I recently purchased my flat panel HDTV set so I am looking for some good cables. I’ve always heard Monster cables are the best but they are so ridiculously expensive. If I purchased all the cables I needed through them I could easily double the price of my TV!
So, I am looking for a high quality cable not made by them. In other words, somewhere in the middle between bargain basement cables and super high quality Monster cables. Any pointers with brand names and such would be appreciated greatly, thanks.
In all my years doing home a/v, i can honestly say that unless you are a complete audophile/videophile, you will not notice a difference between Monster and any We-Makem-Goodem brand.
This is almost true. I’d avoid super-cheap RF cables, like you’d use for hooking up your cable or satellite feed, since quality does matter here–cheap RF cables tend to be (or become) leaky, and therefore noisy. For most other types of signals, low- to medium-quality cables are not significantly worse than high-end cables. Some cabling solutions are outright ripoffs, in fact. One case in point are the component video cables. In many cases, these are the exact same cables used for composite video/audio, but with different connector color codes; they usually sell for two to three times the plrice, however. The component connection found on most DVD players definitely will give you a better quality picture on TVs that can accept it, but stay away from cables specifically labeled for it. Buy the yellow-red-white baseband A/V cables, and just be sure to match up the connections properly.
SlickRoenick- I do not know what constitutes being an audio/videophile but from my current selection of no-name brand cables I can spot a minor difference between various cables of various origins and ages. I have an S-video cables that kind of sucks, and one that is a little better. I have tons of AV RCA cables and luckily two of them sound better than the rest.
All of the red/white/yellow A/V cables I’ve seen use coax for the yellow video line and simple twist-shielded audio-grade cable for the audio. Might work for component, but the different impedance, high-frequency rolloff and signal propagation characteristics might have odd effects on the picture, depending on which signals are on which wire.
Might look OK on a smaller display, but on a large screen (40" or more) it might be a mess.
I’ve seen very few like that–most of them that were almost always were super-duper cheap. Most of the ones I’ve come across were identical braid-shielded coax across the board. I guess we’ve had different experiences in this regard.
Whenever I’ve been involved in projects that require cable fabrication, we usually end up buying bulk cable from Belden and connectors from Amphenol. Both companies make high-quality products that are widely used in commercial and government settings. I’d look for companies that tell you who supplies their bulk cable and connectors, and how they build and test their cable assemblies. You can get top-quality cables without paying insane audiophile/videophile prices.
I use these cables, and they are well built and work as advertised. They use thick 75 ohm cables, triple shielded.
If you absolutely must have more expensive cables with professional-grade Canare connectors on them, try www.bluejeanscable.com. These cables are industrial quality - the kind of stuff you’ll find connecting AV gear in television studios. Belden cable, Canare connectors. You simply won’t find anything that will give you a better picture or last longer.
Here’s the info page for their component cables. You can see the difference between these cables and the ones I linked to above - the pccables brand are made on an assembly line with a molded rubber sheath around the cable and connector. The bluejeans cables are made from separate components. A 12ft cable in this style is about $60.
The thing is, you won’t notice the difference in picture quality between the $9.00 cable and the $60.00 cable. The bluejeans cables will take more abuse, and I’d buy them if I was putting them in an environment where equipment had to be connected and disconnected all the time. Those Canare connectors will stand up better after the 500th time they’ve been unplugged from something and plugged back in.
In a home environment, I’d say the two cables are functionally equivalent. Go with the $9.00 cable.
As for the multi-hundred dollar top-end Monster cables and such - they are a total ripoff, bordering on fraud.
I’ve learned not to build my own cables. While it is not all that hard it can be a bit of a pain for those not used to doing it (as with anything those who do it regularly make it look easy). That said most cables I build are ethernet cables but I have found coax to be messy without the proper (read purpose made) tools.
Buying pre-made cables with a little bit of effort to keep costs in line I think is worthwhile. A manufactured cable will generally be more reliable than one you make yourself. Again I will note I say this from a computer perspective where screwups are generally more noticeable and important for proper operation but I would say to do it with any cable unless you have the tools and expertise to do it yourself.