StarTech’s Converge A/V line sends VGA and audio over Cat5

If you’re looking for a fairly inexpensive and convenient way of combining and distributing a VGA/audio signal to multiple displays, then you should check out StarTech’s four new Converge A/V products. The products consist of three major pieces – an extender unit which combines a VGA line and stereo audio lines into a single Cat5 line and then multiplexes it out to multiple Cat5 outputs, a line splitter unit which is basically like an Ethernet switch – taking a single Cat5 line and splitting it up into four more outputs and finally a receiver unit which takes a single Cat5 line and divides the signal back into separate VGA and stereo audio outputs.

StarTech sells two types of Extenders – a 4 port extender for $259.99 and an 8 port extender for $399.99.

If you couple each Cat5 output from these extenders with another 4 port line splitter (which sells for $399.99 a piece), then you can in theory get upwards of 32 different Cat5 lines coming from a single source - a great way to distribute audio/video to multiple displays – especially for digital signage use.