HDMI Cable info

HighWire

Hi there,
I just bought a new tv and blueray player and the place I bought it tried to sell me a hdmi cable for €100.
Needless to say I didnt take it and they werent including it.

So my question is whats the difference between the one they were trying to offer at €100 and another one I've seen for €25.
The signal is digital so whats going on?
Thanks

M00lers

You were right to leave it in the store. Basically salesman was trying to rip you off.
The expensive cable probably had very good build quality but it would have been of no benefit over the cheaper one....like you said it's all digital.

The only time I would spend more than 20-30 euro on a HDMI cable is if it was a long run going where it couldn't be accessed after the install.

Well done for seeing past the BS.

Wheety

I got one one Ebay for a fiver and have had no problems with it. As you said, it's a digital signal, so either you get the picture or you don't. The quality of the picture doesn't change with a more expensive cable.

Klingon Hamlet

Was that a Monster Cable they tried to sell you? Those things are waaaay overpriced, their packaging is very misleading, implying that the "lower"€50 cables only handle 720p, lower bandwidths, etc.

Youc an get €4 HDMIs that do the same job. Like aprevious poster said, inaccessible points, or perhaps lengths surpassing say 4 meters would deserve more money. Otherwise, the salespeople are just looking for more commission.

(I used to make more money on cables than on tellys/players)

M00lers

One of the biggest frauds has to be the THX certified Monster HDMI cables. THX certified HDMIs,are you "f"in kiddin me.There must be one born every minute.

Wolff

Whilst the monster cables are a complete rip off - there are cheap cables that ive come accross that are crap when dealing with some 1080p sources so not all cheap cables are great.

viperirl

I happen to know that Monster source their cable from China. They then spend the majority of their "R&D":rolleyes: budget on packaging and marketing.

As an aside, yes of course some cheap cables will fail at 1080p. There is a huge difference in bandwidth required for 1080p compared to 1080i. But once you get one that works you're fine.

golfdiva

€100 for a hdmi cable ???? I hope you got a good deal on the BR player and tv.

C14N

Many people will tell you that there technically shouldn't be a a difference between a cheap cable and an expensive one and from a standard scientific standpoint there shouldn't. However, I have seen many reviews on cables from esteemed magazines and websites (most notably What HiFi) that are to the contrary. I haven't tested myself, mind, but I fail to see why they would do so many reviews of various digital cables if they were all identical in both sound and vision. It's also not always the expensive ones that get 5 stars either. Head over to the site and read the reviews, if you want I'm sure most places will let you test both to see if there's a noticeable difference.

Btw, Monster is not a very good name in cables. You wouldn't catch many enthusiasts with Monster cables. Also, some HDMIs are much more than €100.

M00lers

C14N wrote: »

Many people will tell you that there technically shouldn't be a a difference between a cheap cable and an expensive one and from a standard scientific standpoint there shouldn't. However, I have seen many reviews on cables from esteemed magazines and websites (most notably What HiFi) that are to the contrary. I haven't tested myself, mind, but I fail to see why they would do so many reviews of various digital cables if they were all identical in both sound and vision. It's also not always the expensive ones that get 5 stars either. Head over to the site and read the reviews, if you want I'm sure most places will let you test both to see if there's a noticeable difference.

Btw, Monster is not a very good name in cables. You wouldn't catch many enthusiasts with Monster cables. Also, some HDMIs are much more than €100.

What HIFI is a joke of a magazine hardly what you call esteemed.
It's only useful purpose is that it can be used a a brochure as it has some nice photos of kit. The reviews are exceptionally vague and have very little technical info about the product under review.

As for the HDMI cable reviews, it's those that really show them up for what they are "liars" , some of the descriptions are scandalous claiming more vivid colours, better contrast and or a sharper image is just nonsence, in my opinion it should be illegal to make such claims. It's a digital cable, it carries 1s and 0s and thats it.

A good quality more expensive cable might be built to a higher standard than a cheap cable but if they both work as they are supposed to you will not see any difference.

Don't buy into the BS.

C14N

moolers2000 wrote: »

What HIFI is a joke of a magazine hardly what you call esteemed.
It's only useful purpose is that it can be used a a brochure as it has some nice photos of kit. The reviews are exceptionally vague and have very little technical info about the product under review.

As for the HDMI cable reviews, it's those that really show them up for what they are "liars" , some of the descriptions are scandalous claiming more vivid colours, better contrast and or a sharper image is just nonsence, in my opinion it should be illegal to make such claims. It's a digital cable, it carries 1s and 0s and thats it.

A good quality more expensive cable might be built to a higher standard than a cheap cable but if they both work as they are supposed to you will not see any difference.

Don't buy into the BS.

Exceptionally vague? Are we definitely reading the same magazine? I can't see what's remotely vague about it. By technical info I would assume you mean stuff like wattage and what formats it supports and stuff. Generally wattage isn't important in this and they will usually say whether an amp or Bluray player or something supports DTS/Dolby/192khz etc. or what the contrast ratio, res and hz of a TV are. It sounds like you're just sore because they disagree on the digital cables thing (they actually mentioned how many people don't buy into it in one issue). As for it being esteemed, if it wasn't then why would so many manufacturers and shops brag about one of their products getting a What HiFi 5 Star review? All you need to do is browse some of their sites to see them referencing it. Also I called it esteemed because most people I have talked to on various other forums and in person have recommended it as a good source of reviews.

