ROGETRAY wrote:I've heard some chatter online regarding "different' HDMI speeds. Companies propose various differnt HDMI "graded" cables to increase data singals. Does this stuff hold any merit?

I hope no one actually considers buying any of these. I like to think wooters are smarter than that...

inkycatz wrote:

Zero merit. All of the information is being sent in the form of 1's and 0's so there is no need for different "quality" HDMI cables. This will do just as well.

http://www.amazon.com/Premium-GOLD-Series-Foot-Cable/dp/B00068NUOE/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1360337596&sr=8-4&keywords=10+foot+hdmi+cable

Are these list prices for real? Monster is the last company I would buy anything from

They are still overpriced @ 65-87 % off.

Don't buy this. Monster Cables are notorious for overpricing their products. Their HDMI cables are not better than any $0.99 HDMI cable that you can find on Amazon or eBay. ALL HDMI cables are the same. Either they're HDMI, or they're not, there are not levels of quality when it comes to HDMI. DON'T BUY THIS.

Mr. McGuire: I just want to say one word to you. Just one word.

Benjamin: Yes, sir.

Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?

Benjamin: Yes, I am.

Mr. McGuire: Monoprice.

Benjamin: Exactly how do you mean?

I'm actually going to go out of my way and defend monster for once.

I bought one of the optima projectors off woot a while ago, and I had a good three or four HDMI cables laying around ranging from 12-20 feet. Absolutely none of the cables would work for that projector for some reason.. Now the local comet down the road was having a 80% off going out of business sale, and I ended up picking one of the 20 foot cables for about $40. That cable was the only one out of my entire pile that actually worked without a hitch for my projector, for that distance I needed to run it.

While I agree the prices are a bit ridiclous, the quality of the cables at least is a lot better. It might be 1 and 0's running down the cable, but if that cable is made of cheap quality metal there's going to be a lot more resistance and you'll have issues running longer lengths.

Even if their stuff is decent quality, I won't buy Monster stuff due to their trigger-happy lawsuits about trademark infringement against companies and products that have nothing to do with consumer electronics, including a small mom & pop mini-golf outfit.

They have been in disputes with the following companies and organizations:

Snow Monsters (a kid's skiing group)
MonsterVintage, small used clothing store
Monsters, Inc., an animated feature film
Monster Garage, a television series
Monsters of the Midway, a nickname of the Chicago Bears football team
Fenway Park's Monster seats
Monster Energy, energy drinks
Monster.com employment website
Monster Mini Golf
Monster Balls Paintballs manufactured by JT Sports
Monster Transmission

chefferz wrote:I'm actually going to go out of my way and defend monster for once.

I bought one of the optima projectors off woot a while ago, and I had a good three or four HDMI cables laying around ranging from 12-20 feet. Absolutely none of the cables would work for that projector for some reason.. Now the local comet down the road was having a 80% off going out of business sale, and I ended up picking one of the 20 foot cables for about $40. That cable was the only one out of my entire pile that actually worked without a hitch for my projector, for that distance I needed to run it.

While I agree the prices are a bit ridiclous, the quality of the cables at least is a lot better. It might be 1 and 0's running down the cable, but if that cable is made of cheap quality metal there's going to be a lot more resistance and you'll have issues running longer lengths.

Quality of cable does matter when it comes to length, but that's about the only situation where it matters. A low quality HDMI cable longer than 15ft can have issues.

Anything under that, though, like the typical 3-6ft short runs- you might as well buy the cheapest you can find, and only pay more if you desire for either aesthetics or functionality (right-angle, gauge of wire, etc)

oaksw12 wrote:Even if their stuff is decent quality, I won't buy Monster stuff due to their trigger-happy lawsuits about trademark infringement against companies and products that have nothing to do with consumer electronics, including a small mom & pop mini-golf outfit.

They have been in disputes with the following companies and organizations:

Snow Monsters (a kid's skiing group)
MonsterVintage, small used clothing store
Monsters, Inc., an animated feature film
Monster Garage, a television series
Monsters of the Midway, a nickname of the Chicago Bears football team
Fenway Park's Monster seats
Monster Energy, energy drinks
Monster.com employment website
Monster Mini Golf
Monster Balls Paintballs manufactured by JT Sports
Monster Transmission

Those lawsuits are reasonable, considering that they actually invented the word Monster. And the internet. And air.

gjbloom wrote:Mr. McGuire: I just want to say one word to you. Just one word.

