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Trying to use Arduino TV-Out to switch feed to a TV set, s.a. ones found in Clinics, to display some information, s.a. next patient, expected delays etc. The TV is normally playing regular programming fed by a cable STB, but say every 5 minutes, switches to Arduino's TV-out, to display such info, for say 30 seconds, and then switches back to regular programming.

So, the question is --

What might be a very "economical" (circuit / device cost wise) way to switch the input of TV between multiple RCA type composite video feeds (s.a. old'ish set-top-box, teletype box, VCR...) ? If it can switch Audio feeds too, great, but priority (and absolutely must) for me is video switching.

Also, note that I'd like this to happen, under uC control (s.a. Arduino), i.e. the uC decides when to switch to which A/V feed. At the moment, I am looking for capability to switch between one of the 2 feeds.

bdutta74
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  • What are you really trying to do? This looks like you're suffering from an [XY problem](http://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/66377/what-is-the-xy-problem). – Kevin Vermeer Feb 29 '12 at 14:14
  • @KevinVermeer I had never heard of the XY problem. That is a great reference to have for many questions. – Kellenjb Feb 29 '12 at 14:37
  • Thanks for pointing to XY problem. Edited question, to hopefully fix it! – bdutta74 Feb 29 '12 at 14:50

2 Answers2

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Use a high-frequency relay such as http://octopart.com/g6y-1-dc5-omron-697923

Use a video switch IC. http://www.mouser.com/Search/Refine.aspx?FS=TRUE&N=12002272+1323043

Use this instead and just overlay the text on top of the video. http://nootropicdesign.com/ve/

If you don't want it to look like the 80's you could try the HDMI-compatible neTV, but I understand you might not be able to do anything about the really-old-tvs or underlying video. http://www.adafruit.com/category/46

joeforker
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  • Thanks @joe. Actually, this presents itself as a nice upgrade over my rather basic requirements. Definitely looks very nice alternative approach, however, I am fine with plain video switching (without overlay), and my main constraint is cost. Need to keep it as low cost as possible. That way, Arduino TV-out is good enough. Just need a way to switch video feeds. – bdutta74 Feb 29 '12 at 16:49
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For #3, I'd go with something along the lines of a home grade automatic A/V switch - something like this Phillips unit available on Amazon. I have something similar on my home television, and it works pretty well - the most recently activated video source is selected. So in your case, when the Arduino starts outputting, it will switch to the Arduino, when Arduino stops outputting, it will switch back. A bit of research should lead you to a unit that does what you want.

Michael Kohne
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  • Thanks @Michael. Well, I will have to refine my question a bit more. I wanted the ability to switch A/V integrated into the same case/box housing the Arduino. An external standalone box, which quite nice and handy, is probably the last option (an option, never the less). – bdutta74 Mar 01 '12 at 03:13
  • Another issue, I might have with this Phillips unit is that I might not have control over the other video feeds, i.e. for instance, the cable STB is "always" having a video-signal on it's output, so it might never switch on it's own, right ? – bdutta74 Mar 01 '12 at 03:20
  • The unit I have will switch to the most recently activated source. I leave my DirectTV receiver on all the time, but when I switch on the DVD player, the unit auto-selects the DVD player, then when I turn off the DVD, it auto-selects back to the DirectTV. I see though that the use of yet another piece of hardware may be more than you can tolerate for the project. It certainly would clutter up the install. – Michael Kohne Mar 01 '12 at 11:38