HDMI Cables

Rob.Marsh

Rob.Marsh

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Morning all!

I am looking at getting a load of HDMI cables to sort out my Home system properly. Also to utilise my HMDI out on my laptop so that I can use my 32" Samsung to use for editing etc.

I have been looking around, and Cable Universe seem to come up the cheapest by far. However, they do a number of different quality cables, increasing in price as the up in quality.

Will I notice the difference between a basic bottem level cable vs a mid range or even high end cable?

Rob
 
in a word no you wont, cables are pritty much cables.
and with HDMI its a HD signal so its the best quality that you are getting anyway
 
yeah gold connectors don't really matter either, it's a digital signal, it either gets there or it doesn't :)
 
Cheers chaps,

That pretty much enforced what I thought. Bog standard it is then. £2.92 for a 1.8M cable!!
 
This is not strictly true, even the digital signal will deteriote over a distance, so cheaper cables will be fine for under 3m, but anything over that you will be best looking at better quality cables.

Zavvi are selling there 2m cables for £3.99 (usually £10), and they are not too bad at all.

Check out this forum for all you need to know, this question has been asked loads on here.

http://www.avforums.com/forums/hdmi-cables-switches/
 
Do you buy high end IDE or SATA cables? Or £50 USB cables or £100 DVI cables? noooo, you get one that works. Same for HDMI.
 
PD_BARBS said:
This is not strictly true, even the digital signal will deteriote over a distance, so cheaper cables will be fine for under 3m, but anything over that you will be best looking at better quality cables.

Zavvi are selling there 2m cables for £3.99 (usually £10), and they are not too bad at all.

Check out this forum for all you need to know, this question has been asked loads on here.

http://www.avforums.com/forums/hdmi-cables-switches/
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Either the signal gets there or it doesn't.

Expensive cables are a con.
 
PD_BARBS said:
This is not strictly true, even the digital signal will deteriote over a distance, so cheaper cables will be fine for under 3m, but anything over that you will be best looking at better quality cables.

Zavvi are selling there 2m cables for £3.99 (usually £10), and they are not too bad at all.

Check out this forum for all you need to know, this question has been asked loads on here.

http://www.avforums.com/forums/hdmi-cables-switches/
Click to expand...

Mattfeliks said:
Either the signal gets there or it doesn't.

Expensive cables are a con.
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I must admit I understood noise and degredation of signal to be an analogue issue.

I'm looking at a distance of barely a meter so I think I'll spend cheap and see what happens. Its its a case of a better cable is needed after, I'm only £3 down.
 
Lol, I edited out my inflammatory tone but you got there first :)

You'll be fine with a cheap one - if it doesn't' work you can always take it back :shrug:
 
Mattfeliks said:
Lol, I edited out my inflammatory tone but you got there first :)

You'll be fine with a cheap one - if it doesn't' work you can always take it back :shrug:
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Better? Lol

Exactly, Cheers for all your help peeps!
 
Are you using 1080p, if so you need to be aware that not all cables are rated as being 1080p compliant (1080p is approximately twice the data rate of 720p or 1080i).

Cables rated as HDMI 1.3 are guaranteed to work on 1080p, although there is a possibility that unrated cables might work ok.

Not saying you need to pay a fortune on cables, just pointing out that not all cables will be up to transferring 1080p data quickly enough.
 
Kasalic said:
Are you using 1080p, if so you need to be aware that not all cables are rated as being 1080p compliant (1080p is approximately twice the data rate of 720p or 1080i).

Cables rated as HDMI 1.3 are guaranteed to work on 1080p, although there is a possibility that unrated cables might work ok.

Not saying you need to pay a fortune on cables, just pointing out that not all cables will be up to transferring 1080p data quickly enough.
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Thanks for the info, but I'll be running 1080i. I don't have a 1080p tv.

I'm not sure the eye can see the difference between p and i of the same res, but thats a diff argument :LOL:
 
To carry the letters HDMI a cable must transmit at the correct speed with 100% accuracy.
I have an £80 HDMI cable that got thrown in when I bought my TV. I also have a £5 one from Play.com and the picture quality is identical!
 
Gold connectors - bleh..