Benjamin: Yes, sir.

Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?

Benjamin: Yes, I am.

Mr. McGuire: Monoprice.

Benjamin: Exactly how do you mean?

Agreed! I go to Monoprice for ALL of my cables.

That's actually a decent price for that 19' cable. The rest of this is garbage... but I'm trying really hard not to buy that one. Dang it! I would have bought it if hoarders wasn't on!

Why would I want to purchase a cable from a bunch of lawsuit-happy mobsters?

Friends don't let their friends buy Monster cables!

One of their bait and switch tactics from a while back:

http://www.engadget.com/2007/12/17/hdmi-cable-scam-used-to-fool-in-store-customers/

chefferz wrote:Absolutely none of the cables would work for that projector for some reason.. Now the local comet down the road was having a 80% off going out of business sale, and I ended up picking one of the 20 foot cables for about $40. That cable was the only one out of my entire pile that actually worked without a hitch for my projector, for that distance I needed to run it.

While I agree the prices are a bit ridiclous, the quality of the cables at least is a lot better. It might be 1 and 0's running down the cable, but if that cable is made of cheap quality metal there's going to be a lot more resistance and you'll have issues running longer lengths.

Finally some independent thought and actual experience. I get really really sick of responding to people parroting the same uninformed garbage about how "it's just zeros and ones, it doesn't matter." So much so that I've largely given up, but I'll persevere and try once more:

First, yes there are overpriced HDMI cables in existence, and no, most people don't need to buy the most expensive ones they can find, nor the trendiest brand name, just to get a cable that works well for them.

However...

While you don't necessarily need to buy a specific brand, nor spend a fortune, there actually are some VERY significant differences between decent quality HDMI cables and garbage ones. You can save yourself a lot of potential headaches by choosing cables that use quality wire, secure connections, good shielding, and good overall build quality and durability. They will last longer when moved around plugged/unplugged many times, and be less prone to data errors that can show up as "sparkles," audio drop-outs, freezes, or the inability to connect at all.

These actually do look like pretty good quality cables, but many of the Monoprice and similar ones are also good enough in most cases. If you shop only on price you may well end up with garbage though.


For anyone who is actually interested, and can see past the (both incorrect) notions that either "you must buy the very best cables," or "just buy the cheapest thing you can find because there's no difference at all," I will include further technical information below. Feel free to disregard if not interested in learning any actual facts.

An HDMI cable uses three twisted pairs for the primary data stream, one each for Red, Green, and Blue. Those each use separate sets of "0's and 1's" which obviously aren't actually numbers walking down the wire. They are electrical signals (specifically, transition-minimized differential signaling (TMDS), at 3.3 volts +/- 5%, 50 Ohms +/- 10%). A plot of the voltage flowing through the wire in a clean EM/RF environment with a fully in-spec, relatively short, and undamaged cable might look a little like this:

---/````\____/````\-------

While in an electromagnetically noisy environment, or across a damaged/out of spec cable it might be more like:

---/`^``\__v_/`~``\--^-v-

The electronics on the receiving end have to be able to accurately discriminate 0's from 1's but when the signal isn't clean, it's going to sometimes get it wrong. The result of that happening, on average, will be a change in the values of the datastream. In subtle cases, a small number of random bits end up getting flipped, resulting in color values that are greater than or less than the original value. You could, as a result, see little light or dark lines or dots across one or more frames that look like "sparkles." There is also a clock sync signal, which is necessary to keep the sending device in sync with the receiving device (the “source device” and “sink device”) in accurate synchronization.
HDMI uses several different technologies to help minimize data errors, including the somewhat error-resistant nature of TMDS itself, BCH code, as well as a method for the source and sink to adjust the signal to partially compensate for differing electrical characteristics and balance levels, so it's relatively forgiving, but not bullet proof, and because it’s a continuous realtime datastream, if bits are corrupted in transit they cannot be re-sent. If the data errors are very significant, or the sync is lost for a time, then the picture might intermittently go blank or freeze, or noticeable picture corruption might occur, or the audio might drop out.

