The TV`s Sorted - Now The Cables

bf1

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Finally decided that I will buy the Panasonic TH-37PX80B.

Next decision, which I hope members here will help me with, is which cables I should buy.

I intend to have the following equipment hooked up:

Sony PS3

Sky HD

Nintendo Wii

DVD Recorder of some sort

Hope you can help with the type of cables I should use - make/model number.

Thanks
 

bf1

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Im almost certain that someone on this forum has some recommendations for cables?

What make of cables will be suitable for the above TV/PS3/Sky HD? There is such a huge divide in the cost of cables but I would like to know what the members on here recommend.

Thanks
 
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Anonymous

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I contacted a couple of online stores and they both recommended either Ixos or QED.
 

bf1

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[quote user="Scotsgirl"]I contacted a couple of online stores and they both recommended either Ixos or QED.[/quote]

Seems one can easily spend a couple of hundred quid just on the cables alone!
 
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Anonymous

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Sure someone more techy will correct me if I am wrong but I believe it is advised to spend more on the Scart than the HDmi cable.

I remember now that I was told Techlink HDmi cables are really good and cost a lot less than Ixos or QED.

At the moment I have a Profigold Scart and Ixos HDmi cable and both perform well.

I have to say that if I was going to spend a lot on a Tv I would want to get the best cables to make sure I got the best out of it. Not sure about the others but I know Profigold comes with a lifetime warranty.
 

professorhat

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This is a bit of a contentious issue so possibly why no one has answered - just do a search for HDMI cables and you'll see! Anyway, on the Scart cable, I can recommend the QED SQuart range (as in my signature below). A very good cable.

On the HDMI, it really depends on what you want to spend. The Techlink Scotsgirl mentions RRPs at £15 I think. You can get a QED-P cable for around £40 and then a Chord Silver 1.3 Plus for around £75 (assuming we're talking about a metre's length). The contentious issue is, some people claim there cannot be any difference between a cheap certified cable and an expensive one. What Hi-Fi rates all of the above with 5 stars and I personally use the Chord and think it's fantastic. The basic rule of thumb is to spend 10 - 15 % of your system budget on cables. My advice is to try and get a loan of some cheap and some expensive cables from a dealer and see if you can see a difference, then decide from there.
 

professorhat

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And reading your original post again, if you can't decide, I'd spend more on the HDMI cable for the PS3 than the Sky HD - Blu-Ray picture is much better than the Sky HD picture due to the compression inherent in broadcast formats so it deserves a better cable to get the best out of the picture.

As I've said though, this is purely my opinion and you're best checking cables out for yourself and making your own mind up
 

bf1

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[quote user="professorhat"]
And reading your original post again, if you can't decide, I'd spend more on the HDMI cable for the PS3 than the Sky HD - Blu-Ray picture is much better than the Sky HD picture due to the compression inherent in broadcast formats so it deserves a better cable to get the best out of the picture.

As I've said though, this is purely my opinion and you're best checking cables out for yourself and making your own mind up

[/quote]

Prof, thanks for the reply.

I have seen that Chord come out very well when reviewed. A few people have mentioned using profigold but Ive never heard of them.

Will add Chord to my consideration.
 
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[quote user="professorhat"]
This is a bit of a contentious issue so possibly why no one has answered - just do a search for HDMI cables and you'll see! Anyway, on the Scart cable, I can recommend the QED SQuart range (as in my signature below). A very good cable.

On the HDMI, it really depends on what you want to spend. The Techlink Scotsgirl mentions RRPs at £15 I think. You can get a QED-P cable for around £40 and then a Chord Silver 1.3 Plus for around £75 (assuming we're talking about a metre's length). The contentious issue is, some people claim there cannot be any difference between a cheap certified cable and an expensive one. What Hi-Fi rates all of the above with 5 stars and I personally use the Chord and think it's fantastic. The basic rule of thumb is to spend 10 - 15 % of your system budget on cables. My advice is to try and get a loan of some cheap and some expensive cables from a dealer and see if you can see a difference, then decide from there.[/quote]

Is it true that the QED cables aren't very 'flexible'?
 

professorhat

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Depends on the thickness really. My SQuart cable is about half an inch thick and as such is quite unwieldy. I'm sure that would be true of any cable of this size though so don't think it's just a QED thing.
 
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Anonymous

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[quote user="Scotsgirl"]

Is it true that the QED cables aren't very 'flexible'?[/quote]

I thought the thicker ones were better, more shielding/insulation??
 
