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Retailer Calls Rivals' Bluff On "HDMI Scam"
nk497 writes "Retailer Kogan is offering customers of rival stores free HDMI cables to highlight the 'scam' of selling the cables for £100, saying its own £4 cable works just as well. 'An HDMI cable is an HDMI cable,' Kogan said. 'It's a digital cable. You either get a picture or you don't. Don't get conned into buying a 'fancy' HDMI cable because it will make no difference!' Rival retailers Currys and John Lewis said they preferred to offer customers a 'variety' of cables. 'Each of our HDMI cables offers excellent quality and value for money, and by providing our customers with a range of different cables which offer different specifications, we are able to help them find one to suit their specific needs, with features such as different cable lengths, ultra slim and high speed,' said a spokesman for John Lewis, which sells cables for £20 to £99."
You mean the oxygen-free wiring and gold-plated connectors don't make for an "extra dynamic picture" and "much better sound resolution"?
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
...is essentially what Kogan is saying...and they're right!
Sure a cheap $2 HDMI cable is just as good as a more expensive one for a short run (50') they sure as hell do matter. I used to think the same thing, and I needed to do 3x60' runs. So I bought some cheap hdmi cables and ran them, no signal. Tried other 2.. same issue. Returned them, bought better quality ones (no monster cables, but better quality ones), and they ran perfect.
The Denon AK-DL1 is without doubt the winner in the bogus cable category. It's "uni-directional"! http://usa.denon.com/us/Product/Pages/Product-Detail.aspx?Catid=5840d55c-4077-4d9e-9421-36f204fb4587&SubId=85958de8-a123-4213-8ae1-bb6afaee9a97&ProductId=f7d26b3a-05a6-4724-a5c1-2a63642a6206
My UID is prime!
There is no way of those ultra slim cabels can fit a picture big enough for my TV.
Long ago I used to feed this crap to customers at Best Buy while i was in college, but my sin pertained to "gold plated USB cables" and "printing better quality pictures." I knew it was bogus and eventually I just couldn't keep up the bull without feeling dirty and transferred to cameras and cellphones.
Glad to see someone do this.
According to Google, UK£ 4 = $6.42800 which is still at least double what an HDMI cable goes for on Monoprice (depending on length that they are selling)
After Future Shop in Canada got bought up, they've dumped their non-monster cables and stuff. "Oh, you want an HDMI to go with that TV? That'll be $80. Do you want a fucking $400 god damn power bar? It cleans the power gremlins out of your filthy filthy wall socket. Without the filter the gremlins will take a hammer to the inside of your TV, and eat all your bags of chips. It also somehow makes the sound one hundred times crisper because resonance waves from your dirty power account for a huge portion of the signal noise from home amplifiers and receivers. It also has a display to show the current voltage, so you know just how dirty your power was before we made it sparkling fresh!"
ASCII stupid question, get a stupid ANSI
My client insisted we buy cables from Cisco, too. We ended up paying 80 US dollars for one 2-meters long (like, 6,5 feet) straight un-shielded cable. That was the biggest 'client induced retardation' I've experienced, although your price of 100 quids for HDMI cable surely beats Cisco prices.
.Play.Open.Minded.
Thats nothing. How about £9,936 for a 2.5 meter HDMI cable! - http://goo.gl/VMECV - Now that is pushing the envelope to the maximum. Sadly there will always be idiots with too much money in their pockets who buy this stuff. Everyone should do Digital Electronics 101.
Those who can, do. Those who cannot, sue.
About the only relevant difference between HDMI cables I've ever heard of what the HDMI spec is. I believe they are up to HDMI 1.4a now. Which supports ethernet over HDMI. for more info http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HDMI
with features such as different cable lengths, ultra slim and high speed,
There's two HDMI cable specs, supporting 720p/1080i or 1080p. What you mean is "high resolution", but since people don't know what a resolution is because all you do is sell them shiny gold plated voodoo cables you can call it "high speed" and bilk them some more. The price difference is $2 on Monoprice. Incidentally, this doubles the value of the cable. But you wouldn't know that since your cables start at twenty pounds and go up to the stratosphere from there.
I'll be honest, we're throwing science against the wall to see what sticks. -Cave Johnson
Digital signals can still degrade.
Fucking signal integrity, how does it work?
Cameras and cellphones made you feel less dirty?
Customer: "Which camera should I buy?"
Best Buy sales rep: "Either this one that has more mega-pixels or this one that costs more, which means it takes better pictures."
I guess if that made you feel like less of a con-man...
Thanks to some questionable design decisions(eg. simultaneously dumbing the standard down because it is "just consumer"(compare to what SDI and its descendants have been doing over simple BNC or fiber connections for ages now) and tacking on every feature that makes it to "fad of the month" status for at least one hype cycle. HDMI cables are, arguably, more complex than would be idea. Worse, they've been tacked on in a very unsystematic way: You've got a very high speed unidirectional bus, and a slower bidirectional one for CEC, DDC, etc. However, because both of these weren't really designed for elegant expansion, when they added ethernet, they couldn't just dump it into a logical slice of the bidirectional aux channel. Instead, there are two different cable types: the ones that support running ethernet over some extra signal lines and the ones that don't.
It is certainly true that(particularly for short runs, long runs pretty much cannot be saved by any passive cabling; because it's 'Just Consumer') as long as cable A and cable B check the same checkboxes, they are the same, and it isn't worth paying more; but there are rather more checkboxes in the feature matrix than one would like for a basic cable...
"Returned them"
Sure you returned them : they were deceptive products ! To bear the HDMI logo, a cable needs to be certified.
No signal : those were not HDMI certified cables and you should get a refund.
So, taking a dirt cheap cable is a no risk situation : either it works or you get a refund.
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
Un-twist and gently hammer both ends in place. Great picture quality at a fraction of the price. Best of all it's made from recycled components.
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
As far as I know, the only time you should pay more for a cable is when making an extremely long cable run, but for short distances, it doesn't matter.
When I went to buy a new TV, Best Buy tried to sell me a HDMI cable. I actually needed one so I said sure how much? $35. I got in to an argument with the sales rep about how it would do nothing for my picture quality. I told him I'd give him $10 for it, and I knew that was about 700% profit for him so it works out for both of us.
So he told me he couldn't do that and I asked for a manager, maybe he could. Manager says he can't do that and this is an amazing HDMI cable and will make the picture better than any cheap cable I could buy. I told him I'm an electrical engineer and I know he's lying straight to my face to make a couple extra bucks. At that point I was pretty fed up so I said you can keep your $1000 TV. I guess the real mistake was thinking I'd get an honest sell at Best Buy
There are so few things affect the quantify the quality of a cable. Not the least is the current, frequency, and voltage of the signal. Too high a current? You need more metal. Too high a voltage? You need better insulators. Too high a frequency? Then you need noise immunity and impedance matching with coax or twisted pair. Yes, I know this is an over simplification, but a little bit of research will show how nonsensical the high quality cable claims are.
This is my favourite audiophool scam:
"Simply put these are very danceable cables. "
http://www.pearcable.com/sub_products_anjou_sc.htm
Why can't we prosecute these criminals for fraud?
its a bit like saying you can plug in a CAT 5 cable and get gigabit...
the answer is it depends...
the longer the cable the more the signal degrades and just because its digital does not mean it will produce the same results..
have a read of this
http://www.audioholics.com/education/cables/long-hdmi-cable-bench-tests/evaluation-conclusion
I guess the Kogan cables are not very long... dont get me wrong I think they are right most HDMI cables are a scam... but someone needs to actually test them before commenting...
but honestly who is going to listen... they are after fast bit of press... slashdot used to be about technical things..
regards
John Jones
My main background is in Radio. This is the same thing that was repeated for High End Audio, then for USB for printers. I used to sweep test cables for phased antenna arrays.
I was able to sweep many audio patch cables. Most would work fine for short runs of video. Very few had high dielectric loss at video frequencies. Most were about 70 ohms impedance. The rest were between 60 and 85 ohms. Most old VCR stereo audio and video cable used the exact same wire for audio and video. It was all about 75 ohms impedance.
I like to give the sales people a very hard time by asking for the specifc cable specifications that make it better than cable B. What is the impedance? What is the near end cross talk? What is the attenuation at the highest frequency in the carried signal per foot? How much does the impedance and attenuation vary over the pass band? What is the % shielding?
Then I leave the salesman a copy of the cable sweep report on cable B and have him ask his supplier. I want a better cable, not just a claim of a better cable.