Also, while sometimes a reasonable indicator, price doesn't always directly correspond to quality. A company could make a piece of junk cable for $1.50 manufacturing cost and try to sell it for $80 or they could actually spend $50 making a super high quality cable with expensive and sturdy materials and shielding and uncompromising quality control, but then discontinue the product and a retailer might still put it on clearance for $10 eventually. Most cables are somewhere in the middle, with "good enough" quality at a fairly reasonable price.

I'm firmly NOT in the "you must spend a lot to get a good cable" camp, but I'm also NOT in the "buy the cheapest possible cable" camp either. There's no need to be so polarized about it. My advice would be to get a decent quality cable at a fair price, unless you have special needs (for example doing 10.2Gbps across very long runs, a noisy EM/RF environment, using a marginal device on one end or the other, having lots of transition points from cable to cable due to a complex setup of switches or other devices, etc). In such special cases it might make sense to pay a lot more for a specialized cable. It might also be beneficial to buy cables with sturdier connectors if you need to plug/unplug the cables frequently. And gold plated connectors might make sense if they're regularly handled or used in a corrosion-promoting environment.

Further reading: http://www.hdmi.org/download/HDMI_Spec_1.3_GM1.pdf

If you're buying a Monster cable, you're buying it because you care what other people will think when they look at your HDMI cable. You better hope those people aren't properly informed about HDMI cables.

Don't forget Blue Jean cables. They were going to sue them because they were using the same connector design as Monster.

I'd rather watch 480i broadcast television on a composite connection before I used a single Monster product.

oaksw12 wrote:Even if their stuff is decent quality, I won't buy Monster stuff due to their trigger-happy lawsuits about trademark infringement against companies and products that have nothing to do with consumer electronics, including a small mom & pop mini-golf outfit.

They have been in disputes with the following companies and organizations:

Snow Monsters (a kid's skiing group)
MonsterVintage, small used clothing store
Monsters, Inc., an animated feature film
Monster Garage, a television series
Monsters of the Midway, a nickname of the Chicago Bears football team
Fenway Park's Monster seats
Monster Energy, energy drinks
Monster.com employment website
Monster Mini Golf
Monster Balls Paintballs manufactured by JT Sports
Monster Transmission

"Monster 128241-00 FlatScreen Articulating Mount for TVs 10" to 27" "

For real? Does anyone have, let alone *mount* a TEN inch TV?

Does anybody know the actual speed of this particular 19ft no frills cable: 2gbps, 4gbps, 10gb, etc...?

What is its rating 1.3a, 1.4?

I googled Monster 132462-00 and only woot comes up as a seller for this cable. So no other info is available. Although I'm curious why no one else sells this cable.

And this woot listing isn't offering much info.

Any help would be appreciated.

oaksw12 wrote:Even if their stuff is decent quality, I won't buy Monster stuff due to their trigger-happy lawsuits about trademark infringement against companies and products that have nothing to do with consumer electronics, including a small mom & pop mini-golf outfit.

They have been in disputes with the following companies and organizations:

Snow Monsters (a kid's skiing group)
MonsterVintage, small used clothing store
Monsters, Inc., an animated feature film
Monster Garage, a television series
Monsters of the Midway, a nickname of the Chicago Bears football team
Fenway Park's Monster seats
Monster Energy, energy drinks
Monster.com employment website
Monster Mini Golf
Monster Balls Paintballs manufactured by JT Sports
Monster Transmission

So the company name is accurate then? They really are monsters.

blaineg wrote:So the company name is accurate then? They really are monsters.

No different than Disney if you really think about it. Or Apple.. Or Nokia... Or (insert big company name here)

Why all HDMI cables are the same, according to CNET.

