Candlestick Park in San Francisco, California, home to the 49ers and Centerplate (the largest hospitality partner in North America), has installed a new digital menu board system.
Atlona, a digital connectivity solutions provider, helped to power up the displays with multiple HDMI® distribution amplifiers (AT-HD-V12 1×2), HDMI EDID emulators (AT-HDSync), and 50-foot-plus HDMI cables throughout the park’s twenty concession stands. “In a facility this large, with displays so far apart, it was a significant challenge to send an HDMI signal from a single source to 100-plus TVs, all while maintaining the hot plug 5V to ensure that no TV turned itself off due to inactivity of the HDMI ports,” said Kevin Goldsmith, director of digital media operations for Ping HD, which handled the install.
Instead of running a single HDMI cable over thousands of feet and degrading the signal, Ping HD relied on Atlona’s HDMI distribution amplifiers to ensure the highest video quality. The AT-HD-V12 takes an incoming signal from a digital signage “master” TV, and then splits it into two HDMI signals, which are sent to two other TVs using Atlona’s 50-foot-plus HDMI cables. To provide a constant hot plug, Atlona’s HDMI EDID emulators (AT-HDSync) embed the incoming HDMI signal with a 5V current, which wakes up the TVs from standby mode.
The self-operating digital displays not only show concession options, they also display stadium and emergency information. “The digital menus are a hit with fans, and our client loves the simplicity and clarity brought by the ability to show digital signage on the TVs, as well as the level of integration achieved due to Atlona’s products,” said Goldsmith.
