Monitor Movie Guide. Monitor Daily. Photos of the Week. Business Wire. Many places sell normal-width HDMI cables for a few bucks. Is there a difference? Not really. You've read of free articles. Subscribe to continue. Mark Sappenfield. Our work isn't possible without your support. Digital subscription includes: Unlimited access to CSMonitor. The Monitor Daily email. No advertising. That teetering space between "everything's good" and "I got nothin.
Video As you've read, the ones and zeros of an HD image trot happily along, more or less, from your source to your TV. Over short runs, there really isn't anything other than a faulty cable which itself isn't that likely that would cause any issue.
Over long runs, it's possible that interference of some kind, or a poorly made cable more on this later , can reduce the "quality" of the signal to the point where the TV can't make heads or tails of it. Heads or tails -- that's a digital joke. At this point, you're on the edge of the digital precipice.
The most likely outcome is sparkles. Here's what they look like:. It looks a lot like snow, or static. The data received by the TV wasn't enough to figure out what those failed pixels are supposed to be. Your TV likes you, though, and it really wants to show you an image. So it builds the rest of the video, minus the failed pixels.
It's important to note that this artifact is pretty unlikely, even over long runs. You are way more likely to just not get anything at all. If it's so unlikely, why do I bring it up? Because it's important to understand that it is impossible for the pixel to be different. It's either exactly what it's supposed to be, or it fails and looks like one of the images above. In order for one HDMI cable to have "better picture quality" than another, it would imply that the final result between the source and display could somehow be different.
It's not possible. It's either everything that was sent, or full of very visible errors sparkles. The image cannot have more noise, or less resolution, worse color, or any other picture-quality difference. The pixels can't change. They can either be there perfect, yay! All the claims about differences in picture quality are remnants of the analog days, which were barely valid then and not at all valid now.
There is no way for different cables to create a different color temperature , change the contrast ratio , or anything else picture-quality-wise. At this point some of you are saying "but sparkles are noise. If you see sparkles, you need a different cable. Another potential "fail" is a failure of the HDCP copy protection, which shows up as a total snowy image, a blinking image, or something else hard to miss. I have seen this in my testing, though, so it's worth mentioning.
One in particular claims this is because there is no error correction on the audio and its cables are more likely to transmit all the data.
First of all, this is untrue. Audio over HDMI actually has more error correction than the video signal. But even if this weren't the case, it's still utter nonsense. Dolby has extensive error correction built into its codecs. DTS presumably works in the same way, though the company ignored my repeated requests for info.
Cheap or expensive, the cable is irrelevant when it comes to transmitting Dolby or DTS. If the cable is faulty or if there is some cataclysm causing data to be lost between the player and the receiver, the decoders are designed to mute instead of blasting out compromised data. There is no such thing as an audio version of "sparkles.
So if you're getting audio dropouts, it's possible it's the HDMI cable. But if you're not getting video issues as well, the problem is likely elsewhere. If the audio isn't muting, then as long as you're outputting an audio codec, you're getting exactly what's on the disc. This data is packetized, just like the rest of the audio and video signal. Rather, its classification and its certification do. You can buy a very inexpensive cable and still get top-notch performance.
Our recommendation is to pick from among Monoprice or AmazonBasics options, which have huge followings for their affordability and reliability. See the sidebar for specific suggestions. You can find out more about the certification and how to verify authenticity of certification in this article and on the HDMI. These cables are extremely overpriced.
Use keywords only as a starting point. If you look on Amazon or Monoprice. Ensure you get the right cable by looking at the actual specs. The quickest way to determine the type is to look for its bandwidth rating. Price is still an important clue about type and quality. By paying attention to bandwidth rating, refresh rate, and price, you can avoid unreliable cables.
Inexpensive options outside of known brands AmazonBasics and Monoprice are currently the top two can be tempting, but some budget cables have weak electromagnetic interference EMI shielding, which can disrupt your Wi-Fi network, and they might cause visual artifacts and signal drop-outs. On the flip side, bandwidth rating and price can also help you discover cables that punch above their weight, such as the AmazonBasics High Speed HDMI cable Remove non-product link.
Active HDMI cables should not cost exorbitantly more than their passive counterparts. While prices do go up, you can find them for well below the usurious rates of highly marketed cables at Best Buy and similar stores. Purchase only as much cable length as you need. The general rule of thumb is that for lengths of six feet or less, a passive cable is more than adequate.
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