Cheap HDMI cables vs Pricy Branded HDMI Cables -- Any difference in PQ & AQ or ??

[admin_exported]

Hail all HT Gurus... i'm new into HT and just got mine setup last weekend. Comprised of PS3 + Onkyo 875 + Canton Chrono 5.1

I bought a wireworld chroma HDMI cable for 50quids but read elsewhere that there are like 10 quid HDMI cables out there... and there are also 200 quid cables too.

So that just made me wonder... any PQ / AQ or other differences between cheap & expensive cables?? I thought with digital transmission, cables shouldn't matter much?

Appreciate your thoughts... thanks.

 

[Clare Newsome]

Do a search for HDMI cables on this Forum and you'll find pages of discussion on the subject - such as this one.

Our advice on WHF is that you don't have to spend a fortune, but better-quality cables can make a difference - trying before you buy to see what YOU feel is also important. The Wireworld Chroma is a very decent cable, so you're set.

 

[Anonymous]

I agree - HDMI is a digital interface so as long as the cable is of decent quality (which yours is) and is not degrading the signal you're all set.

 

[Anonymous]

Not wanting to stoke this one but to me, unless proved otherwise, there is no grey area with digital cables. The only problem you can have is if the cable has a defect, then you won't get a picture at all.

 

[Anonymous]

Octopo:Not wanting to stoke this one but to me, unless proved otherwise, there is no grey area with digital cables. The only problem you can have is if the cable has a defect, then you won't get a picture at all.

I think we all agree with that.

 

[Anonymous]

got it. thanks guys.. & gal will make sure to look up the hdmi forum.

ta luv..
ronn

 

[Anonymous]

A while ago I purchased a Samsung 1080p7 from Richer Sounds and
needed an HDMI cable too
The salesman advised me that I needed a QED cable at £50 to be able
to get 1080P otherwise I would only get 1080i from another HDMI
cable at £20
I guess he was telling porkies then?

 

[Anonymous]

This is an interesting issue. Sometime back I connected a Pioneer DVD (top of the then range upscaled to 720p) to a Sony 40" LCD via a Chord HDMI (What HiFi award winner) and always found the black part of the picture not so black. Then I had to move some furniture so I needed a longer lead for a short while and borrowed a Thorr(?), which made the black in the picture black and was a lot sharper. I was then convinced that there was something more to HDMI than I'd been reading. Some time after that I upgraded to an IXOS (as I needed the longer run), when I bought my first Blu-ray player, which was pretty pricey!, then again there was an improvement in sharpness and colours.

I have recently changed TV and Blu-ray and HDMI to the VDH-Flat (I needed a shorter run). The VDH is a good cable, quite revealing, however when compared next to the IXOS it lacks punch and colour brightness (even my wife noticed, so there must be something in it...). The free Philips HDMI which came with the player is actually close to the performance of the VDH...[I've Philips HDMI on my BT V-Box, bought from Comet and it is also a very good cable].

So, I do believe that although HDMI is a digital connection, there is something going on inside the cable, what that is I'm not sure, it maybe that system matching has something to do with it. I'd look forward to a review of HDMI cables and how they effect different systems.

 

[Anonymous]

I was having problems with a 10 meter run of Audioquest HDMI cable (came free with my InFocus IN82) - picture sometimes disappeared from BluRay and SkyHD - searching for signal message and then a blank screen (usually in the middle of something). Substituted an older QED 12 meter and there was the same intermittent problem. Consultation with InFocus suggested that it might be a HDMI problem. I bought a new Chord Active Silver Plus HDMI cable (it has some sort of a booster at the projector end) and the problem appears to have disappeared. I have the new cable about three weeks now, so hopefully it has sorted the problem. I also have a connection from my Onkyo PR-SC886 processor to my Sony TV via a 3 meter HDMI lead and there was never a problem with that. So it seems that dropout can be a problem on long HDMI cable runs

 

[Anonymous]

I'm really not convinced that for most users like me with a TV and AV amp 1 metre or so apart, HDMI cable quality makes any difference. Did anyone catch that Gadget Show piece on this issue? They took identical set up's (good quality LCD TV, and Blu-ray player) and connected one with a £10 cable and one with a £160 cable: the result was that they could see no difference whatsoever!

I've been sceptical about shelling out over, say £30, on such cables ever since.

For my kit I've gone for 3 QED Classics at £25 which seem more than up to the job, however, there's NO difference if I use the cheaper £10 cables I had before!