The truth shall set you free!
Directly from HDMI.org :
http://www.hdmi.org/manufacturer/hdmi_1_4/finding_right_cable.aspx
http://www.hdmi.org/manufacturer/trademark_logo_pub.aspx
Since 1.4, there are only 5 differentes cables and correctly labelling them is REQUIRED by HDMI (there is a grace period until the end of 2011).
It's simple : 2 speeds (Normal or HighSpeed) and a feature (with or without Ethernet).
Basically, Normal supports up to 1080i and HighSpeed supports above.
The last category is about automative cabling so we can forget about it.
At last, it is FORBIDDEN to make reference to a HDMI version number for cables ("upgrade your 1.3 cables to 1.4" : those are the same - except for Ethernet but your pre-1.4 devices did not support it).
And for products, if you want to use a version number, the manufacturer have to specifically list the feature added in this version supported by its product.
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
The 4 dollar one will do just fine.And that's exactly right.Digital is digital.Works or don't. :)
The only place where we lay the bucks down is on 15 meters lengths ( 50 foot )
For the rest standard run of the mill cables do fine.We don't buy/sell junk on our installs.
We need connectors that are resistant.Which is the main trouble in HDMI.The wire part is quite
fairly standard.Quality of the connectors matter a LOT. Specially in tight corners ( thin walls when we put
hdmi on connection plates.) is where we separate the good from the ordinary.
But for home use ? Get the 4 dollar one and buy something for the missus with the savings.Take her out to dinner
, or if you are a true romantic : get her a few gigs of RAM
Disclaimer I'm a AV construction specialist. I do this for a living
Good old Slashdot, Why have fresh news when you can have old stuff a day late? Not that I'm moaning mind.
http://slashdot.org/submission/1695738/Kogan-Exposes-Cable-Scams-With-Free-HDMI-Leads
Just do what I do and run VGA cable from the computer to the TV. then you don't have to worry about the HDMI cable scams.
Time to offend someone
Whatever. I'll keep my analog HDMI cables (with wooden knobs!). I can get 5298p on a good day.
While there might be a "scam" it is only half a scam.
The protocols used in HDMI data transfer have mechanisms that handles loss of data or minor errors in the stream. So yes - a cheap cable will seem to work even if there is semi-severe interference and signal degradation. The damage sound and image will be auto-corrected in the receiving end, and the user will be none the wiser. Same goes for common network protocols uses in LAN and WLAN. If a packet is lost underway, or its integrity check reveals data corruption, the packet will be resend again. If the protocol is lossy, the receiving client will simply skip the data and move on with life.
While selling a high quality shielded HDMI cable for 99,- GBP might feel like a "scam", don't let yourself be fooled into buying the cheap cables. There IS a difference in quality, and for high-quality signals it does matter. Especially if the cable-mess behind your PS3 / X-Box / DVD player / Amplifier is filtered around external power adapters. I can visually see if my own HDMI cable is passing too close to the power adapter of my SqueezeBox when the signal is Full HD. The difference is subtle - but definitely present!
The scam is not the fact that there are different cables. The scam is the high prices being asked for the quality cables.
- Jesper
My security clearance is so high I have to kill myself if I remember I have it...
And through in a good electromagnetics course to learn about transmission lines and possibly basic EMI. However, the first time the see Maxwell's equations might blow their minds.
Until 1.4, all cables were the sames but had different qualities. This quality was not "certified" until 1.3.
In 1.3, they defined cable Categories :
- Category 1 (renamed Normal in 1.4) was certified for 1080i
- Category 2 (renamed HighSpeed in 1.4) was certified for higher resolutions and frequencies (like 3D)
Category 1 is certified for displaying 1080i but would generally work for 1080p 2D content.
Category 2 is required for 3D. In 2D, it is required for insane resolutions or frequencies no consumer video source or display support.
1.4 added Ethernet over HDMI using a connector pin that was previously reserved hence not soldered (pin 14). This is called HDMI Ethernet Channel and HDMI ask to label it HDMI HEC. So far, I haven't found a single HDMI HEC TV.
It looks like HDMI really wants to avoid consumer confusion to slow its adoption and with 1.4 cable specification and guidelines, it seems they REALLT wanted to cut the BS on cable "quality".
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
Don't forget that most big box retail stores set their pricing based on selling these cables and selling extended warranties. They often lose money on the TVs. If you're savvy, you'll buy the cables for $5 from elsewhere, and you'll buy the TV for below cost when there's a sale at a big box store. I respect what Kogan is doing but I'm not going to be a crusader for lazy consumers so I can pay higher prices.
I seriously heard some "sales associate" at Best Buy tell someone that documents would print faster if they bought a parallel cable with gold connectors. While it wasn't the first time I'd heard Best Buy's sales people spouting blatant lies (1998: "You'll want the best CPU you can buy if you want to run Word", 1999: "Sound cards fail all the time. I'd never buy one without the extra warranty." 2000: "WindowsME is way faster than Windows98, and if you don't upgrade now, you'll never be able to.") it is still the winner for sheer absurdity and blatant attempt to bilk another $10 from a customer.
I was just passing by on my way to find a new printer, but when the guy said it, I couldn't help myself. I broke out laughing. Pretty loud. The guy and his two gullible customers looked at me. I was in an odd mood, so I asked the guy how fast electricity traveled in gold. Then I asked how fast it traveled in copper. He didn't know either. I told the customers that he was lying to them. Pointed at one of the cheapest cables on the shelf, and told them that was the one they wanted. The sales guy looked pissed. A few other people nearby were watching. As I walked away, some manager-looking guy asked if I needed help. I told him that I came to buy a printer, but that Office Max was only a few blocks away and their sales staff didn't lie to their customers.
Since then, I probably spent only a couple hundred dollars in Best Buy, almost entirely on DVDs. When given the choice, for any piece of hardware (even cables) I'll go to any other store. While I'm sure that in the long run, Best Buy makes decent money off lying to customers, I'd easily estimate that its lost a few thousand dollars of sales just off me. At the very least, it lost about $160 ($150 printer + $10 for uselessly-upgraded cable) that day for that guy's stupid attempt.
A fool and his money are soon parted... I'm all for idiots buying $100 cables. It helps sort the wheat from the chaff. If someone tells me such and such speakers are great and then mentions their $100 cables, I know not to take their advice on the speakers. etc...
The problem is, the box stores use the $100 cables as an excuse to sell the $2 cables for $30+... So now, when I have a cable go bad, there's no place in town to get a replacement at a reasonable price and I have to wait 3 days for it to arrive from newegg.
Eurogamer's Digital Foundry blog did some extensive testing with HDMI cables which shows that it really doesn't matter what type of cables you buy: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/digitalfoundry-vs-hdmi
I literally just had an argument with a Best Buy employee over this the other day. Me and a friend went to the mall because I needed some emergency thermal paste for a PC build I was doing (I was visiting friends 5 hours from my house and had forgot some). I went to Best Buy because they had some for $10 (probably the cheapest thing in the store). After buying the paste, we hung around in the store while my friend's brother went and got a haircut. My friend and I went to the cable section and he asked me about HDMI cables for his HDTV. He showed me the cable he bought (Insignia for ~$40) and asked if it was good. I said it was fine, but that he over paid even for that. I then proceeded to pick up a Monster cable that was only 4 feet long and cost $129 and explain to him that this cable and that cable were the same. A Best Buy employee then came over and started a conversation with me.
Best Buy Employee: "Can I help you with anything?"
Me: "No, I'm all set."
BBE: "I see you have a Monster HDMI cable there. What kind of TV do you have?"
Me: "Oh I am just explaining to my friend that there is no reason to spend over $100 on a 4' cable when a $5 online will do the same thing"
BBE: "Well that isn't true. That cable will give you superior sound and video quality. It also has Ethernet over HDMI capability and compatibility for 3D"
Me: "Well I'm sure it does all of that, but any cable will do that for you as long as it is rated for HDMI 1.4 spec."
BBE: "It will but that cable will give you better picture quality because it has gold connectors and better shielding"
Me: "No, it really won't. Unless you have your TV inside a power transfer station with unshielded electrical cables, you will not really need to worry about interference. And picture quality will not be better regardless of what cable you are using."
BBE: "You are giving your friend bad advice. This cable is better and will give you better -"
Me: *interrupting him* "If I hooked up the same exact TVs to the same exact source with my cable and this cable, not only would they be the same quality, but my cable would be 15' longer and be able to connect across the room where as this is only capable of connecting to a device close by, and my cable will have cost around $5-20 and this one costs $129. I'd bet you any amount of $ that the difference in picture and sound quality would be indistinguishable."
