How far away from my router and PC tower can I site my monitor and keyboard ?

Question

I'm moving my Dell monitor and keyboard (only) to a different room and just want to know how I can extend the monitor's cable? -
I don't mind joining two in series if this is possible, -but is there a limit on the separation between monitor and PC? Ideally I'd like to extend the cabling to about 15 metres...

I guess the keyboard will be no problem, -just a USB lead extension. But will there be a drop-off of quality or speed if I extend the monitor cabling?

Answer 1

Actually, the keyboard IS your biggest problem. USB has a 15-feet run limit. If a USB cable is longer than 15 feet, the USB device will no longer work.



VGA on the other hand has a pretty far cable run limit, something like 50 feet. There will be signal degradation though, so don't be surprised if you get a poor image on your monitor.



My advice: It's not worth the trouble. Just move your computer along with your keyboard and monitor.

Answer 2

It will depend on how far you want to go 15 meters is not that far and there would be no noticeable difference to speeds but there may be some in the quality of the picture, to make things better over a long distance make sure the cable you use is screened to stop any interference or keep it to a minimum

Changing a disc in a drive may become a bit annoying though

Answer 3

A KVM switch is indeed what you would need to do that. Which one to get depends on existing keyboard/mouse connectors, as some do that through USB while others use older PS/2 connectors. Some KVM switches will also switch audio output from the connected computers to a pair of speakers. Personally, I use a separate A/V switch and some audio cabling for that, as sometimes I like to keep an ear on one machine's audio while working with another one.

Answer 4

You might have to buy a longer monitor cable or do what u said by joining two series together which ever helps.

Answer 5

if money is no object, you could look into a VGA > Ethernet adaptor. range of up to 100m there, iirc.

Answer 6

You already answered to your own question use a Adapter