A slightly overstated headline to get attention, but here's 3 great articles that do a good job of explaining it in mostly plain English.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-20056502-1/why-all-hdmi-cables-are-the-same/

http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-33199_7-57321956-221/why-all-hdmi-cables-are-the-same-part-2/

http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-33199_7-57540275-221/still-more-reasons-why-all-hdmi-cable-are-the-same/

And just for giggles:

http://gizmodo.com/363154/audiophile-deathmatch-monster-cables-vs-a-coat-hanger

themosquito wrote:Friends don't let their friends buy Monster cables!

One of their bait and switch tactics from a while back:

http://www.engadget.com/2007/12/17/hdmi-cable-scam-used-to-fool-in-store-customers/

Just so you know, woot is blocking your link if you click it. I had to copy and paste it to get it work. Looks like amazon is slowly gutting our favorite company of integrity.

chefferz wrote:I'm actually going to go out of my way and defend monster for once.

I bought one of the optima projectors off woot a while ago, and I had a good three or four HDMI cables laying around ranging from 12-20 feet. Absolutely none of the cables would work for that projector for some reason.. Now the local comet down the road was having a 80% off going out of business sale, and I ended up picking one of the 20 foot cables for about $40. That cable was the only one out of my entire pile that actually worked without a hitch for my projector, for that distance I needed to run it.

While I agree the prices are a bit ridiclous, the quality of the cables at least is a lot better. It might be 1 and 0's running down the cable, but if that cable is made of cheap quality metal there's going to be a lot more resistance and you'll have issues running longer lengths.

Chefferz, I think we've got to call this one an outlier, and not the magic of a Monster brand cable. 80% off is a decent deal, and I'm glad that it worked out for you, but I'd bet a 20ft in-wall cable from Monoprice would have worked beautifully. The prices Monster charges are outrageous.

These will go great with my hologram bracelets...

thechilipepper0 wrote:Just so you know, woot is blocking your link if you click it. I had to copy and paste it to get it work. Looks like amazon is slowly gutting our favorite company of integrity.

No conspiracy, just a bad link. Look at the underlying link by resting your cursor on it. The text for the link looks good, but the actual HTML is borked.

I am EXTREMELY ashamed that woot would sell this kind of predatory product. Woot, you should be ashamed to hawk monster products; I thought you were better then this.

gjbloom wrote:Mr. McGuire: I just want to say one word to you. Just one word.

Benjamin: Yes, sir.

Mr. McGuire: Are you listening?

Benjamin: Yes, I am.

Mr. McGuire: Monoprice.

Benjamin: Exactly how do you mean?

Can't recommend monoprice enough for cables. Quality products, low prices, reasonable shipping. Not saying Monster makes a bad product, but you CAN get just as good for less. That and I refuse to buy any Monster product on principal.

blaineg wrote:Why all HDMI cables are the same, according to CNET.

A slightly overstated headline to get attention, but here's 3 great articles that do a good job of explaining it in mostly plain English.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-20056502-1/why-all-hdmi-cables-are-the-same/

http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-33199_7-57321956-221/why-all-hdmi-cables-are-the-same-part-2/

http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-33199_7-57540275-221/still-more-reasons-why-all-hdmi-cable-are-the-same/

It's mind-boggling how Cnet manages to cram so much mostly-correct information into a set of articles and yet come to a blatantly incorrect conclusion that directly contradicts some of the information presented in the articles themselves (and even use it as the headline). The author is so invested in proving that he is "right," he doesn't even bother to read what he actually wrote:

The picture will be perfect up to the point where there's not enough signal to create the image. At that point, you'll have nothing. No picture at all. In the occasional situation where you get sparkles (as mentioned above), this is proof of that the system works (but the cable doesn't).

Hey author, you just said you get all or nothing, period, and in the next sentence directly contradicted yourself. That's exactly what happens when you try to write a technically correct "proof" of an incorrect conclusion.

Anyway, carry right on ignoring differences in materials, build quality, shielding, connector tolerances, corrosion resistance, etc, and try to make up for some over-zealous salespeople's lies by simply repeating an opposing lie instead of acknowledging that the truth actually isn't at either extreme.