BBE: "I'd take that bet, but only if I saw the cable you were going to use first"
We then went to the computer in the department and I went to Newegg and showed him this cable. He said "Right but that is a nice shielded cable like this one". And I said "Yea, but look at the length and the price." He then basically dismissed what I was saying and said that the Monster cable was still superior.
I wonder if they train people to be this ignorant? Or could places that sell cables for this price just attract people who buy into the BS?
"I hope you know how very lucky you are to know me, because I am so incredibly incredible."
Nope, Here's the winner in the ripoff competition
http://www.amazon.com/AudioQuest-K2-terminated-speaker-cable/dp/B000J36XR2
Very long runs can benefit from a nicer cable. Probably not 4000% better though.
Blogging because I can...
Its a scam dude.
...or just stupid.
I like when companies throw out the line about offering a range of products to suit specific needs of consumers. It actually means that they are confusing the consumer and most definately will push the most expensive product to the consumer by telling them it is be better in some miniscule way that the consumer would not have noticed to begin with.
IF the best buy guys don't sell up sells and ripoff cables they get there hours cut and geek squad is filled with sales men and not techs. Staples is just as bad.
And don't even think of hhgregg has they are 100% commission and if you buy some thing on sale the sales guy can lose money from his pay so they can be very pushy.
It's purely because gold doesn't corrode. I had some old RCA cables that were looking pretty bad and couldn't make much of a connection because of the corrosion, but the gold-plated ones still work perfectly. The corrosion on the aluminum connectors on the cheaper components became the problem, you want gold there too.
But less than a gram of gold plating doesn't add much to the cost of a cable.
However, in this throwaway age you might not have your components or even a certain cable standard long enough for the corrosion resistance to matter.
For those who didn't realized what this is because this is unbelievable.
This cable is used to connect a Denon DVD player to a Denon AV Receiver to transmit digital audio.
This is a 1.5m RJ45 Ethernet Cat5 cable.
For half a grand.
And from the owner manuel
Signal direction indicator
Connect in the direction shown on the diagram above to achieve the maximum performance the cable has to offer.
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
I'm quite new to HDMI... do I need a high speed cable if I want to be able to fast forward my DVDs? ;-)
The damage sound and image will be auto-corrected in the receiving end, and the user will be none the wiser.
So why exactly should the customer care if this is happening?
for high-quality signals it does matter
And what exactly are "high-quality signals"? One that provides the information required, or one that doesn't? There is no inbetweens. There is no high/middle/low quality signal. There's one that works, and one that doesn't.
You're still repeating the marketing bollocks that manufacturers rely on to convince the customer that there are different degrees of quality to a digital signal. It either works, or it doesn't. If you have a shoddy cable that doesn't work then get a better quality cable. But buying a more expensive cable will not improve, not one single bit, the quality of TV delivered by a cheaper cable that works.
I can visually see if my own HDMI cable is passing too close to the power adapter of my SqueezeBox when the signal is Full HD.
How? Do the light waves from your TV come out looking a bit squished?
While the $20+ HDMI cables are just a waste of money, the cheapest cables can be problematic. Poor manufacture or shoddy shielding can lead to signal loss, whole or in part. The requirements are a bit higher for 3D using the higher bandwidth HDMI 1.4.
It is a high frequency signal, and the cable have to adequately shield that signal from interference, and it goes both ways, your neighbour will probably not like very much if the leaked signal interferes with his pacemaker, having it go wild every time you watch pron. Though that will probably never happen, they tend to be tough little buggers.
The pacemakers that is.
Whatever the length of your cable, either it works and display a perfect picture and earns its HDMI certification or it does not work properly and its NOT a valid HDMI product. And you get a refund for this deceptive product.
I don't care that with a longer cable, it requires higher quality cable parts. I want a Normal Speed HDMI cable or a HighSpeed HDMI cable.
I buy a certified product, not raw components to solder myself.
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
I used to work installing TVs and such, and I remember one time we installed a new system, and when we hooked up the DirecTV box with some super-fancy (and VERY expensive) HDMI cable, we got nothing. So we used the cable that came in the DirecTV box, and Voilá - worked perfectly! That pretty much told me all I needed to know about HDMI cables ...
I can visually see if my own HDMI cable is passing too close to the power adapter of my SqueezeBox when the signal is Full HD.
What kind of artifacts do you see?
By cable, I mean a finished product with soldered connectors at both ends.
Straight from HDMI.org (emphasis added) :
Standard HDMI Cable
The Standard HDMI cable is designed to handle most home applications, and is tested to reliably transmit 1080i or 720p video – the HD resolutions that are commonly associated with cable and satellite television, digital broadcast HD, and upscaling DVD players.
So, I bought a finish product that has been tested for reliability.
Now, you might buy raw cable that might be enough to build short cable or a long cable build from this BUT the end result does not bear the Standard HDMI Cable certification. And if it does and still fails to properly display your image : GET A REFUND for this deceptive product.
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
sorry, but i see a lot of people asking where DO you get cheap HDMI cables. Personally, I've used http://www.cablesforless.com/Default.aspx for several years. I just get the cheapest HDMI cables they offer and they've worked fine. I can tell no difference between them and the pair of ridiculously expensive cables I was conned into when i got my first HDMI TV and devices. As a side benefit, they have lots of other hard to find cables and connectors and can custom make cables to your specs.
anyway. it's a good place to start if you're looking to save money on cables.
When I went to return my Comcast cable equipment which I had had for at least a year I accidentally returned a different HDMI cable than the ones that they apparently included with the set, so they wanted to charge me $120. I laughed and asked them 'why do you want to charge me $120 for a cable that's not worth more than $20? and her response was "That's what we charge." I had to ask her, "if you are just out to scam people why not just ask for $750 per cable?" I then went home and and returned with about 8 "spare" HDMI cables that I had in a box and asked her to pick out the $120 one that was theirs because I had no idea. She then picked out one which was actually of lesser quality than that one I originally tried to give them. I still don't understand what was so important about that particular cable that made them feel justified in asking for $120.
Enjoy your shimmering RFI-induced distortion, feeb.
The gold plated connectors do make a difference, but only after many years. Gold is the least reactive of all metals, and resistant to corrosion. So, in 20, 30, 40 years from now, that cable will still make a solid connection. But of course the $5 cable can come with gold plated connectors too, and the big box stores overcharge by 1000% either way. I recommend Monoprice.com for cables.
IT'S A SCAM !!
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
For that price, I'd want individual Maxwell's demons, each having a certified pedigree tracing them back to James Maxwell, living in the wires and watching each conductor; each opening their gate only long enough to let the good signals come through.
John
The debate about how much a fraction of an ohm of resistance will degrade the "air" of your music is still open.
I seem to remember reading somewhere that "air" is a term for frequencies above 10 kHz. (It might have been something along the lines of this audio equalization guide.) All high-bandwidth digital signal transmission methods use error correction to reject noise, but less audible signal components (such as 10+ kHz) may not be as well protected by error correction as more perceptible components (such as 0-5 kHz). When error correction fails, you get "uncorrectable errors" that a higher protocol layer has to hide those somehow. Better connectors mean less noise will get into your digital signal, which means fewer uncorrectable errors. And the higher the bandwidth, the more accurate the cable's impedance has to be in order to work over long runs. Whether this affects the "air" depends on specific details of the transmission method.
Cause you buy a certified product.
HDMI certification does not care about the raw quality of the components required to build a cable. It just validates that the cable works.
So yes a longer cable requires better components. But as an end-product, it stays a Standard HDMI Cable or a HighSpeed HDMI cable.
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
You _will_ _not_ get a lower quality picture from a cheap HDMI picture. You will get no picture at all.
But can't the TV detect that it's getting no usable picture and request renegotiation down to a lower resolution (e.g. 1080p 3D to 1080p, or 1080p to 720p)? Or am I thinking of something else?
The difference is subtle - but definitely present!
You work at Best Buy, don't you?
With an analog signal, your claims would be sane. There's a whole continuum of picture quality using analog signals.
However, HDMI is digital. With digital, there is no subtle degradation. There's nothing subtle about not getting any picture.
And I thought audiophiles were annoying.
... they break. Then both the 0's and the 1's cannot get through. Result: no sound, no picture. I had a very cheap HDMI cable from a low end retailer which simply fell apart. The two piece silver colored plastic connector moldings broke, exposing all the wires and for a few, the very poor soldering work. This one broke within a month. A slightly better one if connected up once and left alone might well last for a few years.
