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Having moved my Xbox from the lounge so I don’t have to fight for the remote I’ve not got it plugged into my computer TFT monitor via an HDMI to DVI cable. Everything stills looks fine, but of course I no longer have any audio as it is designed as a monitor - not a TV!

I thought perhaps I could plug the HDMI and normal Xbox AV cable in (which has an optical out, or traditional RCA/phono), alas the Xbox cable is too chunky and covers part of the HDMI port when plugged in (I’m not even sure if this would have worked, or if the HDMI overrides the normal AV out).

Unfortunately as HDMI transports digital audio steams (so it can support 5.1 surround like Dolby/DTS) there’s no easy adapter/cable style fix that means I can just split the video signal bound for my TFT from the audio which I want to plug into my 5.1 system. Blast!

A bit more searching though turned up a couple of HDMI switch boxes, some of which offered separate video and audio outputs. I can’t, however, afford to go out and splash the four-figure sums of cash a lot of these devices cost! A bit more digging lead me to the ‘CP-267′ from Keene Electronics, a box which takes HDMI in and gives DVI + SPDIF out. Perfect, apart from the £165.00 price tag - and that’s for B grade stock!

Some further Googling has lead me to a couple of HDMI switches though which look equally as promising, without causing the wallet too much agony.

The first supports upto 5 inputs (4x HDMI, 1x DVI), each with stereo phono input, leading to 1 HDMI output (which can subsequently be converted to DVI) also featuring a stereo phono connection. It supports upto 1080p, however only provides stereo sound and comes in just under the £40.00 mark from thegametrain.com.

The second solution is just a two port switch, with 1x HDMI and 1x DVI + SPDIF/stereo phono inputs, providing 1x HDMI and a SPDIF or stereo phono output. It only supports up to 1080i, but does give the benefit of keeping your surround sound. It’s also almost half the price of the 5-port switch above, coming in at £22.50 from cableuniverse.co.uk.

Not sure which one I’ll go for, or if I’ll search a bit further first, but at least there is hope on the horizon

Update (03/06/08): Of course there is always the possibility of over-complicating things. Perhaps a good ol’ Xbox 360 VGA HD cable will suffice