If you don't care about the extra hassle, then sure, you can buy the cheapest "high speed" cable available. If it doesn't work at all, or doesn't work at higher data rates due to poor quality control, or if it fails the third time you unplug it because it's flimsy, then buy another cheap one, rinse and repeat. That works fine for many people, but don't go telling me it's exactly the same as a higher quality cable. It's not. It never has been, and never will be; no matter how many times you say it.

In any case, what you really want is a cable with the HDMI logo that indicates "High-Speed," from a reputable company (and that does include places like Monoprice). If you actually pick one with better build quality, then you won't have to worry so much about damaging it by plugging/unplugging it a lot or if it gets moved frequently, etc. Anyone with a brain can see that it's still possible for a sturdier cable to be "better" than a flimsy one, even if they produce the same picture quality under most circumstances. If you are in special circumstances (using cables for a touring show, running long lengths, operating under extreme conditions or in the presence of significant EMI/RFI, and so forth) then better built cables could easily be worth more to you.

At the original suggested retail prices, Monster would be greatly overpriced, but at the Woot! prices, not bad at all if they are actually as well built as they claim to be.

szivick wrote:Zero merit. All of the information is being sent in the form of 1's and 0's so there is no need for different "quality" HDMI cables. This will do just as well.

http://www.amazon.com/Premium-GOLD-Series-Foot-Cable/dp/B00068NUOE/ref=sr_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1360337596&sr=8-4&keywords=10+foot+hdmi+cable

I have to step in here and say you are wrong. There are in fact different kinds of HDMI cables. Not all of them will work with all equipment.

For example, if you have a 3D TV, 4K TV, or anything using 7.1 surround sound you need to use a High Speed HDMI cable. A standard cable will not work. Also, some electronics need an HDMI cable that supports the Ethernet standard for proper data transfer.

As long as you get a High-Speed HDMI cable, then you will be fine.

Here are the different grades of HDMI cables,

Darn! I'm late to the parrot cocktail party. Maybe I can find a Bose or Fram party that's just starting where I can cut and paste comments with no real knowledge about a product. lol

kmartind wrote:
If you don't care about the extra hassle, then sure, you can buy the cheapest "high speed" cable available. If it doesn't work at all, or doesn't work at higher data rates due to poor quality control, or if it fails the third time you unplug it because it's flimsy, then buy another cheap one, rinse and repeat. That works fine for many people, but don't go telling me it's exactly the same as a higher quality cable. It's not. It never has been, and never will be; no matter how many times you say it.

Bullsnot. When setting up the nearly 300 displays in my new business, I don't need to tell you I wanted to save some coin. I bought the cheapest HDMI cables I could find, sourced them for $.75 a piece (6ft, 288 of them). 4 years later, some having been unplugged dozens of times easily, some even being unplugged every work day (for laptops, those would close in on 1000 plug cycles) not one has yet to fail.

There are fewer places making HDMI cable than one might guess.

Monster brand, Not a chance I would buy these.

crisss1205 wrote:I have to step in here and say you are wrong. There are in fact different kinds of HDMI cables. Not all of them will work with all equipment.

For example, if you have a 3D TV, 4K TV, or anything using 7.1 surround sound you need to use a High Speed HDMI cable. A standard cable will not work. Also, some electronics need an HDMI cable that supports the Ethernet standard for proper data transfer.

As long as you get a High-Speed HDMI cable, then you will be fine.

Here are the different grades of HDMI cables,

While this statement is true. There are different types but the cost difference should be measurable in pennies not $10 bills. So, yes be sure you're getting the high speed cable but don't let them fool you into thinking that they're selling you some fancy new 4k hdmi. It's the same cable and should cost the same.

burns11 wrote:Bullsnot. When setting up the nearly 300 displays in my new business, I don't need to tell you I wanted to save some coin. I bought the cheapest HDMI cables I could find, sourced them for $.75 a piece (6ft, 288 of them). 4 years later, some having been unplugged dozens of times easily, some even being unplugged every work day (for laptops, those would close in on 1000 plug cycles) not one has yet to fail.