The fact that this is digital changes how we consider reliability. It either works or it doesn't. If it doesn't work, you'll be able to tell immediately. But what you won't know is if it will fail later even though it works now. When you see it working fine now, it might be an excellent cable and work forever, or it might be a piece of junk close to failing. It might work fine if connected once, then break when pulled out and plugged back in a few times. And the connections might corrode over time from humidity, or lose contact over time due to temperature changes.
But £100 or even $100 for a fancy cable is just not worth it. Something 1/5th of that might be right. Something 1/25th of that might be junk but then, if/when it does break, you can buy another.
now we need to go OSS in diesel cars
For some uses, such as long runs, you really do need a better cable. For most, you don't.
There is no such thing as a "better cable". You have certified cable (made from better quality component for longer runs) and you have non certified or deceptive products.
Once a cable has passed the certification, ALL CABLES are the same regarding image quality.
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
You know what, you're absolutely right. With a higher quality cable, the ones are just so much more oney, and the zeroes are so much more zeroey. The difference really is quite amazing.
Some people say that as long as the peak of the signal wave is above the receiving equipment's sensitivity rating you're good, but I want that sine wave peak to be WAY above the required sensitivity level. I want it to be so god damn far above that I can see the ones hitting the back of the TV!
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
Thats nothing. How about £9,936 for a 2.5 meter HDMI cable! - http://goo.gl/VMECV - Now that is pushing the envelope to the maximum. Sadly there will always be idiots with too much money in their pockets who buy this stuff. Everyone should do Digital Electronics 101.
Well, I WOULD pay good money for a list of their customers' e-mail addresses.
I have some longer cheap cables and I have serious issues with the DRM failing. I get a picture, and it tells me I'm not allowed to play on this device or ... .A few of the wrong missed bits and you get epic fail. Technically speaking to meet the spec the cable should be tested to fall within specifications for signal delays and losses, but I have a gut feeling the quality control on my cheap cables is not the greatest. So while the short cables you can probably get away with crap, anything on the longer end might be worth getting something other than the cheapest.
Actually, this is Standard and not Normal. Sorry :)
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
Did you see the customer review? It's great: "Such good value, I bought two of them. One to use for my TV, one to tie the dog up to the gate when she is outside."
Too high a frequency? Then you need noise immunity and impedance matching with coax or twisted pair.
And the frequency of HDMI, especially at 1080p 3D, is pretty dang high. The theory is that the expensive cables will have more durable connectors and more precise impedance matching.
I like Ireland for things like this. Friend walked into a local Pc World and asked for a HDMI cable and the guy showed him the two types they had in stock. First one was too short. Second one was 80 Euro, he asked the guy why it was so expensive and he just said there was no difference between the two and he shouldn't buy it.
Just do what I do and run VGA cable from the computer to the TV.
How well does VGA work for long runs, such as running VGA cable from the room with the computer through the wall to the room with the TV?
The proper name for category 2 HDMI cables is indeed "high speed" not "high resolution" as the cable in and of itself does not have nor care about resolution. The added bandwidth could be and often is used for higher resolution, but is also used for 3D, higher refresh rates, or supplementary data like ethernet over HDMI.
Indeed HighSpeed is certified for 1080p (while most short Standard cable might work) and is required for 3D but it is NOT required for Ethernet since this is a independent feature. You can have Standard cable with or without Ethernet and HighSpeed cable with or without Ethernet.
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
OK, I RTFA and Kogan has opened up shop in the UK. I wondered why the prices were in pounds. They've been doing this in Australia for a while, mostly to score free publicity at the expense of JB and Harvey Norman.
it is FORBIDDEN to make reference to a HDMI version number for cables
I told the sales rep at Best buy that, that there was no connector difference between 1.3 and 1.4, the difference was in the features supported by the devices. But he persisted to argue that the more expensive cable was "1.4 compatible" while the cheaper one wasn't. He even carried on when I began loudly stating how much his argument made no sense, and why.
Of course, this was the same twit who tried to convince me that gold-plating the connector makes OPTICAL cables better. ;)
Magic doesn't work in my presence. My power of disbelief is too strong.
You need 19 of them since HDMI is using 19 connectors. And 20 for HDMI Ethernet Channel.
Sig (appended to the end of comments you post, 120 chars)
Never had that problem. Picture quality with Netflix from the computer is better than from the dvd player with composite video connection. It is only a short run of about 4 feet from the powered VGA splitter through the wall
Time to offend someone
Other posts have pretty much nailed up my thoughts save this. The general consensus here seems to be that the gold plated connectors are only useful or important after very lengthy periods of time or if you change things around a lot. I wanted to mention that there are other factors at play here that make gold plated connectors valuable to me (and presumably others). Humidity and other environmental factors play a big role on corrosion. I live in Florida, USA where we have a very warm and humid climate. Lots of "ocean air" as well. Exposed electrical connections can become corroded quickly and fail to work 100%; often after less than a year if I'm not using corrosion resistant materials. Typically this manifests its-self as things like the tv not getting HDCP synch when you turn the systems on etc. Sure, jiggling the cable might temporarily resolve this, and I could probably pull the cables and wash the ends in solution to clean them back off... OR I can buy cables with plated connectors and avoid the trouble.
Having said that, I buy gold plated hdmi cables on ebay for under $5 that work just fine. They're probably manufactured in China's "foxconn" sweatshops and contain deadly carcinogens in the plastic, but I don't handle the cables on any regular basis after installation. I don't have any young children chewing on them either.
As for the sparkle problem on lower quality cables. I've got a friend using a 50 foot (15 meter) hdmi cable he got on ebay for under $20 for his HD projection system. He's seen no sparkle problems even when specifically looking for them.
The scam is not the fact that there are different cables. The scam is the high prices being asked for the quality cables.
And that's the point. There may indeed be quality differences between the $3.99 cable and the $12.00 cable that are evident under certain conditions. But digital is digital and once you get the signal to noise ratio up and the bit error rate down below where the error correction can handle it, who cares? The $100 cables aren't going to buy me a better experience. Unless I want to watch American Idol through some serious EMP. And then I'm not sure my TV set is that well shielded.
Have gnu, will travel.
Just like vinyl records, you can cause damage to the tiny, delicate pits that hold the music. If you need to get to a future point, lift up the laser and carefully set it back down at the point you want to play. Be sure to use your anti-static brush.
The damage sound and image will be auto-corrected in the receiving end, and the user will be none the wiser.
So why exactly should the customer care if this is happening?
Because more major cable faults will result in frequent total loss of picture.
And what exactly are "high-quality signals"? One that provides the information required, or one that doesn't?
A "high-quality signal" is one that provides a margin of safety for the error correction to work properly. It's like the difference between four bars and one bar on a cell phone.
You're still repeating the marketing bollocks that manufacturers rely on to convince the customer that there are different degrees of quality to a digital signal. It either works, or it doesn't.
And you appear not to be aware that there are different degrees of failure in error correction of a digital signal.
I can visually see if my own HDMI cable is passing too close to the power adapter of my SqueezeBox when the signal is Full HD.
How? Do the light waves from your TV come out looking a bit squished?
Error correction isn't perfect. Small blocks of uncorrectable error may show up as small bars of picture noise, and large blocks of uncorrectable error will cause the picture to drop out frequently.
http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2002/11/25/
Category 2 is required for 3D. In 2D, it is required for insane resolutions or frequencies no consumer video source or display support.
I'm not entirely sure I understand what you mean by "consumer". Digital information is not "consumed" when it is viewed. If by "consumer" you mean "home user", there are plenty of computer displays larger than 1920x1080, such as the built-in monitor on some iMac computers.
To go with the fancy HDMI cables you surely need this $10,000 Ethernet cable, conveniently available at Amazon: http://www.amazon.com/Denon-AKDL1-Dedicated-Link-Cable/dp/B000I1X6PM
Directly from HDMI.org : http://www.hdmi.org/manufacturer/hdmi_1_4/finding_right_cable.aspx http://www.hdmi.org/manufacturer/trademark_logo_pub.aspx
Since 1.4, there are only 5 differentes cables and correctly labelling them is REQUIRED by HDMI (there is a grace period until the end of 2011).
It's simple : 2 speeds (Normal or HighSpeed) and a feature (with or without Ethernet). Basically, Normal supports up to 1080i and HighSpeed supports above.