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Anonymous

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I have the QED HDMi-P on my TH37PX80 - I use it with my Xbox Elite and it looks stunning. I wholeheartedly recommend it.
 

professorhat

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Just another thought on the Scart cables - some, like my QED cable, only pass through the video signal, not the sound, thus in theory giving a better picture. However, if you intend to use your TV for the sound on this source, you need to ensure the cable you get does both.
 

bf1

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[quote user="professorhat"]Just another thought on the Scart cables - some, like my QED cable, only pass through the video signal, not the sound, thus in theory giving a better picture. However, if you intend to use your TV for the sound on this source, you need to ensure the cable you get does both.[/quote]

Ive got a 2.1 sound system that I will be using for the sound but I may just use the tv speakers if watching something that doesn`t require the additional effects.

The sound system arrived yesterday (Harman Kardon HS250) much to my wife`s dismay! (It took 2 blokes to carry it in!)

Looks a beautiful bit of kit.

Just need to work out the best way to connect the equipment up.

My initial thoughts are to connect the Harman receiver/dvd player direct to the TV via HDMI (Does HDMI carry the sound signal back to the Harman unit?)

If I connect the PS3 direct to the TV via HDMI will this automatically feed the sound via the Harman?

As you can guess Ive never set up a home cinema system before.
 

professorhat

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Hi there - sorry for the delay in responding - with GT5 out last Friday, haven't been on the forums much! Unfortunately, the audio signal from your TV won't travel back through the HDMI socket back to the Harman unit. Nor will the audio signal from the PS3 go back to the Harman if you connect it to the TV, it will just come out of your TV speakers.

Looking at the Harman, I'd say (assuming you have 2 HDMI ports on your TV), hook the PS3 up to the TV using HDMI and the Harman using optical digital (and set the PS3 to send the video through HDMI and sound through optical). Then hook the Harman to the TV using HDMI also. With any luck, your TV will have a audio phono out connection (two RCA sockets, red and white, labeled Audio Out). If so, these can be hooked into the Harman as well to get TV sound out through it.

If you only have one HDMI on the TV, I'd hook the PS3 up using this and hopefully the TV has a component in and you can hook the Harman up using this (with the sound the same as the above).
 

bf1

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[quote user="professorhat"]
Hi there - sorry for the delay in responding - with GT5 out last Friday, haven't been on the forums much! Unfortunately, the audio signal from your TV won't travel back through the HDMI socket back to the Harman unit. Nor will the audio signal from the PS3 go back to the Harman if you connect it to the TV, it will just come out of your TV speakers.

Looking at the Harman, I'd say (assuming you have 2 HDMI ports on your TV), hook the PS3 up to the TV using HDMI and the Harman using optical digital (and set the PS3 to send the video through HDMI and sound through optical). Then hook the Harman to the TV using HDMI also. With any luck, your TV will have a audio phono out connection (two RCA sockets, red and white, labeled Audio Out). If so, these can be hooked into the Harman as well to get TV sound out through it.

If you only have one HDMI on the TV, I'd hook the PS3 up using this and hopefully the TV has a component in and you can hook the Harman up using this (with the sound the same as the above).

[/quote]

Thanks Prof,

That`s very helpful. I have 3 HDMI`s on the TV.

I plan to get Sky HD, currently have Sky+, if I connect the audio out of the Sky box to the audio in of the Harman wil this negate the need to connect audio from the TV to the Harman?
 

professorhat

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In theory, as long as you only want sound from the PS3 and the Sky box. If you have anything else plugged into the TV that you want sound to go through the Harman, you're better off leaving the TV connected up as well to give you this option. However, if it's just the two sources, you could hook the Sky box up direct to the Harman using the RCA phono connection instead of the TV
.
 

bf1

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I will have other devices in time so maybe connecting from the TV to the Harman will be the thing to do.

Thanks
 

professorhat

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No probs - just had a quick look at the manual for the Harman and it suggests you have two sets of audio in (on page 9 showing the rear panel connections, 7 and 14 seem to be "Audio in" and "TV Audio in"). If this is the case, you can hook the Sky box and the TV up at the same time, though I'm not sure what benefit this would be. Best bet is, once you've got everything, try hooking the Sky up on its own as well as just listening to its sound through the TV and see if it improves the quality to see if it's worth doing.

The Sky HD also has an optical out, but since (a) this is 2.1 system and (b) you're probably already using this for the PS3, there's probably not really any benefit to using this.
 

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