exm

And you believe I purchased my equipment from Best Buy? Or that I even shop there?

I can say that I'm proud of my high-end setup, my research that I've done before purchasing it, and all the upgrades that I've done. One of those upgrades involved replacing a low-end 40 feet HDMI cable with a Blue Jeans cable, which resulted in a much more dynamic display.

Just FYI: I have a HD Projector.

My point was and still is that it doesn't make sense to invest heavily in expensive cables, if your equipment isn't up to the extra benefits a high quality cable gives you. But I do value not having a cable as the weakest link. The general rule of spending 10% of your A/V budget on cables is fair one IMO.

Uhm... Where did you get that information from?

Jah-Wren Ryel

No. I suspect that you WORK there since you are repeating the very same salesline they drill into their own employees.

And there is your downfall. Feeling pride means that you identify with your purchase. Thus any refutation of the marketing claims becomes a perceived attack on your ego and must be defended against with rational arguments at first and when those run out, irrational ones.

Define "dynamic" - Contrast ratio? Color saturation? If your answer is anything other than less pixel blips -- usually seen as "sparklies" in areas of solid black -- it is all in your head. And if your video source is encrypting its output, as do most sources with HDMI output, then you can't even claim fewer pixel blips, with encryption it is pretty much all or nothing. Either you got the picture or you got scrambled static because the data was corrupted in transit.

Not for digital signals and ESPECIALLY not for encrypted digital signals.


Right here. And before you claim the guy is just some anonymous poster, read what he writes in the thread. He clearly demonstrates his knowledge and experience - anyone with even a little exposure to electrical engineering can tell the guy isn't bullshitting.

MoviePage

I bought a $60 HDMI cable from Circuit City when I purchased my 50" plasma TV there. Did some searching online after the fact and found one at Amazon for $4.95. Ordered it, switched cables when it arrived, absolutely no difference in picture quality. Needless to say, the first cable got repackaged and taken back to the store.

I just checked at Amazon and the same cable is now $21.09 for some reason - but it was $4.95 when I ordered it. Yay!

lordzeppelin

I love when people feel the need to defend overpriced cables because they fell for it and purchased them. Just admit it...you bought into the hype. We've all done it. I've done it. I own some Monster cables (analog Audio cables). I'll admit to it. But at the time, it was either those (open box, actually cheap) at Best Buy and I needed them that afternoon (like 8 years ago...) or the Recoton ones that looked needle thin. Since then, I buy nothing but stuff from Monoprice and (before they were around) Parts Express.

Over the last 7 years, I've learned A LOT about cables, and A/V, and even worked for an A/V company for 2 years. Cables, for the most part, are snake oil. Always have been. Is there a difference between your average, in-box pack in with a Cyberhome DVD player and the $40 Monster Component cable? Most definitely. Will you notice it on a SDTV smaller than, say, 27"? Nope. Is there any difference between a $40 monster cable and a $4 monoprice cable? No. I'd love to do some double blind tests with even a silver serpent cable versus the monoprice 'premium' ones that run like $14, and see if any of the "my setup is worth $XXXXX" guys can prove that their pen-, I mean that they can prove their expensive cable is better.

exm

Oh, I hear you! I can definitely tell you that some cables are hardly an improvement; these are the cable where I can only see an improvement with a direct A-B comparison. In my opinion, here are the cable categories and where * I * noticed the biggest improvements (results from most improvements to least):
- Speaker cables
- Analog audio cables
- Component video cables
- HDMI video cables
- Digital audio cables

And no worries... I disagree with BB sales practices. As I said earlier, spending 10% of your budget on cables is fair, while BB usually try to make that 50%

[QUOTE=Jah-Wren Ryel]
Define "dynamic" - Contrast ratio? Color saturation? If your answer is anything other than less pixel blips -- usually seen as "sparklies" in areas of solid black -- it is all in your head. And if your video source is encrypting its output, as do most sources with HDMI output, then you can't even claim fewer pixel blips, with encryption it is pretty much all or nothing. Either you got the picture or you got scrambled static because the data was corrupted in transit.

Not for digital signals and ESPECIALLY not for encrypted digital signals.

Interesting link, but I still doubt if he really is who he claims.

Either way, I'm happy with my HDMI cable: I didn't spend a ton of money on it (Blue Jeans Cables is more expensive than Monoprice, but not overpriced like many high end cable brands), and for me it's worth it. I respect your opinion if you disagree with higher priced cables. However, also respect mine since I do value the extra benefits in my setup.