The last category is about automative cabling so we can forget about it.
At last, it is FORBIDDEN to make reference to a HDMI version number for cables ("upgrade your 1.3 cables to 1.4" : those are the same - except for Ethernet but your pre-1.4 devices did not support it).
There's a difference, though, between specs and build quality. You can get a cable made in China for $1 if you don't care about build quality. While it may meet the HDMI specs, its durability and life span could be questionable. You don't want a cable whose end connector comes off the first time you unplug it or corrodes over time.
That said, there's a price point where all you are paying for is hype - an at the consumer end of the spectrum I'd guess it somewhere around the $10 - 20 dollar range (depending on length). For a professional setup where the cable cost is less important than absolute repeatable performance it may be more simply do to the QA requirements to ensure the cable works as needed.
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
Uhhh, so, the cable needs to have gold connectors while the plug you are connecting it to does not :-/
Why in gods name are you running >50 foot HDMI runs.
Signal source in one room, display in another. Some Slashdot users seem to think that's the best way to run a home theater PC.
That way, you aren't subjected to the godawful din made by the cooling fans, let alone the whine from spinning disks.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
Generally when it comes to cameras the one that costs more does take better pictures, even if it does so at a lower MP. Megapixels are a fairly useless indicator of picture quality, I've seen 5MP cameras outperform cheap 12MP cameras that produce nasty, grainy photos, and if a sales rep tried to sell me on "More MP must be better" line I'd quickly walk away. Cables, on the other hand, once you've risen above the russian roulette price range, are a prime example where paying over the odds gives you a vastly diminishing ROI.
It wouldn't surprise me if Monster cable sued them for it. They have sued people before for far less.
I'd pay more for their home addresses :)
Those who can, do. Those who cannot, sue.
When I bought my 3D TV I 'could' have purchase the in-store 1.4a HDMI cables for around $300. These in-store cables would have come in a simple plastic bag with no indication other the sales person word that they where 1.4a HDMI cables. But they where cheaper the in-store MONSTER cables (priced at $330).
I decided to buy on-line from a retailer that is recognized and certified (and confirmed) from HDMI.org. My 1.4a HDMI cables on-line came with certificate (from HDMI) that indicated they where tested and preformed or exceed the 1.4a standards. My price $40 (including shipping). The $40 cables works great.
Monoprice provides very well made cables, at cheap prices. That is my objection to things like Radioshack cables. I too have found that as the years pass, they have problems (their insulation tends to be crap). You don't need to deal with that, just get cheap cables from Monoprice (or Tartan) and they do a good job and are well built.
I bought a 15 dollar cable at Micro Center. It didn't work very well. This isn't because of the conductivity of the metal, it just had poorly manufactured connections, I think. Because it worked sometimes, I thought there was a laptop -> tv issue for a while. I would have saved a bit of grief with a better quality cable.
That's not to say the cables are not over priced. I think my CHEAP cable was still over priced. So long as the retail in the story is selling a quality cable, good! It really is a scam.
Its a digital signal.
At the physical layer, nothing is digital; all is current and voltage. The signal from one computing device to another is an analog signal created by a modulation process, and "digital" is an abstraction of this.
It works or it doesn't.
By "it doesn't", I assume you refer to uncorrectable errors. There are two kinds of uncorrectable errors: those weak enough to be localized and those strong enough to cause loss of synchronization. Some displays will allow some signal degradation before they cut the link; they attempt to piece together a semi-usable signal before blanking the screen.
Also, there are specifications for HDMI that cables must match.
There are "standard" (720p and 1080i) and high-speed (1080p and 1080p 3D) HDMI cables. Some cables certified for "standard" use may kinda-sorta work for the higher frequencies used by 1080p, and I guess this is where people run into problems.
It is easy to notice when you have a problem. However you are right, problems can and do happen. For short runs, as most people have in their setups, no there really isn't an issue. A 28AWG cable is all you need and there is nothing that will cause any problems. However for longer runs, you have to start dealing with signal issues. You can deal with them by getting cables with thicker wire, tighter tolerances (Belden makes cables sold through Bluejeans that have more bandwidth at a given AWG due to tighter tolerances), active EQs, repeaters, or in the case of really long runs, converting to fibre.
So for runs of say, 10 feet or less, a cable is a cable is a cable at current resolutions. As you start to exceed that, you start to have the potential for signal issues. If you will depends on a lot of things. However, if you are doing something like say an in wall installation, where your gear will be up front running back to a projector or something, it pays to get some thicker cable. Would suck to get everything done, only to find out that indeed there are issues.
You buy something expensive there, they try to sell you over-priced accessories on the spot considering you likely want to run straight home and use it, not stopping anywhere else.
The more valuable the main purchase item is, the more they can jack up the accessory price. $200 TV, maybe they'll "find" a $30 cable for you. $2,000 TV, the cable just went to $300. Too bad they're the same cable.
... they break. Then both the 0's and the 1's cannot get through. Result: no sound, no picture. Just because they charge more for it doesn't mean the build quality is better.
My 5298p display is truer and has more dynamic presence, because I go the extra step and hang magic rocks from my wooden knobs. Amateur.
Eschewing all modern technology, and dictated this post to someone correct? Because ALL companies lie about their products. I remember when Intel said their Pentium 3 made the web better. Every brand of AC I looked at talked about the amazing exclusive features of their compressor, the same Copeland compressor they all use. Apple used to claim they sold "super computers". My air filter says it's large blue indicator light is a "mood light" and that it "helps set a calm, soothing ambiance."
It is called marketing. In the case of Denon, the reason for the cable is because of audiophiles. Their Denon link connector works just fine over any Cat-5 cable. It was designed to do lossless multi-channel audio before HDMI came about. However audiophiles complained, I mean how can you have good sound over those nasty computer cables? So Denon obliged and made a cable to suck money out of their pockets.
At any rate if you get all whiny because someone oversells their product you'll find precious little you can actually use.
You should just be pragmatic about it, and do a little research. Like my air purifier. I don't believe anything about it's "mood light" which is really just a large indicator I turn off. However that bit of marketing silliness doesn't mean that it indeed doesn't do a good job filtering air, which is what it was purchased for.
A simple example would be a projector. So let's say at home you want a projector in the back, like in the theaters for a big screen. Cool, you can have those they sell many of them. However you want to keep your gear up front so you can get at it, see the indicators, and use your remote pointing it forward at normal. Also, you don't want a big ole' cable running across the carpet, you want it inside the wall, across the top of the ceiling, and so on. Easy to have a long run for that. Were I to do it in my house, I'd have about a 60' run. It would only be like 20' from the gear to the projector but it'd have to run up one wall to a high ceiling and down another.
Same shit for installations in offices. We are putting a new projector in a computer lab at work, and it has HDMI. While the video switcher and all that is analogue (5 coax cable RGBHV) and that'll remain, we want to bring back the HDMI feed for newer systems that deal with that better. That is going to be 70-90 feet, I haven't measured. It needs to go across the ceiling, down the wall, under the false floor, and up to the desk where laptops are set.
So long as there is a sucker born every minute there will be someone to buy an HDMI cable for a hundred bucks.
But the expensive power shit is still BS. An extremely high end shunt mode surge protector is like $100 from Tripplite. A series mode protector is like $200 form Zero Surge. These are high end, overkill, units and they are still cheaper than the Monster crap BB tires to sell.
I agree that a surge suppressor is a good idea to have. However realistically a cheap $30 one will work fine. Just something to clamp down on large spikes. This is particularly true with most modern electronics that have active PFC switching power supplies. They tend to be rather voltage agnostic and will work on anywhere from like 90-260 volts. That means a small increase in voltage is nothing to them, hell they work more efficiently. You get a cheap surge suppressor and you are fine. If you are worried, you order a really high end one from Amazon or something. You don't waste money at Best Buy.
Power conditioning power strips are worth while for the protection against over and under voltages
Ah yes. Fix the major electrical hazard with a cheap gadget. Good show.
or
Wow, a p o w e r c o n d i t i o n e r, so that's like something to make the power all smooth a nicelike right? Wow man, why didn't I think of that. Hey, what if we took that conditioner and stuck it on the side of the house where the power comes in? Then like all the power in the house would be nice and smooth dude. Ya get it? We have GOT to get together on this man. BIG IDEA. We can sell this to everyone. We're going to be rich!!!
Pfft. Magic rocks? Way too inorganic for me. I just slather mine with mink oil for that organic experience.
No - this does.
