A Good, Clean Matrix HDMI switcher

Hi, Pavel. I'm so glad you are diligently improving the Vanity Pro. I did not align and set up my multichannel monitoring system until this past week, I've been too busy! So it's been at least a year with the Vanity sitting and waiting to be used. I did successfully upgrade the firmware. I could never see the STM device in Device manager. What category should it show up in Device Manager? Anyway, I installed the STM DFU driver and ran the firmware updater and it saw the Vanity so I carried on and the firmware update worked. For anyone reading this post, you have to follow the firmware instructions IN ORDER and very carefully.

My problem is a Monoprice Matrix HDMI switch, causing audio dropouts. I need to explain the problem below.

My three HDMI audio sources are: Apple M1 Studio Ultra, Apple TV, and Oppo Blu Ray.

So I'm using a Monoprice matrix HDMI switch to choose between the sources going into the Vanity Pro. The cheap Monoprice switch turns out to cause the Vanity to produce occasional dropouts. The old firmware was very susceptible to producing dropouts when using the Monoprice. It was a several second long dropout aobut every 2 or 3 minutes. The new firmware is less susceptible with the Monoprice.... I get a short dropout every five minutes or so. I believe this is NOT a problem with my DAC, but rather a problem with the stability of the Vanity when locking to less than stable HDMI sources. I believe this is the case because when the dropout occurs the green HDMI indicator on the Vanity momentarily goes out. So I'm pretty sure it's an INPUT problem, not an OUTPUT TO DAC problem.

The Vanity EDID is not working as desired for me, even after the firmware update. The Apple TV keeps on wanting to output Dolby Digital or Atmos, which produces a continuous noisy coded audio stream, not the actual program audio. (The Apple has a delicate menu structure, it's hard to set it to "Auto" so it could be me and not the EDID). But I am totally successful using a little HDMI splitter with EDID. This splitter's EDID is properly telling the Apple to output linear PCM 8 channels. Using the HDMI splitter, which feeds the TV and the Vanity, the audio is clean and there are no dropouts! Hooray!

In the past you would copy the EDID from the Vanity HDMI output. Can you restore that as a menu option, please?

Now I have to conquer the Matrix switch issue so I can switch among sources cleanly. I need a very clean and stable HDMI switch that does not produce a jittery or funky HDMI output that would make the Vanity produce dropouts. Preferably one with built in EDID capabilities in case the Vanity EDID isn't working. Any suggestions?

I just bought this. It's a professional grade matrix switcher. Hopefully it's stable enough for the Vanity to stay locked.

Hi Bob,
Thank you for your post! I am glad you have finally found some time to play with the VanityPRO

The issue you are describing is quite strange. There hasn't been any complaint about sensitivity or stability of the HDMI input. Also, not sure how the firmware would affect this. But the HDMI indicator colour change certainly points to this direction. On the other hand, you get dropouts when the HDMI chain is reinitializing - source or sink HDMI device being connected or disconnected or EDID changes in any of the connected device - even changing input on your sink device can cause this. Of course I cannot accurately diagnose this remotely, but there are quite a few variables.

We are happy to keep improving the EDID editor further. For example, to give the user the option to eliminate any compressed bitstreams formats from the capability list. The EDID copy function you mentioned applies only to the video part of EDID. The video capabilities are copied from the connected sink device, otherwise a set of default ones is used. It is the default values which the user can change in the menu.

As for the matrix switch, does it give you problems without any other devices connected? From what I know not all HDMI ports in these switches are equivalent. Usually there is a system of priorities, ports which support passing EDID, etc. so normally not all connectivity combinations are possible. Have you tried to use different port combination for the VanityPRO and AppleTV ?

Please keep us posted. This sounds like a very interesting problem.
Best Regards,
Pavel

AP Wrote:
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> Hi Bob,
> Thank you for your post! I am glad you have
> finally found some time to play with the VanityPRO

Hi, Pavel. The new matrix switcher solved the stability problems with the Vanity Pro. I know you say that the symptoms were strange, but since the new matrix switcher is working fine, my informal diagnosis that the bad matrix switcher did not produce a suitably stable HDMI signal seems reasonable.

Anyway, on to the EDID issues. I have gotten an excellent freeware EDID editor app from ANALOG WAY, at [www.analogway.com]

In addition, I have gotten an excellent freeware EDID extractor, which can read the EDID from an attached monitor and save it as a bin file.

Those tools, in combination with the EDID abilities of the new matrix switcher, have enabled me to begin debugging my current situation.

My current situation is that:

1) the Apple TV produces linear PCM (8 channel) audio ONLY if it sees the EDID from the Vanity Pro! The Apple TV produces 1080P video in that condition, and 8 channel linear PCM.

2) Setting the Vanity Pro video EDID to a 4K setting does not make a difference, the Apple TV continues to produce 1080P video. So I conclude there's something about the video portion of the Vanity Pro EDID that the Apple TV does not like.

3) What would be great is if you can keep the audio portion of the Vanity Pro EDID but steal the video portion from its output, and memorize that. In that case I could connect the Vanity temporarily to my Vizio TV and steal just the video portion. Then, hopefully, the Apple TV will produce Dolby Vision video at 4k and linear PCM Audio.

The Apple TV will not produce linear PCM in any other situation, looking at any other EDID, which is very sad, since the Apple TV is capable of producing 4k video and also supports Dolby Vision. For example, if I send an EDID from my Vizio TV back to the Apple TV, it will produce 4k video with Dolby Vision, but it will NOT produce linear PCM audio. So I attempted to edit the Vizio EDID, but nothing I was able to do, modifying the Vizio EDID got the Apple TV to produce linear PCM.

But honestly, I'm not hopeful this will work. My tests seem to indicate that the Apple TV does not like to produce linear PCM audio if it's producing a high res (4k and/or Dolby Vision) video output.

4) I have a Blu Ray player and a Mac Studio M1 Ultra. Both of these units will produce linear PCM (8 channel) audio in conjunction with high res (4k) video when looking at the right EDID, including the same EDID that failed with the Apple TV. So it's possible that the problem is the Apple TV. The Apple TV doesn't seem to like to produce linear PCM and high res video at the same time. It's kind of "conditioned" to produce a coded audio format (AC3, AC4, etc.) when it's also producing a high res video. What a pity! If you can get an Apple TV it would be very helpful if you can confirm this conclusion.

I have the tools so if you want to direct me to make any further tests, I'm happy to. The new matrix switch is capable of sending independent EDIDs back to each input. And it can use custom EDIDs from .bin files, so it's very versatile.

The Matrix switcher is from Simplified Manfacturing, model RM42C. It's very versatile and powerful. Its manual is on this page: [www.simplifiedmfg.com]

Hi Bob,
Thanks for this!
We will test on our side with the AppleTV and let you know. From our experience most HDMI sources (players) would have no issues playing 4k video along with 8 channel LPCM, so it is probably to do with AppleTV. Let' see.
Also, thanks for the links for the HDMI mux and the EDID editor.
Regards,
Pavel