Stores trying to rip people off by saying they have to have Monster Cable

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portege

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#28937 16-Dec-2008 19:25

My ex-flatmate wrote me an email saying that she's trying to buy a PS3 w/ Sony and the salesperson (Probably from Bond and Bond/DSE etc) told them that HAVE to buy a $500 monster cable HDMI so it would work.

I find that quite disgusting as my friend know nothing about this matter and the salesperson is taking advantage of it - I suggest her to go somewhere else where they can be honest!

n00dy

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#184637 16-Dec-2008 21:05

so right, having worked in car I am dismayed at stores giving the uninitiated the idea that they must have blah blah type cable at great expence. I have a mix and real cheap cable and some good quality ( not monster & you dont need to spend a fortune to get decent cable) and it is difficult to notice any difference. My opinion, save the $

portege

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Master Geek

#184638 16-Dec-2008 21:10

I read somewhere that ALL HDMI cables are the same as all they do is pass over a digital signal

freitasm

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Geekzone

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#184641 16-Dec-2008 21:26

Yes, it is a scam.

musicislife

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#184661 16-Dec-2008 23:44

theonly difference is the quality of the coating on the cable really to protect against corrosion etc.

you can pick up a nice gold coated hdmi cable off trademe for around $10

crazed

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#184688 17-Dec-2008 07:09

Yep struck this myself at the local Harvey Normans store, Brought a HDMI DVD player and was told I needed a monster HDMI cable to get it working. The salesman was pretty pushy about it, until I pointed out that the DVD player had component out and I was planning to use it rather than HDMI. I eventually purchased a HDMI cable through another store afew weeks later, a 1 meter cable cost me $65, still have yet to notice much different between the HDMI cable and the component.

CraZeD,
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sbiddle

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#184693 17-Dec-2008 07:57

The Zinwell Freeview|HD boxes were purposely sold without HDMI cables at the request of some major retailers who saw this as an opportunity to upsell customers to a $150 Monster Cable since it was required to view HD content.

It's not hard to get a 1M HDMI cable wholesale for ~$10 - at least DSE on the other hand included a cable in their box so their customers didn't feel completely ripped off.

LennonNZ

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#184696 17-Dec-2008 08:08

crazed: Yep struck this myself at the local Harvey Normans store, Brought a HDMI DVD player and was told I needed a monster HDMI cable to get it working. The salesman was pretty pushy about it, until I pointed out that the DVD player had component out and I was planning to use it rather than HDMI. I eventually purchased a HDMI cable through another store afew weeks later, a 1 meter cable cost me $65, still have yet to notice much different between the HDMI cable and the component.

As DVD's are not "HD" you will most likley see exactly the same quality over HDMI and Component. Depending on the DVD player it will upscale it to 1080p or just send over HDMI the unscaled 576p output. but its still orginally only 576p quality.

I have bought $10 HMDI cables and $80 wholesale ($250 retail) HDMI cables and haven't noticed much of a difference apart from the $10 HDMI cables "looking cheap" but they have only been under 2M cables.

If you buy a 10M cheap cable it SHOULD be able to go 10M with no problems (why else would they make it/sell it.. think about it).

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akia

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#184843 17-Dec-2008 19:22

I've had quite a few of my close friends have this told to them by sales man too. One oh my friends even laughed right in front of the guy and then walked out. We've also had guys trying to sell us $400 cable, when we knew the $30 - $40 cable was just as good and we kindly declined the $400 one :)

It's somewhat shocking how they can put this across to people. Any friends that we hear who are purchasing LCD's we warn straight away.

LennonNZ

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#184850 17-Dec-2008 19:43

Have a look at: http://www.audioholics.com/education/cables/long-hdmi-cable-bench-tests

a note at the end of all this..

A"t lengths less than 4 meters you can just about use silly string (OK, not really) and get HDMI to pass at any current resolution. At less than 3 meters you'll even extend that to 12-bit color and possibly the next crazy idea HDMI Licensing decides to throw at consumers. Don't spend a lot on these cables and if you want to save money you won't let anyone at a big box store talk you into buying from them."

Thanks
Craig

timbosan

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#184872 17-Dec-2008 21:48

Guys, who have to realise that Monster Cable themselves are worse in a lot of ways than the retailers (and no, I am not making ANY excuses for the retailers, even though I have a family member who works at Harvey Norman they STILL try and flog me Monster Cables!), and the best case in point so far is this quite amazing situation in the US where Monster tried to sue another company for copyright infringment, but didn't realise the owner of said sued company had a legal background.

http://www.audioholics.com/news/industry-news/blue-jeans-strikes-back

It is great reading, and shows that eventually you will find someone who will fight back.

[EDIT MOD (RC): Changed the retailers name, please treat everyone as you would like to be treated.]

eXDee

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#185022 18-Dec-2008 21:07

I hate monster with a passion, thankfully the specific shop i work in doesn't sell that brand, but i certainly dont try and be pushy about any other cables either.
Most of the blame goes on monster, and the head office of the company for choosing that product and the sales policy to go with it. The salespeople have to get their BS from somewhere.

kiwitrc

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#185057 19-Dec-2008 06:11

To slightly bend the thread, the company I work for have a lab and tested some audio interconnect cable for a company some years ago. They were claiming all sorts of things and wanted frequency response tests done. We did this and gave them the results. At the same time we did identical tests an twin tru rip (electrical cable) to see how that went. The Tru rip had a slightly better frequency response (although within the margin of error for the test set up). From memory I think the tested cables sold for around $600 and the Tru Rip was $1.20/m

robjg63

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#185092 19-Dec-2008 10:38

Amazing how this cable con continues.

I saw an article in the media recently (was it on stuff.co.nz?) where they were recommending people to buy really expensive cables or they would get a bad picture.

I think the main reason that retailers push it so hard is that the big screen TVs and DVD players are sold on pretty tight margins these days and they actually make more profit selling you a 'magical' cable than they do on selling you the appliance - but I cant see for a short cable (say 2m or less) that you are likely to get too much signal loss.

Nothing is impossible for the man who doesn't have to do it himself - A. H. Weiler

Jaxson

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#185101 19-Dec-2008 11:02

Big thing really is that with digital, if all the bits get there, the same signal is recreated. The focus really should be on shielding to ensure no interference reaches the signal. Thing is if you're running in an industrial plant room with motors/fans etc operating then this is an issue. If you're experiencing this type of interference in your living room you have bigger problems than your picture quality!

Try the cheaper ones first and spend more later if you need it or the cheaper one has poor quality plugs etc. If it works for you, then it's all good.