Retail stores have a higher overhead than online shops. You pay for that. While "double" sounds like a lot consider the item is cheap. Think more like "$3 for convenience." Just about anything Target will sell me, Amazon will sell me for at least a little less. What I pay for with Target is the convenience that I can have it now. For example if I wanted a new wireless router, say a Linksys E3200, Amazon would sell it to me for $132 with free shipping. I'd get it in a week or so. Target would sell it to me for $140, and I'd have to pay sales tax. However I could have it in 20 minutes, and that is just because it would take me that long to get to the store.
Also consider things tend to be more expensive in Europe for various reasons.
Its sad that people are stupid enough to fall for scams like this. Its just the same with every other cable for AV and Hifi. If it has a sane amount of copper and a gauge that makes the resistance within tolerances its totally impossible to measure any differances at all.
I find speaker cables the most funny since people can spend a fortune on them totally oblivious of the 30+ feet of spiderweb thin industry standard copper wire in the speaker elements.
that monoprice charges sales tax (for us that's guilty of living in California) on shipping fee too.
ELOI, ELOI, LAMA SABACHTHANI!?
Perhaps, but only fools would go to Best Buy looking for a high-end camera.
BB employees are trained to become used car salesmen after they graduate from BB.
ELOI, ELOI, LAMA SABACHTHANI!?
or bent.
Funny thing is that making a high-frequency cable with specific characteristics (e.g., impedance, cross-talk, etc) is fairly easy. Making one that mantains the same characteristics also throughout its lifetime when bent, mishandled, etc, that's difficult. This is especially true with HF measurement equipment cables (thousands of dollars per meter of cable), but it may be becoming relevant also for consumer equipment (e.g., thunderbolt).
The Best Buy salesman probably isn't lying, or even entirely incorrect, he most likely just doesn't know why. Mega-pixels are purely a measurement of resolution, it tells you how many pixels make up the photo you just took, nothing more, nothing less. A more expensive camera will (generally) have a higher quality lens that gives better focus, sharper image quality (not the pixels themselves, they're digital... the reproduction of a real, analog, event that the photo depicts), better (optical!) zoom, better color receptors, better low-light operation, etc.
Frankly, megapixel inflation is a scam. It increases both the cost of the camera AND the file size of the photos, often with little or no benefit to the user. Once we hit about 8mp, it stopped mattering for the majority of people, who just post pictures on Facebook or make 4x6 prints and maybe run out an 8x10 print once in a blue moon and never really show their work beyond friends and family. At the sizes most people interact with photos, any more than that is going to be invisible, even with cropping.
For a casual, amateur user, you probably are better off paying a bit extra and getting a low-medium end Canon/Nikon/Sony/insert-your-own-favorite-here, but not going crazy and getting a D-SLR or some-such extravagance. 10mp is generally more than enough, and spare yourself the gimmicky bells and whistles...do you really need the camera to detect when you smile, rather than just setting a timer?
I do put in one caveat: bird-watchers and enthusiastic sport-parents may want to splurge on the high-zoom models. 100x optical zoom is practically useless for kids' birthday parties, but if you want to see the sweat on Jimmy's face when he rounds 3rd, or capture the plumage details on that Appalachian Horn-Blower (I have no idea if that's a real bird), it might come in handy. You also should consider a tripod, or at least a monopod, because at that level of zoom you will definitely need it.
I used to sell cameras non-commission and run a low-end photo-printing studio in a big-box. My thought was that I wanted them to come back and get prints, since only the lab sales were actually relevant to my hours or pay, but the only way I could get them to do so was if they were actually happy with the sales service. Admittedly, I also did a tidy business in extended warranties, though I wasn't very pushy about them and ours were less bad than most of the competition (about 50% or less of the price, identical service and coverage through the same 3rd party vendor). The lab sales increased a bit, too.
Try not to take me more seriously than I take myself.
It's funny that we've had optical audio for such a long time now, but video? We're still using copper.
I remember a similar discussion about Minidiscs (the now-obsolete Sony recordable disc format). Music was obviously stored as digital data, but some brands marketed their much more expensive minidiscs as having 'superior sound' etc.
Bleeding may be due to lower bandwith on one of the s-video components. So here the problem was likely not how good the Monster cable was, but how bad the competing cable was. If it was brand new, it shouldn't have been rated for s-video operation at all. Analog video cables are working at around 10 MHz frequency (order of magnitude). If your cable is bad/long/both, cable quality will affect the image.
Same thing goes for HDMI cables. If they are rated for HDMI, they should work now and forever (when treated according to specifications). If they don't, they shouldn't be sold as HDMI cables. If some cables are able to withstand rough field conditions, they should be specified and sold as such. If they are going to sit still behind your flat screen, at ambient temperature, with 5 plug/unplug cycles during their lifetime, any cable will do.
Of course, all of the above doesn't apply to audiophiles stuff, since what matters for them is below 200 kHz and any cable of almost any length will equally do. (Please note, I really meant 200 kHz, not 20 kHz. Reason for that, on another post maybe...)
Comment removed based on user account deletion
The conclusion of that link is that it only 'depends' for lengths greater than 10m and for formats for which media doesn't exist yet. You're stretching the "it depends" clause there. Since Kogan does not appear to be selling cable for "in-wall" placement or for video players from the future. i.e. the context is restricted Not to mention that buying for today and upgrading tomorrow may well still be the best bet.
myth; it's digital, it either works or it doesnt. no. interference can give you an intermittent problem of pitcture/no picture. Distance and environment come into play here. I see some commenters taking about heat, and the connections, etc... i have yet to see a cheap hdmi cable with shoddy connections. Heat? sorry, how long do you want a cable to last? At $4 buy another one in a few years. Or spend more on a longer or shielded cable.
If you are seeing total loss of picture, or even uncorrected errors, then that is "not working".
It appears we are running into a definition conflict. Then let me try to reword my point under your definitions: In products intended for home entertainment, there exists a state of "not working yet acceptable". A better cable will reduce the chance that the signal will degrade from working to "not working yet acceptable" or from "not working yet acceptable" to unusable.
While I agree that claiming a better picture from more expensive HDMI cables is just empty sales-talk, there is a valid point which is often/always overlooked in the HDMI debate: You *can* make a better digital cable. Just look at the different grades of network cables (CAT5, CAT6, etc). So there is a very real reason to make better HDMI cables - they will work over longer distances.
I'm not sure that higher price equals better quality, but no matter what, there is such a thing as a "good" and a "bad" HDMI cable. And since none of us really have any idea of the characteristics of the different cables being discussed here, we can't judge whether the cheap ones are as good as the expensive ones. They may very well be, but it isn't a god-given truth, that only simple, non-technical people would doubt.
There are many. many good reasons to laugh at the pricing of many HDMI-cables and the outrageous claims about what they will do, but I feel that a few more nuances in the debate would suit it.
as if it is a bad thing. I for one welcome being able to browse among the TVs to find one I like and then to buy it at the biggest discount possible right there and then because the retailer plans to make up the margin by selling cables. It's not as if the cables are a mandatory part of the deal, you can always order them online or buy them at a different store.
Nullius in verba
Monster cable for years was selling some super expensive speaker cables. Granted they were 'low oxygen' litz wire type cable, nice and flexible even though they were #12 gauge. The hype was that that kind of wire would have super high frequency performance and low loss. Litz wire does reduce the skin effect that is seen at high frequencies, but you can't begin to detect that until you reach the HF RF region. I don't think you can begin to measure skin effect losses at AUDIO frequency. What's important for speaker cables (especially with 4 ohm speakers) is that the resistance / foot be low. So when it came time for a friend of mine to wire up his home theater system he went to look at the available speaker cables, and then decided for the price to go to the Home Depot and bought a large roll of #12-2 Romex cable! It sounded just great BTW.
serifs will fsck your stuff up.
Yeah, they were really great... At removing skin from the unfortunate hands that had just succeeded in breaking the molecular level bonds of the joint, banging off all available sharp edges inside a computer case, and occasionally yanking free the other end of the the wires from whatever component you will now also be replacing.
From what I understand, the Jaws of LIfe company was prototyping a hydraulically powered unit for separating molex connectors right before they were eclipsed by SATA.
Molex: from the root word molars. Specifically, wisdom teeth.
I have a 30' HDMI cable fished through my wall and crawlspace from my basement to my TV. My receiver said I needed to use 'High-Speed' cables and I was like BS! However, I was plagued by black screen and intermittent video for weeks. I finally purchased a 'High-Speed with Ethernet' cable and have not seen the problem since. Granted, I still got the first 30' for $12 and the second for $20 on E-Bay so I am not paying those crazy prices. When running over long distances through a distribution device such as a receiver it seems to me that there is some merit to the high-speed claim.
