Cheap hdmi cable

[tonksy26]

Just bought an Xbox and been looking at hdmi cables.

Is there much difference between a eBay £1.60 cable and a £30 cable from comet ?

Noticed some hdmi cables from comet are £70 - £80.

 

[.Adam.]

I've got one which was £5 from Sainsbury's and is just as good as a mate of mines who paid £30 for his.

 

[Gareth]

There is no difference whatsoever.

 

[SC03OTT]

ASDA had them for £1 a few years ago.

 

[.Adam.]

I think I remember reading an article a while ago about how shops were being told they could no longer claim a £90 cable was any better than a £5 one.

 

[Gouldy]

There are no difference at all between the cheap hdmi cables and the expensive ones. This is due to how hdmis work compared to scart leads etc that suffer from interference.

 

[PP200t]

If you have a pound land near you, they have them in some of those. The quality seems ok tbh.

 

[robbygraham]

On a tv you are not going to see much if any difference, on my desktop moving from a cheap £5 cable to a slightly better £30 cable made a big difference, as I was getting ghosting on the screen, the better quality cable sorted that problem. Its only really an issue if you for any reason want xbox at one end of room and tv at the other, thats when a higher quality cable would be needed.

 

[Gouldy]

On a tv you are not going to see much if any difference, on my desktop moving from a cheap £5 cable to a slightly better £30 cable made a big difference, as I was getting ghosting on the screen, the better quality cable sorted that problem. Its only really an issue if you for any reason want xbox at one end of room and tv at the other, thats when a higher quality cable would be needed.

Wrong, that's impossible unless the cheaper cable you had was damaged.

 

[Darren S]

HDMI is digital - it either works or it doesn't.

VGA however - there can be a MASSIVE difference in the quality and therefore picture clarity from the cable.

I think the 360 HDMI cable I use, came from eBay at about a £5, iirc? Works absolutely fine.

D.

 

[iain187]

On a tv you are not going to see much if any difference, on my desktop moving from a cheap £5 cable to a slightly better £30 cable made a big difference, as I was getting ghosting on the screen, the better quality cable sorted that problem. Its only really an issue if you for any reason want xbox at one end of room and tv at the other, thats when a higher quality cable would be needed.

you original was either loose or as gouldy says, damaged.

 

[conneh]

No difference really, i have both a £70 cable and a £5 cable.

 

[Toypop]

Can also confirm no difference.

The latest trick is that they try to get you to buy an expensive cable by talking about 3D compatibility.

That is a load of old cobblers too as I have the cheapy HDMI cable I got back with my first HD box (not during the last World Cup but then one before that!) and it still works fine in 3D on the PS3 and Sky.

 

[D4N13L]

They reviewed these on the gadget show a while ago and agreed they could not tell the difference.

 

[Olli3]

I get all my HDMI cables from here... http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/HDMI-Gold-Plated-Flat-Cable-V1-4-High-Speed-Ethernet-2K-/270554671013?pt=UK_Computing_CablesConnectors_RL&hash=item3efe50a7a5#ht_2568wt_1163

They are brilliant.

 

[Tom]

Poundland.

 

[Wick]

I have a 1.34 ebay jobbie. works spot on.

 

[MarkCup]

I get everything I've needed from www.kenable.co.uk - good range of prices and some decent quality items if you need RCA etc.

 

[Ronnie R]

Go for one of these, I bought a couple of cheap cables - they worked fine until I ran everything through my amp. These are the best for the money. v1.4

http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B002U3161M/?tag=cliospnet01-21

 

[Gally]

HDMI is digital - it either works or it doesn't.

VGA however - there can be a MASSIVE difference in the quality and therefore picture clarity from the cable.

I think the 360 HDMI cable I use, came from eBay at about a £5, iirc? Works absolutely fine.

D.

What this man said. Anyone who tells you otherwise is a liar. Or a salesman... Same thing.

 

[James28]

Never knew this! Interesting!

 

[DannyR]

Can also confirm no difference.

The latest trick is that they try to get you to buy an expensive cable by talking about 3D compatibility.

That is a load of old cobblers too as I have the cheapy HDMI cable I got back with my first HD box (not during the last World Cup but then one before that!) and it still works fine in 3D on the PS3 and Sky.

Sky 3D would work with an early version cable anyway as its only splitting an image.

But no difference unless your going over 5m. Weve had customers buy 15m cheap HDMIs and then after 6 months of it being in a wall and ready for a tv to go on it doesn't work!

Any run over 10m we now do over Cat 6 cable though

 

[Gouldy]

It's makes no difference whether it's a 2m or 20m hdmi cable. The picture will be exactly the same, hdmi's arnt affected by interference or the signal getting distorted etc because they use binary ( 1's and 0's )to transfer data. A 2m £90 Hdmi cable will have the exact same picture as a £4.99 20m hdmi cable.

 

[CupDude]

So is HDMY 100% lossless? If it's transferred through the cable in a stream rather than in blocks (as computer data is) surely there's some loss (however minute) due to imperfections in the cable?

 

[jam.]

It amazes me companies are still allowed to sell moronically priced hdmi cables when there is proven to be no difference whatsoever between them and cheap bargain bin ones. Other than the design of the actual cable.

I feel sorry for the gullible.

 

[richy22]

It's makes no difference whether it's a 2m or 20m hdmi cable. The picture will be exactly the same, hdmi's arnt affected by interference or the signal getting distorted etc because they use binary ( 1's and 0's )to transfer data. A 2m £90 Hdmi cable will have the exact same picture as a £4.99 20m hdmi cable.

So is HDMY 100% lossless? If it's transferred through the cable in a stream rather than in blocks (as computer data is) surely there's some loss (however minute) due to imperfections in the cable?

No its not 100% lossless. Well it is upto a point.

And there is a difference between a 2 metre cable and a 20metre cable its just you wont be able to physically see/notice the difference from a picture point of view. Or more to the point nothing to worry about for the average person buying one anyway.

Signal degradation happens to any form of data after a while.

 

[Gouldy]

So is HDMY 100% lossless? If it's transferred through the cable in a stream rather than in blocks (as computer data is) surely there's some loss (however minute) due to imperfections in the cable?

Not 100 % lossless no, but it has to be quite along hdmi before you notice Any difference in picture quality.

 

[DannyR]

It's only recommended for HDMI to work up to 25m, we've found some cheap cables just won't work at all at those lengths. More than likely just manufactured cheaply and crap connections.

There's no difference but if I was putting one in a wall 6 months before my tv went up I'd go for a decent branded long one. They're not expensive either

 

[Wilkeh]

I saw some that were over $1000 once. Only recently this way, really can't find the link any more!

 

[sn00p]

Denon (I think) once had a really expensive ethernet cable which had hilarious reviews on amazon...search for AKDL1. They're worth a read if you fancy a chuckle!

 

[jam.]

hmm, just turned my PS3 on and was getting artifacting all over the place whenever there was any movement on screen.

Swapped the cheapo hdmi cable I had in there for another, and it's now back to working perfectly.

hmm indeed...

 

[Gouldy]

You sure it was in correctly or it wasn't damaged ?

 

[jam.]

Was in perfectly yeah, and it's not physically damaged either. Tried it in my Apple TV too and got the same effect.

 

[Gouldy]

It could be damaged internally. I'd get another one bud.