Admittedly, it may be different with higher-end kit such as yours though, John!

 

[carter]

i would advice anyone to go for the qed(purple one)retails for £50 but if you look around(you all no best place)you can pick them up for £22 .good build quality 5star winner for not much more than your local super market would sell a no name cable for.

no brainer

 

[michael hoy]

(Did anyone catch that Gadget Show piece on this issue? They took
identical set up's (good quality LCD TV, and Blu-ray player) and
connected one with a £10 cable and one with a £160 cable: the result
was that they could see no difference whatsoever!)

I believe they used 3 cables 1 costing region of £10.00, 1 region of £29.99 and the third region of £160.00.

If my memory serves me right, they noticed a difference between the cheapest and the expensive one but not between the £29.99 cable and the expensive one.

But these are the people who said MP3 was better than CD and Vinyl!!!

 

[carter]

ide belive anything gail porter told me

 

[bigboss]

I've just ordered an HDMI cable worth £4.89 from Ebay, just to see if it's going to make any difference to the PQ or AQ.

 

[aliEnRIK]

Theyve certainly made a difference to my eyes

Why? Jitter and bandwidth

 

[Anonymous]

My Van Den Hul Ultimates are certainly a step up from my Chord Silver Plus 1.3 HDMI.

 

[bigboss]

I've just attached my new Panasonic player with a cheap £4.89 HDMI cable from Ebay...........can't notice any difference over my £40 cables. Both picture & sound are brilliant. I'm no cinephile or audiophile, but I'm quite happy with the cable which is a tenth of the price of my other cables. Maybe now I should try the 98p HDMI cable from Amazon.........

Either there's a discernable difference which I can't notice, or we're just making ourselves happy of owning 'better quality' expensive cables.

 

[Anonymous]

aliEnRIK:
Theyve certainly made a difference to my eyes

Why? Jitter and bandwidth

Why would one cable cause jitter and another not?

 

[professorhat]

Probably spite.

 

[laserman16]

professorhat:

Probably spite.

 

[Anonymous]

The review I saw was definitely just 2 cables tested: £10 and £160.

No difference on identical set-ups.

As for the mp3, CD vinyl debate, I've not got long enough!

.......

 

[idc]

Octopo:Not wanting to stoke this one but to me, unless proved otherwise, there is no grey area with digital cables. The only problem you can have is if the cable has a defect, then you won't get a picture at all.

In the latest issue of What Hifi a HDMI cable costing £5 has been given 5 stars. It is by ThatCable. When I looked up their website I found this; http://www.thatcable.com/acatalog/info_hdmi_cable_tester_.html . The cable tester performs 9 checks on the cable, so it seems to me that there is a lot going on in an HDMI cable. So there is a lot that can go wrong, or at least not be as good as it could be. So, like you Octopo, not wanting to stoke the flames, is that proof that there can be grey with an HDMI cable? One cable is better at transmitting the Red signal path or the Clock path than another, so that produces differences between cables.

If What Hifi have already tested the ThatCable HDMI, could they now test their tester?

 

[bigboss]

The whole point is, pricier cables do not mean better quality. This cable thing is a big scam. Printers are never sold with a printer cable. I bought a laser printer worth £45 from PC World a couple of years ago, only to find that I am required to buy a printer cable, & PC world was selling them for £20!! I couldn't justify myself to buy a cable that's half the cost of the printer itself! I got one from Tesco for £4 & it worked fine.

There's no harm in checking the cheaper cables first (the ones costing 97p - £5). If they don't work, atleast you don't lose much. But if they work, you end up saving a substantial amount of money.

I bought an HDMI cable worth £4.89 from Ebay. I showed it to my friend, let him have a feel of its quality. I then connected it to my blu-ray player & switched a movie on for him to check its performance. He guessed the price of the cable to be at least £50.

 

[professorhat]

Sigh

 

[Anonymous]

I'd love to know the science behind what a "quality" HDMI cable can do better than a cheap cable. Are they able to transfer better quality 1s and 0s? Unfortunately, cable manufacturers don't seem to want to explain the science behind it, and neither do people who claim to see the difference. All I see are people using buzzwords by claiming that a cable has more "punch" or a cable is more "revealing". That doesn't really tell you anything and can be explained by the placebo effect.

So, is anyone willing to exlain how a more expensive, higher quality cable is able to send a better quality signal? Maybe there are some 1.5s tranmitted down these cables that I wasn't previously aware of.