Those noise bars are clearly obvious, and picture drop-outs would noticed by a two year-old. If that happens, the cable you bought is faulty and should be taken back for a refund.
Numerous connections and disconnections weaken the connector, causing noise bars to show up eventually after the user has repeatedly plugged and unplugged a cable box, PS3, Xbox 360, and laptop PC in order to use them with fewer than four inputs on the TV. By that time, the return window has expired. So how is an end user supposed to tell the difference between a cable that's more expensive because it's more durable and a cable that's more expensive because it has "moonshine magic"?
I prefer to offer customers a 'variety' of bridges. 'Each of my bridges offers excellent quality and value for money, and by providing my customers with a range of different bridges which offer different specifications, I are able to help them find one to suit their specific needs, with features such as different spans, ultra slim and high speed'
I wonder if they train people to be this ignorant? Or could places that sell cables for this price just attract people who buy into the BS?
You were arguing with someone who has a financial interest in selling the more expensive cable. You wasted your time even discussing it with him. He may or may not have believed what he said but you certainly weren't going to convince him of anything.
I actually have some admittedly juvenile fun sometimes with these clowns when they try to sell me an overpriced cable. I run a company that manufactures data cables. We make cables like these and harnesses that are much more complicated. I like to let them spew for a bit and then ask them very sweetly "what do I do for a living?" Of course they have no idea. I ask them if they have an engineering degree. Invariably they do not. At that point I let them know that I both make these cables and have an engineering degree. I then point out that until they know something about the person to whom they are lecturing, they probably should keep their mouth shut lest they reveal they have no idea what they are talking about.
Never had that problem.
I HAVE had problems with VGA signal quality into HDTVs but i'm pretty sure it was down to lousy receive circuitry in the TV and/or lousy cables, not any fundamental problem with VGA.
Having said that I've also had problems with digital hookups to HDTVs. Some HDTVs seem to be able to take a digital signal at their supposed native resoloution and blur it such that using a computer with them is highly unpleasant.
If all you are doing is watching TV then quality is far less noticeable because TV content doesn't tend to contain important lines that are only a handful of pixels wide in the first place.
Picture quality with Netflix from the computer is better than from the dvd player with composite video connection.
Well yeah. In general HDMI/DVI (digital) is better than component/VGA (analogue with separate lines for each colour component and support for progressive scan and HD) which are better than RGB scart (analogue with separate lines for each colour component but no support for progressive scan or HD) which is better than S-video (analogue with luminance and chrominance signals) which is better than composite (everything combined into one analogue signal).
Exactly how much the difference is in a particular case will depend heavily on the quality of implementation.
note: i'm known as plugwash most places but i screwd up registering that here somehow in the past and now can't register
The other problem with cheap cables is the radio frequency interference they transmit. A good cable doesn't transmit interference. That can matter if the interference happens to be at the same frequency as any broadcast you might want to listen too, or if there are EMT's at your house because you fell down and can't get up, or some other reason. That said, an expensive cable doesn't guarantee a good RF design, and a cheap cable doesn't guarantee a bad one. My favorite HDMI cable that doesn't broadcast interference cost me about $10.
And this is why I read /.
I find out new stuff every day. I am not a big A/V person (I like watching movies and just want reasonable quality from across the living room), so the fine details of the different connections is something that I didn't know much about.
Time to offend someone
"I bought 4 of these to tie my girlfriend up to the rack in our dungeon. Just the thought of how much money I spent on these things took our playtime to a new level. It truly is a mind blowing experience knowing you've got almost $60,000.00 worth of Oxygen Free Copper wrapped around your limbs. "
Those who can, do. Those who cannot, sue.
Where to begin ...
its not always what you think.
one 'guy' that moves things around is heat. heating and a/c and humidity in the house. cables expand and contract and fit (and don't fit!) the connectors and this slow bounce, if you will, causes things to lose connectivity, even if just 1 wire in a bundle. seen it plenty of times.
Umm, the kind of temperature differentials that would need to occur to make this concern valid do not happen in the developed world, unless we're talking about something in NEMA cabinets out on the lone prairie in northern New Mexico.
multi conductor cables are a NIGHTMARE (which is why I hate the hdmi designers. what a bunch of losers! 2 opto cables would have done it better but NOOOO they had to have multiple metal-to-metal's and lots of wire and twists and interference. idiots!!! please, if you currently have an hdmi designer in your employ, fire him now. fire him. now.)
What? Copper is way cheaper than optical cable and is a heck of a lot more consumer friendly. You know how many people I see treat cable like rope or string?!?! Shouldn't do that with copper, can't do that with optical fiber. So, no, optical not practical given the behavior of the current consumer.
hdmi cables are not even locking cables. (same with older sata cables; dont' get me started on THAT nightmare we call a cable ...). hdmi cables fall out of alignment since the connector is VERY cheap and so are the cable males. cheap and cheap are not a good way to ensure success.
look at older db9, db25 style connectors. those things were strong enough to lift a house! ;) THOSE were connectors made by visionary men. keyed, robust, cheap to make and they never fell out on their own. compare to hdmi and you'll see the night/day diff in how cables used to be designed vs how they are designed today.
Just a guess here, but you weren't alive in the 1960s and 1970s were you? When this stuff was new personal computers were made out of what we geeks had lying around. In this case, a lot of CB and Amateur Radio equipment that already used a lot of these big beefy connectors. The DB-x style connectors came from the telco guys, mostly, and used to cobble together protocols like Parallel and Serial Ports so their new fangled gadgets could talk to other input or output devices.
My point? A lot of these connectors were horribly over-engineered for their current purpose. Also, digital (and analog) signaling was no where near as efficient and clean as it is today. Have you looked at a motherboard from 1980s PCs? Some gigantic circuitry on that baby. Caps bigger than your pinky on the motherboard, and not for power! So, yeah, things were beefier back then. You want something built like that for today, go for it. Cost a gazillion (that's a lot) Euros/Dollars/Pounds/Yen, put out as much heat as a jet engine, but you'll be able to play the latest FPS at 120 fps.
Just because it's small and doesn't require a lot of expensive parts doesn't make it any less effective at its purpose.
sometimes you have to re-flex the cables or pre-strain them before you install them. the flex of the cable is not enough compared to the stiffness of the so-called strain relief they use. again, as an analogy, look at an ide cable and how well it stays in (even if you hang the drive UP by it!) vs a sata cable. compare the molex power cables of yesterday to the sata power cables of today. all steps backwards!
I really hate the backwards move in cable design and quality. its like they are TRYING to make things bad on purpose, refusing to use what worked well in the past - out of spite?
More nonsense. Yes, cables become tense and like to stay in one position if stored or maintained in that position for any length of time. What part of "there's metal in there" doesn't make sense? It's not rope. It's not string. And, it's not single conductor wire.
I'm leaving the backwards thing alone. Too much irony.
s/ looking for a high-end camera//
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
Digital transmission do not normally produce subtle effects. The border between no effect and a drastic effect is very tight. You are almost certainly fooling yourself. Get somebody to set up a "blind" test with the HDMI cable (out of sight) close to or far from your power adapter and chances are that you won't be able to reliably tell the difference.
Fun thing to do at Best Buy:
Go find some electronic device you might possibly want to buy. Attempt to purchase it.
When they assert that it fails all the time, or that their grandmother bought something like that (This is actually a script of theirs), and it broke, and you should buy an extended warranty...
I've always wanted to do this. Sadly for this plan, I refuse to set foot in Best Buy ever since we gained a Frys.
However you might enjoy it. Next time you're getting a DVD, grab an iPod or something. They will start making up shit at the checkout to get you to buy an extended warranty, and it's fun to act outraged or confused by this fact. (And if they don't, somehow, either don't buy it anyway, or just return it unopened. But they will.)
If the Best Buy was closer, I'd probably wander around in there doing this anyway and/or correcting sales people until they barred me from the store.
If corporations are people, aren't stockholders guilty of slavery?
You can even buy ultra-expensive power cables for AV equipment. Apparently there are actually people willing to believe that three feet of ultra-high quality power cable outside the wall can make a difference when connected to 50-odd feet of dirt cheap electrical wiring inside the walls. And they'll swear up and down that they can hear the difference.
... what self respecting (and indeed, competent) engineer would work at Best Buy? In fact, I don't think Best Buy pays enough for ANY engineer to be employed there.
