitor to simplify. I thought it would be nice to have my 6k Pro XDR display have windows from all computers, but it's just too messy.
The second may like upscaling.
Worked great!
I’ve used the app for other things too. It’s a great solution if you already have an iPad.
This has annoyed me many times as well with the headless computers I run... until recently, when I bought a USB-powered 7-inch HDMI monitor for an embedded project that didn't go anywhere. But now I have a spare little monitor that I can easily use in these situations and even carry it around if necessary.
I like https://feelworld.ltd/collections/5-6-inch-camera-monitor/pr... or similar, $100.
I use it for projection - then I can run the projector as a second monitor through this thing (or similar) and not have to use binoculars to see what's on the screen from the back of the room.
Larger ones can be used as portable second monitors, too.
USB capture devices introduce latency, get surprisingly hot, can have frame rate issues, and streaming video from them seems much more CPU-intensive than, for example, playing an equivalent-sized h.264 video (I don't know why but presume it's because they encode using something basic like MJPEG). A portable display has none of these problems.
Or now that I think of it, just use the glasses with a regular hdmi adapter ( but no 3dof tracking then )
I now carry a little HDMI screen and not one but two portable keyboards with me for all work travel. One of the keyboards is a larger but rolls up, the other is tiny but also has a mouse built into a touchpad.
These devices have saved my bacon more than a few times. Highly recommend.
I have several old laptops that still have good screens and keyboards, It would be nice to repurpose some of them. They are certainly large enough to house a compute module with plenty of extras.
I'm sure we could have improved on that setup but we were an inexperienced skeleton crew on a shoestring budget and not the best management.
I always thought it would be great to have a "laptop without a motherboard" to manage these, and this is close enough given the price of the redundant hardware now.
That's basically what a rack console is. At 1U it was skinnier than laptops from prior decades. They're not exactly a laptop form factor, but to get them smaller you would have had to accept a much lower screen resolution, which would risk some systems not being able to display (e.g. your server may have booted-up to 1280x1024 while your laptop could only do 800x600), or would have needed to be quite expensive to add an ultra-high DPI screen.
Still, at various times there were briefly devices like that available for purchase at closeout prices... like the failed "Motorola ATRIX lapdock":
https://www.cnet.com/reviews/motorola-laptop-dock-review/
https://www.amazon.com/AT-Laptop-Dock-Motorola-ATRIX/dp/B004...
I'd say the USB-HDMI capture card is a better solution all-around. I even prefer it to USB "crash carts" because you aren't dependent on the manufacturer keeping their proprietary software software updated for each subsequent Windows/Linux/Mac release.
Advantage - battery still somewhat worked so you could get a few minutes (often all you needed) with just that.
You'll want to look up the flags/settings for low latency playback to make it more usable, e.g. for mpv: https://mpv.io/manual/stable/#low-latency-playback
ipkvm, I really like my 2 JetKVMs. It works very well, physically feels substantial, and the ATX power add-on makes remote management as good as any IPMI solution. I also have a sipeed NanoKVM and that works well, but I don't use it much at this point, just use the JetKVMs instead.
For usb KVM I'm trying to find something that works as a KVM so that I can use the nice display on my home computer but also control my work laptop. This is purely a convenience thing. I'm not trying to use the work laptop remotely or fool my employer. I just prefer my 4k oled display on my personal thinkpad over the crap 1080p dell display on the work laptop.
So I've tried two usb USB kvms.
Cytrence Kiwi - this is the one I settle on to use. The software works well and has had regular updates. It does keyboard capture which I never could get to work with the NanoKVM. The video quality is much better. Except for the inability to capture alt-tab is my only real complaint. :( However, they just (yesterday?) released a new software build that can map another set of keys to alt-tab. Maybe I can train my fingers to do windows-tab or something similar.
NanoKVM-USB - This one has some good ideas. I like the form factor. I like the USB port you can easily switch between host and target to copy images or whatever. As a crash cart type thingie, this is probably just fine. However, as stated above. Trying to use it full time with my work laptop was simply too frustrating. Video quality and lack of keyboard capture (maybe I just couldn't find it) just made it impossible.
So, in summary: JetKVM for ipkvm, cytrence kiwi for usbkvm.
[0] https://github.com/programminghoch10/ESP32SerialSSHProxy
No software, just a built-in hardware kvm exposing the screen, keyboard and pointing device to an external port.
A niche thing, but it shouldn't be expensive to implement, and the ports are already here (usb-c, hdmi).
A Display Controller Board for driving a laptop screen from an external input is going to add at least $20 to the price of the laptop. Considerably more expensive than the $6 USB-HDMI capture devices which do the job (and have more utility).
The HDMI output port on your laptop (if you even have one, many only offer miniDP) can't just be run in reverse. The board would need to be updated to allow switching it between output and input, at considerable extra cost.
It was a strange laptop. MXM socketed GPU, 120Hz screen that came with Nvidia 3DVision shutter glasses, and the worst battery life I've ever experienced.
I think this might be it?
https://gpdstore.net/blog/gpd-pocket-4-kvm-module-explained/
or there is a similar one. It was a tiny laptop, the kind that a devops/sysadmin would carry around in a server room.
So I use one of those cheap HDMI capture devices that flooded eBay about three months into the pandemic to watch Raspberry Pi boot logs or function as ad-hoc console monitor, either with my MBP or with the iPad Pro. The iPad Pro functions usefully as an occasional second monitor for the MBP more directly with USB-C/wifi, of course, so it all works out rather well.
[0] mostly macOS, though I am finally building up a desktop linux escape strategy, 31 years after I first ran X on linux, which might get finally kicked up a notch depending on what happens with Affinity at the end of the month
Shouldn't this be possible with a single direct ethernet link between laptop and device? I'm not actually sure on the specifics. Or would this require a router? I know you can forward graphical programs with X11 as well
This is one of those rough edges that I wish a Linux distro got right. It's rare, but once in a blue moon you do want to hook up two laptop (say one broken and one working one) and control one from the other (without the ability to configure stuff)
https://github.com/moononournation/T-Deck/blob/main/ArduinoV...
I may have been unlucky, but I have seen even worse.
So many times I want to dork with a raspberry pi or start mucking with an old computer... the rpi400 is nearly useless "as is" because you generally require a mouse and then everything goes to hell as far as "single device" goes.
The concept of a "mobile crash cart / workstation" in laptop form factor even makes this tempting as a "front end" for a Mac mini or something?!?
Sooo many times I want to bring the K/V/M to the computer instead of the computer to the K/V/M.
Being able to "watch TV" on your computer used to be a somewhat popular request from well-to-do consumers, and as DVD's came out, people started wanting to digitize their VHS tapes, and video capture cards (the same concept as what the article is doing) allowed that.
I think it was really right before COVID that HDMI capture devices finally dipped below $200. Then that Macro Silicon chip at $9 appeared out of the blue and solved PC video input problem. 20 years ago it indeed had been prohibitively expensive to capture desktop video outputs.
The challenge was high bandwidth nature of raw display outputs. Just 1024x768 @ 60Hz is over 1Gbps without overheads. A capture device for that is not something that can be "just" made.