The Hoff

iTrader: (5)

I am trying to display an HD movie on my PC, being viewed via VLC player, to my HD tv.

To do this I think I just need a DVI to HDMI cable and carry the sound seperately via the sound card to my home cinema system (have done this already but using DIVX movies), I have looked for the cables but the price varies so much! From 80p from Amazon with £4 postage thru the Ebay channels starting at £4 + postage up to the £30 versions.

Are they really any different? How much should I be looking to pay?

Ant

can you not use the VGA cable i do on mine and its perfect if you get the res right and your tv will support it , it will show a hd films ok

GC8

High end TFT televisions dont have a VGA port. I was pissed off to discover that myself. As the signal is digital then theres no point at all paying for an expensive cable.

Simon

Ant

My sony Bravia 3 Months old has one?

bigsinky

he said high end tvs mate ;-)

Ant

sorry thought £1000 on a 40" LCD would be high end enough obviously not

GC8

The lower models in the ony range have one. When I got mine Id looked at one in Currys that had a VGA in D-Sub, but mine (a 'W' model, the equivalent is the 'X' according to Sony) and the 'V' model below it didnt have a VGA port. Whether this has changed I dont know, but Sony Technical said that VGA wasnt and wouldnt be supported on high end kit.

Ant

my bad i could have the V then just tried looking but quite hard when its on the wall all i know its Kdl - 40D 3500/4000 and its 1080p

MJW

I posted a similar question a while ago and got cables & connectors pretty cheap from here :

Premium HDMI Cables

I got a 12m HDMI cable and DVI-HDMI adaptor for £30 & they work fine. You can buy graphics cards these days that can also carry sound signal over HDMI, but I did it with using seperate coax cable.

Removed.

The Gadget Show did a test on HDMI cables comparing el-cheapo, mid-price and foofing expensive, and they couldn't spot any difference with the naked eye, and they were peering up close on a pretty huge screen. I guess if you used some really fancy test gear you'd measure a difference, but I wouldn't splash out too much.

bigsinky

i was taking the pish mate hence the ;-)

chrisUK300

iTrader: (10)

Buy cheapest you can find, ive seen HDMI cables in Currys for nearly £100

Got a cheapo from Asda for £8 works a treat, its a digital signal anyway IIRC its not affected by the cable.

Chris

GC8

'Premium cables'; £30 HDMI? Why, when its a digital signal so the cheapest Chinese piece of tat will work just as well? There's only an advantage to be had with a decent cable, when you're working with an analogue signal. The sound quality isn't dependant on the signal quality in a digital signal, as long as the binary code gets through (and it will on a piece of doorbell wire!), then the sound you hear from the converter will be perfect.

Expensive digital cables are a massive con and I wouldn't deal with a firm that made or sold them, as from that you can see what their opinion of you is.

Ant

exactly I see it all the time with customers who just bought a new tv and needing a aerial , currys selling them the 1.5mtr lead for about £80. They was 70 year old ffs con artists

chrisUK300

iTrader: (10)

I knew someone would be along to explain it in a more technical term than I could manage

GC8