(re-posting from " everything else" I never got a response there)

I' m looking to buy a source selector for my games because my forest of composite/component cables in front of my TV needs to go away. I' d like to plug in 6 devices, but I only need component for 3. Price is a factor, but size isn' t. I' m only asking here because most of the ones I' ve looked up seem to have signal degradation after the second set of inputs.



IE, this must die, any suggestions?

I hook up all that shit to my audio reciever, it has like 5 Component in, 3 S-Video, and some other crap.

The problem with receivers and some other types of switchers is that they are active instead of passive. What' s the difference? Active switches use electronics to switch sources instead of good ol' fashioned physical contacts. Many active switchers do not have enough bandwidth for HD resolutions. A good example of a bad active switcher is the [url=" http://www.amazon.com/Universal-System-Seletor-Pro-Silver/dp/B0001GAYUE" ]Pelican Pro System Selector[/url] which has 8 component & s-video & composite & stereo inputs plus 3 TOS-link inputs and a few ethernet inputs. It is what I use and I hate it. I have gone through three of them, taking each one back due to video artifacts. In 480p the top of the picture sometimes distorts for 1/60th of a second. In 1080i there is visable video noise. There is also video noise in 720p but not as much. Some active switchers are better than others. Not sure what kind of receiver Evil Man has but it has got to be better than the Pelican switcher.

I haven' t done any research on passive switchers recently because I am far too lazy, but you can buy simple composite video/stereo switchers for cheap at Radio Shack which have a three-wire input and output. This will only be good for the component video cables, so you' ll have to route the audio some other way. The switcher has as much bandwidth as your cable and won' t introduce any noise into the signal. The switcher goes *clunk* when you press the buttons, changing physical contacts inside. They cannot be switched by remote.

I' m talking about the reciever for my 7.1 system. You know, the box you hook up all the speakers to and shit.

This is what I have

It has components, s-video, composite, toslink, etc. I don' t get any artifacts or anything, I have my PC, PS2, HDTV Cable Box, PC, and an mp3 player hooked up to it.

I know thats not a " Source Selector" but you said you were looking into getting a 5.1 or 7.1 system, that one is a good value if you wanna keep it under $1000 and has a shitload of inputs for video and audo, you can just buy a reciever now for $100, but when you buy your 7.1 system the reciever will be useless so I wouldn' t.

Alright, thanks guys. I might get that audio system sooner than I thought, my paycheck was way bigger than expected. So depending on how much November drains my cash flow, I could have one before Christmas.