The Truth About HDMI Cables – NEWSFLASH – ‘Don’t Get Ripped-Off!’
HDMI Cables Expensive vs Cheap??
With all the hype surrounding HDTV and what a great signal and image you get manufactures have been quick to jump on the gravy bandwagon in the accesories department. Now we can’t blame a guy for trying but the inflated prices for relativly inexpensive to make products such as HDMI cables are getting ridiculous.
Now if you have a brand spanking new HD TV and a games console such as the PS3 or xBox 360 you’re going to need a HDMI (High-Definition Multimedia Interface) cable to link the two together and get the most our of you High Definition gizmo’s. HDMI cables range from under £5 to over £100 (check out Cableuniverse to see what I mean) and retailers generally try to convince you that the more expensive the cable, the better…..except that’s not necessarily true..
HDMI cables carry digital signals (1’s and 0’s) and the bottom line is that it either works or it doesn’t. You can only get 2 types of pictures from a HDMI cable, excellent or bad. It doesn’t matter if you’ve paid £5 or £50 for the cable if they both work, you will get the same quality of picture in both instances over the same distance.
Now it can be argued that over longer distances, say up to 10 meters, it pays to opt for a more expensive cable but the majority (and I do mean vast majority) of home users will only need at most a 2 meter HDMI cable (I mean, how far away are you really going to place your console or HD DVD player away from your TV?).
Over a range of 10 meters or more you may experience signal loss with a cheaper HDMI cable meaning you may get flecks on screen, sparkles, an interrupted picture or nothing a all, but, and this is the crunch, if you do not get any loss of signal, that £5 cable from wallmart or wherever will perform exactly the same as that £100 cable from ripoffsRUs.com.
So the best bet when dealing with HDMI cables is to get the cheapest you can find and if it doesn’t work perfectly send it back and get another until you find one at a low price that works exactly as it should. Don’t get taken in by sales jargon and hype into forking out for a high priced skipping rope….
Sources:
HD Guru
cForums
And many more just do your research before you fork out.