I've seen really crappy cables and had them fail early in the past. I've also seen cables that didn't fit tightly due to the connector tolerances not being quite right, so they'd flicker or cut out if wiggled too much. I've even seen a huge multi-national company contract for thousands of cables and ship them to customers with products only to later find they were out of spec, caused problems, and had to be replaced. Even though the cable supplier was at fault and had to make things right, it still did some damage to the company's reputation as a result.
Sounds like you got lucky and picked what turned out to be a good brand, or got good batches, or both. Good for you, you saved some money. If you had guessed wrong and your supplier delivered sub-standard products I can guarantee your story would be very different though.

As I already stated, most people would do fine with any decent high speed cable, especially for short runs, but that in no way contradicts my statement that all cables are NOT of exactly the same quality. They actually aren't. You don't "need" to spend more, but there really are some valid reasons for certain others to choose to, and people who claim there are no such reasons are doing a disservice to those folks. Nearly as severe a disservice as people who claim you must buy the most expensive cables to get the clearest picture, which isn't true either. I've never understood why people have to be so polarized about such issues when there's such a reasonable middle ground position.

kmartind wrote: If you had guessed wrong and your supplier delivered sub-standard products I can guarantee your story would be very different though.

Nope, sorry, guessing has nothing to do with it. Sometimes products go wrong. You are just as likely (i.e. extremely unlikely)to get a manufacturing defect from the chinese-made products with the Monster Logo as those with any other logo.

Advantage: Monoprice

kmartind wrote:in no way contradicts my statement that all cables are NOT of exactly the same quality. They actually aren't.

Nope, no one claimed that they are exactly the same or exactly the same quality. They claimed that the differences are IRRELEVANT. Which they are provided the "HDMI Class" (i.e. 1.3, 1.3a, 1.4, etc) is the same.

Advantage: Monoprice

kmartind wrote:You don't "need" to spend more, but there really are some valid reasons for certain others to choose to, and people who claim there are no such reasons are doing a disservice to those folks.

Nope, your attempt to pretend that there are valid differences is the disservice. Your "valid differences" prey upon the elderly and the uninformed.

Advantage: Human Decency

kmartind wrote: I've never understood why people have to be so polarized about such issues when there's such a reasonable middle ground position.

Nope, there is no middle ground. Two opposed positions do not a valid controversy make.

Advantage: [MOD: Inappropriate comment removed.]

Icy13 wrote:Nope, there is no middle ground. Two opposed positions do not a valid controversy make.

Advantage: [MOD: Inappropriate comment removed.]

Disadvantage: You're wrong.
Well, except yes, there's no physical cable specification difference between cables called 1.3 or 1.4a, etc, only between Standard and High Speed, with and without Ethernet. I never disputed that though. I just actually accept that things like quality control, differences in manufacturing tolerances, and materials, actually EXIST, and do affect product quality; a demonstrable fact.
Not to mention that I also shop at Monoprice, and agree that $80 cables are a rip-off...

Edit: Also, since several posters are so keen on Monoprice, here's a statement directly from their page:

Wire gauge directly relates to the amount of electrical current that can be carried on the wire. The larger diameter of wire, the more current it can carry. In terms of HDMI this means that a larger gauge wire (smaller AWG number) is capable of higher bandwidth than a smaller gauge (larger AWG number). Therefore, a 22 AWG wire is capable of higher bandwidth than a 28 AWG wire...
The cutoff points for High Speed HDMI Cables of each AWG rating are:
28 AWG = maximum 10 feet
26 AWG = maximum 12 feet
24 AWG = maximum 15 feet
22 AWG = maximum 25 feet

http://www.monoprice.com/home/home.asp?pn=help&idx=12
So the conductors in an HDMI cable (without an inline amplifier/equalizer chip) labeled as High Speed must be a certain AWG or thicker. The lowest quality cables will frequently be almost exactly at the minimum thickness allowed for the length of the cable. Higher quality cables often use a bit larger conductors, which can help achieve a successful connection in high bandwidth modes even if the source is slightly marginal. Not all of the higher quality options are unreasonably priced either. I'd never pay full retail for Monster HDMI cables, but a 20ft "Professional" line cable from Monoprice actually costs more than the 19ft cable here (though that's the regular price, not a sale). Unfortunately Woot! doesn't specify the AWG of the conductors, so it's hard to compare the two.