M00lers

C14N wrote: »

Exceptionally vague? Are we definitely reading the same magazine? I can't see what's remotely vague about it. By technical info I would assume you mean stuff like wattage and what formats it supports and stuff. Generally wattage isn't important in this and they will usually say whether an amp or Bluray player or something supports DTS/Dolby/192khz etc. or what the contrast ratio, res and hz of a TV are. It sounds like you're just sore because they disagree on the digital cables thing (they actually mentioned how many people don't buy into it in one issue). As for it being esteemed, if it wasn't then why would so many manufacturers and shops brag about one of their products getting a What HiFi 5 Star review? All you need to do is browse some of their sites to see them referencing it. Also I called it esteemed because most people I have talked to on various other forums and in person have recommended it as a good source of reviews.

Mmmm,
Where do I start, firstly I'm in no hurry to have a a back and forth argument with you about this, I'm well past that.
But to answer your latest post, no we are not reading the same magazine, I have not read it for years becauce of the lies it prints. I'll admit to flicking through it briefly if one of my mates has a copy but thats about it.

By technical info I mean information like measured black levels,ansi contrast ratio, candence detection on film and video material, input lag measurements, pre and post calibration results to name but a few. Wattage?:rolleyes:

As for your question about why manufacturers brag about 5 star ratings etc.
Google marketing, you'll figure it out!

Take care,
Moo.

Idleater

moolers2000 wrote: »

It's a digital cable, it carries 1s and 0s and thats it.

Hmm, tell that to NTL/UPC/Sky - ever get the squares while signal interference corrupts some of the picture?

Hate to nit pick, but you are so wrong in that digital cables either work or don't work.

M00lers

nereid wrote: »

Hmm, tell that to NTL/UPC/Sky - ever get the squares while signal interference corrupts some of the picture?

Hate to nit pick, but you are so wrong in that digital cables either work or don't work.

If everything works as it should i.e no interference or badly constructed cable. There should be no difference. It's a complicated issue with many variables.
But my point is that a HDMI cable costing hundreds of euros will show no improvement over a cheaper cable in picture quality terms e.g more accurate, vivid colours etc. Thats just lies, a break up in a satelite feed is a completly different thing.

M00lers

Have a look through this, it's a good read and explains thing much better than I ever could.

http://www.audioholics.com/education/cables/long-hdmi-cable-bench-tests

I'm leaving this thread alone now, my only motive was to stop people wasting money on snake oil products.

Idleater

moolers2000 wrote: »

If everything works as it should i.e no interference or badly constructed cable. There should be no difference. It's a complicated issue with many variables.
But my point is that a HDMI cable costing hundreds of euros will show no improvement over a cheaper cable in picture quality terms e.g more accurate, vivid colours etc. Thats just lies, a break up in a satelite feed is a completly different thing.

I agree completely. For most cable runs, there is never going to be an opportunity to notice any signal degradation, but on longer runs it is possible.

I once had a cheapo 1m cable, and I like to use it as proof that though HDMI is digital, it is not fail safe.

I could see most of the image, but there were patches and squares and flickers which indicates that some of the signal was not reaching the destination correctly.

As HDMI doesn't correct all signals this means that you can have an incomplete digital signal, just like NTL/UPC/Sky (whatever the encoding it is still a digital signal) so the "rule that HDMI is digital" is just not applicable carte blanche.

M00lers

nereid wrote: »

I agree completely. For most cable runs, there is never going to be an opportunity to notice any signal degradation, but on longer runs it is possible.

I once had a cheapo 1m cable, and I like to use it as proof that though HDMI is digital, it is not fail safe.

I could see most of the image, but there were patches and squares and flickers which indicates that some of the signal was not reaching the destination correctly.

As HDMI doesn't correct all signals this means that you can have an incomplete digital signal, just like NTL/UPC/Sky (whatever the encoding it is still a digital signal) so the "rule that HDMI is digital" is just not applicable carte blanche.

Like I said if your cheapo cable worked as it should you wouldn't have had those problems. It was obviously a faulty cable.

Picking out a statement from my previous post is as you said "nit picking". It was a throw away statement that in hindsight I souldn't have used.
Do you think it acceptable that people pay hundreds for a 3m HDMI cable when a "working" 20, 30 euro cable will do the same thing?. I don't, that's all.

coylemj

Gold/Platinum or whatever kind of expensive shielding is used to justify the high price of a HDMI cable makes absolutely no difference. The data being transmitted is digital, it's all zeros and ones and it either gets through successfully or it doesn't. If the picture isn't breaking up and you can make out what people are saying then the cable is doing it's job, no amount of money will make it better.

Buy a good brand like Philips but don't waste your money on fancy cables, they don't make the slightest difference.

Before the audiophile police (not the RS folk, who are gentlemen and ladies all) jump down my throat, read this....

http://reviews.cnet.com/hdmi-cable/

donnacha

interesting article - might hold off on ordering that €30 1.5 metre cable so.