I've been staying with friends and they have a projector(can't remember what kind, but it's lower end) and we've been watching movies projected on the wall. They just have cheap-o cables (Red-White-Yellow) running from the DVD player to the unit. Things looked pretty good on the wall, till you pop in something like Toy Story, then you notice some degredation. I'm wondering what kind of difference component cables would make. I saw a set at Radio Shack for $30 and was tempted to just pick them up and try them out, but I couldn't get anyone to check me out, so I split.

Has anyone ever bought component cables and not noticed much of a difference? Could I just get another set of RCA cables and plug them into the component slots or is there something special about component cables? I see sets of Monster cables for $120. Are $30 cables really all that different?

to answer your first question, switching to component cables will make a HUGE difference. Since this seems like an inexpensive setup (cheaper projector, no screen, etc.) I would not reccomend spending a lot of money on the cables. I actually just got some very inexpensive component cables from Monoprice.com for the HDTV in my bedroom (11 bucks for a 25 foot component cable) and have been very happy with the quality.

You could just try using the (Red-White-Yellow) cables as component cables to just try it out. The red and white cables provide sound, so you won't be hearing anything if you try this. Component cables and your red-white-yellow cables are basically the same, just match up the colors on the component in of your projector and the component out of your DVD player (I usually match red-red, white-blue, yellow-green, but you can do whatever as long as both ends are the same).

Ok, maybe I'll just dig up an extra set of RCA's and see if it makes a noticeable difference. I'll check back......

I just tried it and when I switch the input settings on the projector to 'component', it says 'no component input detected'. I double checked all the cords to make sure they're in the correct spots. Everything's good there. Could it be that the cables are just too cheap-o? Or is there another issue?

I'm wondering how anyone is getting composite cables to work over component inputs ...

Anyway, they are worth the money. Just don't buy 100.00 Monster cables or anything like that. Most people find RCA cables to work fairly well. Component video carries Red-Blue-Green signals instead of just 1 video.

Some DVD players require you to set your video output to Component in the setup menu (like my Toshiba). You might want to have both the composite video and the component video hooked up at the same time to change your DVD player over to component output.

That's what I was wondering too. I never even thought to try it because I just assumed it wouldn't work. It wasn't until someone mentioned trying it tonight that I tried.

So what's the deal? Do component cables have longer prongs or something?

Ok, I'll take a look and see if that's an option.


Nope. No option to change the output on the dvd player. I did get something to happen though. I had all three cables plugged into proper ports on both devices and switched the projector to component. 'No input setected'. I pulled the 'Y' plug out of the projector and moved it back to the 'video' jack, keeping the other 2 where they were, and it projected the DVD menu screen with a sharp blue tint.

That's as far as I got. I guess I'll just go buy some cables and see what happens.

Better shielding, connectors, and conductor - I think.

If you're going to use the normal red-white-yellow cable, the yellow video cable is the only one that really should be used for component video. So you'd need three of the cable sets to do it at all decently.

The yellow video cable has a 75 ohm impedance (or should have unless it's complete junk) which is the proper specification for component cable.. The red and while cables are more like 50 ohms and only for audio.

Ok, so I finally bought some component cables at Radio Shack. I plugged everything in and switched the 'input' on the projector to 'component'. The picture quality actually looked worse and it was greyscale. I went into the projector options under 'component' and there were 2 options: 'component' or 'scart RGB'. It was set to 'scart RGB' so I switched it to 'component' and the picture changed to a super blue tinted color.

What the hell's going on? The manual doesn't really say anything about troubleshooting component problems.

I had a little problem with component cables too...i switched from s-vid to component cables, turned my player to progressive, and although the picture did get sharper, it also got much grainier and looked like shit...i have a high definition 52" widescreen rca tv, and a newer sony dvd player...any ideas??

What band/model of projector is this? You may be trying the wrong order of inputs. Check the connections to see if any are loose or in the wrong place. Also try changing the order of the cables. Don't just go by red, green & blue.

I had the blue tint thing happen to me once and it was due to a faulty cable.

Sonic

It's a Viewsonic PJ520. I just matched color to color on the input/outputs. So you're saying that a blue on the output might go to green on the input or viceversa? That's lame. In any case, would that just be affecting the color or might that affect the quality as well. In addition to the color issues, the quality was markedly worse with the component cables. I think I might trade them in for S-Video cables. Then that way I can output my computer through it as well. There's shouldn't be any confusion there.

Maybe it's just my good luck, but I used a set of red/white/yellow cables for my component from the DVD player, down to my Denon, and then another set of cables from there over to my Mitsu RPTV... works great! I've heard this setup working great for others too.

This thread is the first I've ever heard about differing resistance on the audio vs. video cables, is that impedance as simple as checking it with an ohmmeter?

Anyways, worked great for me.

I believe you need to use more sophisticated equipment such as a time domain reflectometer.

The audio cables can vary in impedance and not matter much but the video cable is supposed to be 75 ohm. So there's a chance the audio cable could also be 75 ohm.

I ended up buying an S-Video cable and things look a lot better now.

What the hell's a time domain reflectometer? Sounds like something Douglas Adams invented.... (you don't have to answer that X)

Check your DVD player setting that it is set to output through component cables. Something like that happened to me once with a Cyberhome DVD player.