Black Rhodium HDMI cables hit "every price point" except ours
Actually, we're being too kind. It hits every price point except the one below "absurdly inflated." For whatever reason, Black Rhodium figures it can get away with launching a pricey new line of HDMI cables that are "engineered for optimum performance at every price point," yet the cheapest one is a full £35 ($69)... and that's for a 0.5-meter edition. The sure-to-be-noticeably-faster (ahem) Sapphire HiSpeed cables boast gold-plated connectors, copper conductors and meet the ridiculous demands of HDMI 1.3b . Oh, and they go for £75, £130 and £180 for the 1/5/7.5-meter models. Sure, maybe these aren't quite as baffling as Monster Cables, but they're way too close for comfort.
Filed under: Cables
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Rob @ Jun 27th 2008 11:15PM
Well, if Monster Cables can get away with fooling customers for the last decade or, and now with the HDMI cables, what makes you think another liar would not join in in the fraud. I laugh when I see those $34 HDMI cables, in all brand names, with all kinds of fancy terminology and sales pitch. Please, MonoPrice FTW!!!
eric f. @ Jun 28th 2008 10:56AM
"MonoPrice FTW!!!"
Word.
CubeGuy @ Jun 28th 2008 12:49AM
I can get them in town for $15. I love local stores.
WiFiSpy @ Jun 28th 2008 1:43AM
M0n0Price !!!
DrXym @ Jun 28th 2008 4:12AM
Oh well, I guess I'll just have console myself with the regular cables and their 100% picture and sound quality.
John Drinkwater @ Jun 28th 2008 5:37AM
If you use British Pounds in your post, would you fancy using metres too? ;)
GenBanks @ Jun 28th 2008 8:34AM
We don't use the metric system very much in the U.K. I'm afraid ;) We still use miles etc quite often.
Which is understandable if we remember which empire spawned the US... :p
DrXym @ Jun 28th 2008 9:12AM
Aside from miles and pints virtually everything else is metric in the UK.
bartoron @ Jun 28th 2008 9:44AM
What about stones? Those are basically 14 pounds.
DrXym @ Jun 28th 2008 12:30PM
Stones, pounds, ounces may be used by people of a certain age, but all weights and measures are officially metric. The list of exceptions are very small - miles, pints (for beer) and acres I think.
Ireland is slightly further along than the UK - all road signs and speeds were switched from miles to kilometres a few years back.
GenBanks @ Jun 30th 2008 12:46PM
But in day to day usage, I hardly ever people talking about meters or kilometers or other such metric stuff. And I'm not really 'of a certain age', I'm a uni student. And even if we're not completely anti-metric, if Britons were ever told that their miles, stones and pints were extinct there'd be a mini revolution :p
Jose Olcese @ Jun 28th 2008 10:28AM
What about this USD499 ethernet cable?
http://www.usa.denon.com/ProductDetails/3429.asp
Michael @ Jun 29th 2008 10:03PM
All of these fancy over-priced cables and accessories remind me of the story of Emperor's New Clothes.
We're expected to believe that these cables are magically better just because the company says they are.
Consumers should demand that companies like Monster and Black Rhodium prove that their "premium" cables are actually worth the price by showing third-party test results.
My stance is that if you can't hear/see a difference, there isn't one.
Jason @ Jun 30th 2008 12:44PM
If anyone who says high-quality HDMI cables are over-priced had ever tried to run one more than 15 feet and watch a 1080p Blu-Ray movie, you would know that there IS a difference. But if your cables are short or you are using a bargain-basement $99 upconverting DVD player and an el-cheapo $799 Vizio TV, you can use the cheap stuff because your system isn't transferring enough data to need a better cable. Stop being an armchair quarterback if you've never played the game!
Zulbahrim Abdul Ghaffar @ Aug 18th 2008 2:33AM
Here's what I experienced. I connect my Philips LCD Full HD LCD TV model PFL 5403 to my
Pioneer HDD recorder with 1080p upscaling through which I also output my cable TV decoder
( notorious for its low resolution that produces fuzzy, watery pictures on high resolution displays.)
When I first bought the LCD TV I used the HDMI cable that came with the Pioneer recorder.
Depending on the source the results ranged from clean, natural near plasma colour vibrancy (from
the recorder ) to 30 % better than S-video pictures save for one particular channel that was just
greenish and blurry beyond redemption from the cable TV decoder. Last weekend I replaced the free
cable with Black Rhodium Pearl expecting to see a major difference. Well, on the 'Dragon Wars'
movie, the only discernable difference was on the skin tone of the heroine ( more natural and detailed )
when she was lying on the couch under hypnotism while throughout the rest of the movie I wondered whether I had wasted
my money on very subtle improvements that I could have lived without. I played Live Free Die Hard
and detected improved colour saturation and clarity, ok , more noticeable differences, same goes for
the action dark comedy caper ' Shoot 'Em Up ' but on the British bank heist ' The Bank Job' and the
mindless thriller ' Boarding Gate', I swore I could have used my free cable and still got the same
results.
However, it was what I got out of the cable TV that impressed me more. While previously with the free
HDMI cable I was merely happy to see improved picture quality from S video, with the Black Rhodium
it was like watching DVD instead of the low resolution cable TV. Last night I watched Casino Royale
and was very impressed especially when they had close ups of Craig and Green smooching, the skin
tone, the lines on his face, the imperfections were so vivid and lifelike. Outdoor scenes also had more
depth and colour was more realistic. Add to that sound that was fuller and more detailed so much so
that I either though my mobile phone was ringing or there was something falling object in the living
room depending on the scene.
In conclusion, had I paid the retail price of about £200 for a 2m lengthI would have cursed myself but
I got it relatively cheap at about £65, so I'll console myself with 1) more viewing to look out for more
improvements on a few samples ( which I would not bother doing had I stuck to my free
'comes-in-the-box' Pioneer HDMI cable and 2) now, watching cable movies is more satisfying.
I guess Jason has some points, if your cable is short and you are not using Blu-ray, may be you
ought to seriously consider unless you have lots of spare money.