You should try to match the metal on the socket to the plug - so if your TV has a gold plated socket, you should use a gold connector on the cable. If it's just steel socket, then just normal steel connectors will be better.

IRL it doesn't really make a difference, but when you have a mismatch of metals, 'something happens'
 
TBH if you have good quality top end kit then the cables do make a difference to picture quality and sound quality but for 90% of people it makes no difference
 
I remember reading earlier last year about Monster HDMI cables. They offer a number of different HDMI cables with prices ranging from 10-100 pounds.

A stand they had set up to show the difference in the cables had 2 identical tellies taking a feed from a player. THe difference was quite obvious. IT was only when you saw round the back however that only the high end pic had a HDMI cable the other was using component.

With digital cables the differnce over small distances is very small..

Analoge cables the difference is huge. I have a set of chord phono cables that cost 60 quid and I had spent a few days with 3 different sets of cables testing them. The chord cables are briliant :D

BAck to HDMI though. I picked one up from scan for a few quid for my HTPC and it had braiding over the outside which doesnt make any different but IMO looks better :D
 
do be fooled by getting really expensive ones its not like the old days of scart leads play.com have some around the £7 mark and there excellent
 
Oakey22 said:
how can the cable on a digital signal make any difference? its either there or it aint. its only 1's and 0's not like the old analogue where the picture degrades.
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You look in What Hi-fi and they regularly test analogue and digital cables and its quite surprising what a difference it can make to picture and sound quality, but as said it is unlikely to affect most normal consumers
 
ppp said:
You look in What Hi-fi and they regularly test analogue and digital cables and its quite surprising what a difference it can make to picture and sound quality, but as said it is unlikely to affect most normal consumers
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I just had a look, they do say they affect the sound and picture quality, i presume they are testing over 5m though where the signal can degrade. I honestly didnt think they would bother testing hdmi cables.
 
Oakey22 said:
I just had a look, they do say they affect the sound and picture quality, i presume they are testing over 5m though where the signal can degrade. I honestly didnt think they would bother testing hdmi cables.
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The Video & Audio Signals are both digital and cannot degrade. If the cable is that long/crap that the signals begin to 'miss' the logic 1/0 levels then the information will 'drop' out. It's the same sort of effect you get when freeview/sky plays up
 
Hope I dont break the rules here - but the place I work is probably the cheapest for HDMI cables .... here are two 1m versions

Nickel or Gold plated connectors?
 
Analogue or Digital signal is just an electrical signal, as with any electrical signal it is affected by cable resistance, conductivity and quality of cable, they may all look the same but are subtly different, and that's where the quality difference comes in
 
Just to say, if your running sky HD and are running over 3 metres or so, be careful. I bought a cheap 10 metre hdmi cable (definately on the basis of digital is you know..on or off, it's gonna work or it ain't), but started get problems with HDCP signal. This is a signal that the toe rags at SKY send down the line to prevent you making perfect HD copies to a DVD writer or whatever (which is a bit pointless given if you really wanted to you could just use the component output). Basically, the sky HD box pauses and blocks the signal randomly and you either have to turn your tv off or disconnect and reconnect the hdmi cable, which is bloody annoying.

Turns out that my cheap hdmi cable couldn't handle this signal (any HD Ready TV will be HDCP compatible but good to double check). Bought one that was guaranteed and the problem went away.

May help.. Would stress that my research led to the fact that pin 17 of the hdmi cable was faulty, and this was down to cheap and nasty build quality. Technically I still agree that a £3 digital cable is just as a good as a £30 cable in terms of signal going through it. The question is how long for and whether the connectors at the ends break if you pop them in and out with any regularility!
 
on your average home TV as said before you probably won't see a difference however the fact it is a digital signal does not mean it is immune from the basic physics/chemistry of electricity and wires such as resistance, interference, crosstalk, attenuation, and differential impedance
 
ppp said:
on your average home TV as said before you probably won't see a difference however the fact it is a digital signal does not mean it is immune from the basic physics/chemistry of electricity and wires such as resistance, interference, crosstalk, attenuation, and differential impedance
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Yes agree all these factors may interfere.. but..its how these affect the signal which is important. Digital connections require a minimum signal level and a minimum signal to noise ratio. As long as it has that, the receiver couldn't give two hoots what cable it receives it on, it will display the best digital picture the TV it is capable of. Given that majority of digital receivers (be it in a TV, projector or whatever) have error correction if the signal quality is poor, then it either just drop the signal or you get macro blocking which mean horrible green squares..Usually things like bad weather etc will cause this on Sky.

