April 11th, 2025

Low cost, high speed data acquisition over HDMI [video]

A presentation at Osmocom's event introduced a low-cost data acquisition method using $10 HDMI video grabbers and FPGA boards, enabling high-speed data capture for hobbyists as logic analyzers or SDRs.

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Low cost, high speed data acquisition over HDMI [video]

A recent presentation at Osmocom's event highlighted a method for low-cost, high-speed data acquisition using HDMI. The approach involves utilizing inexpensive USB 3.2 HDMI video grabbers, specifically the Macrosilicon MS2130, in conjunction with small FPGA development boards like the Sipeed Tang nano series. Both components are priced around $10 each. This setup allows users to capture various types of data by connecting the devices via an HDMI cable, effectively functioning as a low-cost logic analyzer, analog-to-digital converter (ADC), or a DIY software-defined radio (SDR). The presentation emphasizes the potential of this technology for hobbyists and developers looking for affordable solutions in data acquisition.

- The method uses low-cost HDMI video grabbers and FPGA boards for data acquisition.

- It enables high-speed data capture through HDMI connections.

- The setup can function as a logic analyzer, ADC, or DIY SDR.

- Each component costs approximately $10, making it accessible for hobbyists.

- The technology was presented at Osmocom's event, showcasing innovative applications.

Link Icon 2 comments
By @jmpman - 27 days
I’ve always wondered about using HDMI as a data exfiltration path. To the best of my knowledge, there are security tools monitoring for employees plugging in USB drives or connecting to Google drive, etc, but none which are watching the video output. You could easily hide the data transfer such that someone looking at the screen remotely wouldn’t notice the data transfer.
By @tanvach - 28 days
My understanding of the motivation for this (really neat) hack is that cheap FPGA boards lack IO pins to interface to USB3 interface chip and external components (i.e. parallel DAC) at the same time. Seems like these boards tend to have built--in connector that uses up the GPIO pins.

Wonder then if it's possible to use the HDMI port to connect a custom board with the USB3 chipset. Maybe the crosstalk between the wires is too high.