Patent ID: 7725916

Claim:
A signal switching device comprising: a selecting unit operable to select a video signal from a plurality of video signal inputs, each video signal input being transmitted from an input source device of a plurality of input source devices; a memory for storing information; a reading channel for reading the information from an output destination device that is an output destination of the video signal; a reading unit operable to read the information through said reading channel, the information (i) indicating a physical address of said signal switching device, the physical address of said signal switching device being generated by the output destination device and including information indicating a physical address of the output destination device, and (ii) indicating a status of the output destination device; a storing unit operable to store the information read by said reading unit into said memory; a read-out unit operable to read out the information stored in said memory; a plurality of read-out channels for outputting the information to the plurality of input source devices, each read-out channel of said plurality of read-out channels corresponding to a respective input source device of the plurality of input source devices; an outputting unit operable to output the information indicating the status of the output destination device (i) through a read-out channel, of said plurality of read-out channels, that corresponds to the input source device transmitting the video signal selected by said selecting unit and (ii) to the input source device transmitting the video signal selected by said selecting unit; and an address setup unit operable to generate a respective physical address of each input source device of the plurality of input source devices, each respective physical address including information indicating the physical address of said signal switching device, wherein said outputting unit is operable to output, to each respective input source device of the plurality of input source devices, the respective physical address of the input source device including the information indicating the physical address of said signal switching device generated by said address setup unit such that each respective physical address corresponds to an input source device of the plurality of input source devices.