Certainly if you have a better quality of cable you could argue that it will be less susceptible to this may end up with a more reliable connection, but it will not affect QUALITY of picture like bad noise or dirty signal would with analogue. Googling you can find people who have used coat hangers vs. expensive cables to prove the point. A digital signal is a digital signal, you hit the required numbers of 1 and 0's and that's it..you have a picture.

Of course there are those audiophiles who claim different digital cables do make a difference which of course they are entitled to, but it all starts getting VERY personal about "feeling" things and depending on whether it's a full moon and your standing on one foot etc. I guess ultimately nip into somewhere like Richer Sounds and ask them to show you a setup with two different quality hdmi cables, if you can REALLY tell the difference yourself (not by being told by a salesman) then hey ho it's what you ultimately feel you can afford and are happy with..

Now where did I put that damn metal coat hanger from the Dry Cleaners.....
 
Why then if it is a digital signal that will all go down the same wire regardless of quality etc do you need to buy different categories of cable to get a cable tested past 1080i/720p

""HDMI 1.3 has defined two categories of cables: Category 1 certified cables which have been tested at 74.5 MHz (1080i/720p) and Category 2 certified cables which have been tested at 340 MHz (1600p) to reduce the confusion about which cables support which video formats. A Category 1 HDMI cable will be marketed as a "Standard HDMI cable" and a Category 2 HDMI cable will be marketed as a "High Speed HDMI cable".""

A cheaply made cable of about 5 meters (16 ft) can be manufactured to Category 1 specifications using 28 AWG conductors. With better quality construction and materials (24 AWG conductors) an HDMI cable can reach lengths of up to 15 meters (49 ft). The HDMI website has stated that many HDMI cables under 5 meters of length that were made before the HDMI 1.3 specification can work as a Category 2 cable but cautions that only Category 2 tested cables are guaranteed to work. Long cable lengths can cause instability of HDCP and blinking on the screen due to the weakened DDC signal which HDCP requires.

Surely you should be able to chuck whatever digital signal you like down any HDMI cable and get the same result?
 
ppp said:
Why then if it is a digital signal that will all go down the same wire regardless of quality etc do you need to buy different categories of cable to get a cable tested past 1080i/720p

""HDMI 1.3 has defined two categories of cables: Category 1 certified cables which have been tested at 74.5 MHz (1080i/720p) and Category 2 certified cables which have been tested at 340 MHz (1600p) to reduce the confusion about which cables support which video formats. A Category 1 HDMI cable will be marketed as a "Standard HDMI cable" and a Category 2 HDMI cable will be marketed as a "High Speed HDMI cable".""

A cheaply made cable of about 5 meters (16 ft) can be manufactured to Category 1 specifications using 28 AWG conductors. With better quality construction and materials (24 AWG conductors) an HDMI cable can reach lengths of up to 15 meters (49 ft). The HDMI website has stated that many HDMI cables under 5 meters of length that were made before the HDMI 1.3 specification can work as a Category 2 cable but cautions that only Category 2 tested cables are guaranteed to work. Long cable lengths can cause instability of HDCP and blinking on the screen due to the weakened DDC signal which HDCP requires.

Surely you should be able to chuck whatever digital signal you like down any HDMI cable and get the same result?
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I totally agree. The issue is RELIABILITY not quality of the end resulting picture. As long as minimum data levels that the digital signal requires are can run across a cable with the characteristics to achieve you will get a picture. This still technically could be a coat hanger (allbeit a posh one) Note the website says "cables guaranteed to work" rather than any mention of reduced quality of the picture. By the laws of physics it will either work or it won't.
 
it's like a car travelling across freshly laid tarmac or a cobbled street, one has interference and the other doesn't but generally the car gets from one end to t'other.
 
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