Don't be ripped off by pricey HDMI cables
Archives Forums/General Discussion/Don't be ripped off by pricey HDMI cables
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| [EDIT Can this be moved to general discussion? I posted it in the wrong forum i think) My mate at work just phoned me. He was just about to set off to goto PC world, and he asked me if i knew anywhere to find cheaper HDMI cables. He ain't exactly a technological shopper. He gives me the price of... wait for it... £45 <<<<<< I went on E-Bay and got him one for £3.99. It might not have 24 carat gold plating, but christ, for over 10 times the price, i'd expect to get 2 Blu-ray discs with that. Have a look at PC worlds HDMI cable collection. £45 seems to be the cheapest... http://www.pcworld.co.uk/martprd/store/pcw_page.jsp?BV_SessionID=@@@@1935162914.1251549525@@@@... Maplins ain't much better: http://www.maplin.co.uk/Search.aspx?criteria=hdmi%20cable&source=15 (On a side note, this thingy me bob, means i can play my PS3 on my computer monitor, and not have to suffer the moans of hogging the TV: http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=97901 ) |
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| Yea,... I've seen them as high as $90! The funny thing is, the cable quality is even less important today than it used to be. With a digital signal, it's all or nothing, so a 70% signal will look the same as a 100% one. |
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| I bought a VGA cable off eBay and it was crap. Caused horrible ghosting. Bought a 'proper' one from a shop which was 3x as much, was fine. Not everything on eBay is a bargain. |
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| Holy God alive, and I thought 20 quid was a rip off. Why are HDMI cables so expensive? It's just a cable! |
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| Everything's expensive in PC World. They charge like £8 for an IDE cable. You can get 'em for a quid and a half elsewhere. |
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| I really like monster cables and they sell one for £14.99. |
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| The funny thing is, the cable quality is even less important today than it used to be. With a digital signal, it's all or nothing, so a 70% signal will look the same as a 100% one. Wrongo.... digital signals take a lot of bandwidth.. the reason is that in order to create the digital (square) wave-form you need a lot of harmonics. lesser cable quality *can* cause harmonic loss which mutates the wave-form into a more sinusoidal one...once it degrades too far you will get losses which in the digital world look like missing blocks on the screen or no picture at all. Whats actually most important is good contacts (since you can incur a loss of around 3db {1/2 signal} with a bad one) and good shielding if you have much in the way of transmission devices around your home. Monsters are a good quality / price as Pete mentions as long as your not getting them from an audio/visual store that inflates the price. |
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| I recently bought a 4-pack of six-foot HDMI cables for $12 at a buy.com "special of the week" sale. They work like a charm at full 1920x1080. I'm only using two of them so I guess the other $6 is wasted for now. |
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| One of the MVPs at the XNA site swears by this site: monoprice.com At Best Buy and RadioShack I routinely see prices such as $50 for a 4-foot HDMI cable. I think they go all the way up to $150 for a 10 or 15 foot cable. Total insanity. |
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| The funny thing is, the cable quality is even less important today than it used to be. With a digital signal, it's all or nothing, so a 70% signal will look the same as a 100% one. There are grades of HDMI that allows more or less throughput, generally the best ones to go for are the middle of the range (leaning towards the cheaper side) - the cheapest ones are dodgy pieces of crap (for example, no more bandwidth than 720p and 2 channels of audio) and the expensive ones are simply for stupid people. Have a look at PC worlds HDMI cable collection. The big chains can afford to get in the stupidly expensive cables, because they have stupid customers that don't shop around (or understand the tech). It's the same in Aus - Harvey Norman (large retailer in SA) has HDMI cables ranging from $AU100 - $300+... That's something like 30-100 pounds. And the shop assistants will of course push the most expensive cables to ensure their customer has the 'best quality experience' and the assistant the largest commission. Meanwhile, across Rundle Mall JB Hifi sell ace cables ranging between $15-$50. I got one worth around $30 I think. Bought a 'proper' one from a shop which was 3x as much, was fine. Not everything on eBay is a bargain. It's different for an analogue signal of course. The cheapass VGA cable you bought was obviously not shielded, allowing any old electrical interference (including the signals from other wires in the cable). A similar shoddy HDMI cable would give the problems Skully detailed. |
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| The big chains can afford to get in the stupidly expensive cables, because they have stupid customers that don't shop around (or understand the tech) No, the big chains carry expensive cables because those have the highest profit margin -- and a lot of their customers are people that need something *now* and don't have time to wait for a couple of days for an internet order to show up... Even if you know you can get it cheaper over the internet, you may still suck it up and pay more in the store because at least you can leave with the cable in your hands 5 minutes later. (Which makes it more annoying that that the majority of printers don't ship with a USB cable anymore -- so now grandma gets to buy the $19.95 USB cable for her $50 printer, because HP couldn't be bothered to include one that would have cost them $0.50 themselves) |
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| Not everything is a bargin on ebay Yeah, your probably right about that. I just shocked me how much people are selling these kinds of things for. Oh and yeah, the USB cable thingy is the biggest rip off. They sell you a printer with no USB cable, and as you say, charge you £19 for one! |
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| The biggest joke is that the expensive cables don't work any better than the cheap ones. In fact in my experience so far he cheapest ones I've bought have lasted the longest. BTW avoid moving or maipulating HDMI cables unnecessarily they are likely to go bad on you if you do. Darkheart |
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| I like my Monster Cables too. |
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| No, the big chains carry expensive cables because those have the highest profit margin That was inferred, or they obviously wouldn't peddle them. and a lot of their customers are people that need something *now* and don't have time to wait for a couple of days for an internet order to show up... And don't have time to go to a different shop in the same mall that has sensible prices. The biggest joke is that the expensive cables don't work any better than the cheap ones. They do, technically - they just don't offer value for your buck. There are even rare cases where these expensive cables are actually the best choice for an individual - but like I said... it's rare. |
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| re the pc world bits it helps that they are open till 8 and everyone else is shut, so if you need something after work and couldnt shop around on your lunch break then its that or wait till your day off. there is a maplins 10ish minute walk away from my local pc world but their prices are probably just as stupid for usb and hdmi cables having said that there is an argos, tesco and asda within walking distance of both shops and i know tescos sell usb cables cheap(er) and are all open till 8 or later in the supermarkets case |
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| That's nothing. Monster sells 3 foot USB cables for $60+ (Canadian), and they have a ridiculous claim on the box that the things transfer data faster than the USB 2 spec is capable of, along with a tiny disclaimer that the transfer speed is limited by the attached devices. Personally, I'm not a fan of those guys. |
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| Hey look! Our fiber optic USB converters can technically transfer data 10000000 times faster than your regular USB cable!!!!!!!111 |
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| I bought a 10 foot USB lastnight for $7, they started at about $5 and went up to $29 for the fancy ones with cool looking insulation and plugs. My $7 ones were still gold plated and the best part for me was that they were white. so they don't stand out against the wall colour (printer is sitting on the shelf to the side of my wifes puter. |
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| I pay mine 5 pounds at Argos where my mates pay 80 pounds for GOLD HDMI!!! Silly boy! lol |
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