ELOI, ELOI, LAMA SABACHTHANI!?
How do we get 5 cables out of 2 speeds times 2 configurations (with or without ethernet)? Following the link points out an Automotive class that likely won't be relevant, but your post managed to start out unclear...
You guys are ignoring the genius of KOGAN.
The way Kogan is offering this is by asking customers to send Kogan the receipt of their TV purchases.
Just think of how much data it will provide them.
The retailer in question is JB Hi-Fi, and with this scheme, Kogan is getting priceless data at a very little cost.
What kind of data are we talking about?
1.The price the TVs were sold at (Was the customer given special discount? Was the tag price "Make us an offer"? How big was the discount?)
2.The Accessories that are accompanying the TV (Discounted? Thrown in for free? What kind of Accessories are customers most likely to fall for?)
3.The market JB Hi-Fi is attracting, and their tendencies (Price conscious, but how far will they go for free stuff?)
I've been using RCA cables since the 80s, and the gold ones I bought back then were the only ones that survived until today.
Actually, the scam is when they try to tell you that HDMI exists for the consumer's benefit.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Fancy cables are not worth a pinch of coonshit.
Our dollar store sells them for 2 dollars. They also sell other cables such as Cat 5, in 50 foot lengths (15 meters) for about $7.00.
People used to by Pet Rocks and still do buy "Monster Cable (the analogue stereo version)", same principal ... Idiots have money!!
The wild rock rock we caught in the driveway worked very well for keeping an eye on the cabin my buddies and I rented for the winter at a nearby ski resort back in the 70's. Didn't cost us a dime!!
I have a box full of $5 HDMI cables for using with devices where routing the cable is easy enough.
I do on the other hand buy $10-$15 when I need something in either another color or when I'd prefer to have a softer cable that is easier to bend.
The fact is... the emperor has cloths. It's just that there is a clear difference between charging an extra $10 for a nicer cable and charging $90 for a similarly nicer cable but under false pretenses.
I'm a huge fan of someone providing DC power over a speaker cable and digital audio via a sub-band carrier on the same cable. When someone sorts that out... then monster is completely screwed. But until then, companies like monster do make nice cables for carrying analog audio signals over distances.
What kind of artifacts do you see?
No "artifacts" really.
... something like "HDCP failure: check source".
If its a DRM protected source, the TV will sometimes stop showing the picture, and throw me an error about the content DRM being broken. Can't remember the exact message
If the source is not content protected, or if the signal noise is not heavy, the picture will sometimes freeze for half a second, making it look like I am watching the movie on a PC that has trouble decoding the picture. On rare occasions the picture may "blink" with an all white color for a split second, then resume the playback.
- Jesper
My security clearance is so high I have to kill myself if I remember I have it...
You work at Best Buy, don't you?
Haha ... not quite. I work with OLAP cubes in the ERP workspace.
With an analog signal, your claims would be sane. There's a whole continuum of picture quality using analog signals. However, HDMI is digital. With digital, there is no subtle degradation. There's nothing subtle about not getting any picture.
Allow me to copy a reply from a post to another /.er (who was more polite than you btw - I really don't understand what you need the bad vibes for?)
... something like "HDCP failure: check source".
If its a DRM protected source, the TV will sometimes stop showing the picture, and throw me an error about the content DRM being broken. Can't remember the exact message
If the source is not content protected, or if the signal noise is not heavy, the picture will sometimes freeze for half a second, making it look like I am watching the movie on a PC that has trouble decoding the picture. On rare occasions the picture may "blink" with an all white color for a split second, then resume the playback.
Picture never stops completely. It is always just for half a second or less. But if that happens every 3-4 minutes while you're watching a movie, it becomes a pain. And if I rearrange the cables and ensure the HDMI cable is not anywhere near the external power adapters, the problem disappears. It's a cheap cable, and I have no idea if an expensive shielded cable would be better. But moving it away from the adapters has been sufficient, so I haven't bothered getting a new one. My new TV also seems less sensitive than the old one (I switched from an old Samsung Series 7 to a new Series 8 C).
And I thought audiophiles were annoying.
Yeah. I hear you. And the whiners at /. who spread their negative karma without so much as considering whether the guy at the other end MIGHT be an intelligent human being, but just start ranting and accusing you of being employed at Best Buy, are even worse. Don't you just hate it when that happens???
- Jesper
My security clearance is so high I have to kill myself if I remember I have it...
While I like your humor, you're totally off base here.
As with any other digital signal, a HDMI stream may be interrupted. No different from the noise you see in an Ethernet network if its wired with cheap, unshielded CAT 5 cables running right next to power cables. Why do you think the guys making the physical cabling do extensive testing with specialised tools?
A digital transfer is based on a network protocol sending packets in one form or another. If packets become corrupted or even missing, the protocol will have fallback procedures, like resending the package or skipping it.
What on earth makes you think HDMI is any different? Do you think the sending devices just throws a whole bunch of ones and zeroes into a cable, and the receiving device magically just knows what the hell to do with that stream? Or do you think someone actually made a ton of work on standards, handshakes, packet flow control, states, key exchange, key validation, hashing, and error correction?
- Jesper
My security clearance is so high I have to kill myself if I remember I have it...
s/ looking for a high-end camera//
Around where I live, Best Buy is about the only game in town when it comes to A/V equipment and computers, since all the computer stores closed down. I don't mind ordering online for computers, but for most A/V equipment I want to see it and hear it before I buy it.
Thanks for agreeing with me. Because the designers did their job with error correction and protocol definitions, the system takes care of transient conditions by itself. The point is that if you're getting a signal that isn't blinking in and out, you're done. In a digital universe, there is no difference between -8dB and -80dB if your receiving equipment is sensitive to -100dB. Yes, if you introduce a massive amount of noise to the environment, there will be a difference, but you might want to just not point the microwave you are operating with an open door at your home theater instead.
Throwing a stupidly expensive cable at it is a massive waste of money if you're already getting good signal through a cheap cable, which 95% of everybody will have no problem with. The receiving equipment doesn't give a shit as long as the signal is there, and the encoded data will not be somehow improved by the increased SnR of the digital link over what is necessary to actually transmit in the first place - which is what these bullshit cable manufacturers claim with their "bass doesn't sound reedy and thin" or "reds are much truer with this $120 cable" horseshit.
Slashdot still doesnâ(TM)t support Unicode after it was added to the HTML standard in 1997.
Throwing a stupidly expensive cable at it is a massive waste of money if you're already getting good signal through a cheap cable
Well, as you perhaps missed in my original post before you went ahead and made jokes, not getting a good signal was my precise example...?
:-) If, for example, the signal is -100dB in a -8 to -80 dB setting, there would be no data loss at all. Hence no error correction. I explained a scenario where noise is introduced - quite possibly by an iron core entangled in copper wire and connected to a 240 V mains supply (eg. power adapter for a Squeezebox Duet). A totally different setting, where my point was that a proper shielded quality cable might fare better than my cheap-ass 8 USD cable. Your productive and intelligent comments on that topic are most welcome.
:-)
I agree with you in principle, that 120 USD cables are a load of BS, but what does that have to do with my post? I never defended such cables. I simply stated that saying there is NO difference is plain wrong, and I gave a real-life example to support that claim.
Your point seems to be that as long as the signal is within specifications, the data throughput will be at 100%. You have repeated that view once again - which is great, as I totally agree. But that was not the case I described. In my case there is clearly a noise/data loss issue which results in loss of data. The viewable result on my Samsung Series 8 screen is a few lost frames every 2-3 minutes, white blinks on rare occasions (perhaps 2-3 times an hour), and errors when negotiating DRM handshake information between devices (typically a PS3 playing BD media).
So clearly the data transmitted through a HDMI cable can not be rated as either 0% or 100% throughput as you are arguing. If that were the case there would be no point in implementing error correction etc. in the transfer protocols, because there would be a guarantee that all transmitted data was always received flawlessly. And in case of failure it would be like flipping a switch, and everything would just go dark - which again is not the case.
I fail to understand what exactly it is you are trying to say?
- Jesper
My security clearance is so high I have to kill myself if I remember I have it...
I recently bought my dad an Apple TV for father's day and forgot to pick up an HDMI cable for it, so I can to Best Buy and the cheapest HDMI cable they had in the entire store was $40. I understand you pay more at brick and mortars, but compare this to newegg where you can get the same thing for $4, and you see that this 1000% markup is a bit excessive.