Appendix F; Additional Features Available On Alif2002T - ADDER AdderLink Infinity ALIF2000 User Manual

Appendix F

Additional features available on ALIF2002T

New lossless CODEC (AFZ) ALIF 2002T only
The new compression scheme builds on the existing codec and is primarily
focused on improving the performance for "natural" images (i.e. photographs
and movies). It works in concert with the existing codec and is automatically
selected whenever there is a benefit to do so.
The new codec is lossless and is very low latency (a small fraction of a frame
delay). It generally achieves 50% improvement (in compression) over the current
scheme for any areas of the screen that consist of images, gradients, shadows
etc., elements commonly found in modern desktop environments.
To maintain compatibility with non AFZ -enabled transmitters and receivers
there is an automatic switching method which will revert back to RLE when an
AdderLink Infinity receiver is connected to the AdderLink Infinity Dual.
Magic Eye (anti-dither support added) ALIF 2002T only
This is enabled by default.
The Magic Eye feature increases performance and reduces network traffic when
the AdderLink Infinity Dual is used with Apple Macs and other host computers
that have dithered video output. It also improves performance if the video
source is noisy (e.g. from a VGA-to-DVI converter).
Dithering is a technique used by some graphics cards to improve perceived
image quality by continuously varying the colour of each pixel slightly. This gives
the illusion of more shades of colour than the display can really reproduce, and
smooths the appearance of gradually shaded areas in images. Unfortunately
dithering is an issue for KVM extenders such as AdderLink Infinity because it
makes the image appear to be changing all the time even when it is static, thus
creating much more network data than can be carried by a Gigabit Ethernet.
The result is a reduction in video frame rate, which the user sees as slow mouse
response.
Magic Eye works by ignoring small variations in the video from frame to frame.
It is enabled by default as it is not obvious to the user that his poor mouse
behaviour is caused by dithering. In most cases Magic Eye is invisible, but it
can produce slight colour inaccuracies on the monitor. For full colour accuracy,
Magic Eye can be disabled for video sources which are not dithered or noisy.
33