So as I continue my efforts in improving my home cinema I start to realise one of the major issues I’m going to have - lack of HDMI ports. Back in the day (and I’m only talking 18 months ago) I purchased a Sanyo Z4 720p projector. Two areas that concerned me at the time were the presence of only one HDMI port on this projector and the fact that the maximum resolution was 1080i. At the time however High Def, and in particular HDMI sources, were thin on the ground so I didn’t really deem it a major issue.

Fast forward to the present day and I’m starting to understand the drawbacks. I must admit, not really with the fact that the maximum resolution is only 1080i given that this, at present, is the resolution broadcast mostly by Sky HD, combined with the fact that I have my XBox 360 connected over component, again limiting High Def output to 1080i. In fact, the only source in my cinema room capable of 1080p is the Playstation3. The Playstation3 however, combined with the Sky HD box means that I now have 2 HDMI sources and only one HDMI port on the back of my projector.

Up until now I’ve been manually switching the HDMI cable between these two devices and although this is pretty simple to do it leaves me with a feeling of an unfinished cinema room.  Of course there have always been solutions available to allow multiple HDMI ports into one, however up until recently they have either been of poor quality, or very expensive. Well that is beginning to change and now I’m in the market for an HDMI switch.

These boxes allow you to plug multiple HDMI sources in, with one HDMI uplink to your screen or projector of choice. You can then either have ones which require you to manually switch them to the correct source, or automatically switch based upon which source is active.  There are some which also all for audio optical inputs, which again is something that a lot of home cinema enthusiasts welcome.

Of course my choice now is do I go for a box which offers 3 way switching, something that will more than cover me now, or future proof myself by going down the 5 way switching route.

It’s a good job I like these kind of decisions.