Having finally got round to buying a HD TV I have dug out the HDMI cable that came with the Foxsat HDMI and noticed that its a cheap one - not gold. Is it worth buying a better quality one ?

Does it work? Does the picture break up? If the picture is perfectly fine then there is no point at all buying anything else.

As long as the digital information gets from one end of the cable to the other without degradation then that is all it has to do. Changing one cable that meets that criteria for another that does exactly the same will have zero effect on picture quality, no matter what the cable costs.

As @chrisjr says. The likes of Comet, Currys etc try to flog £100 cables as giving a better picture. It's been proved time and time again that this is no more than marketing hype. (In other words a lie.)

If you have spare cash I would buy a better remote control which does help a little

Using the box that is and not the picture quality.

Automan.

Cheers for the info - will try it as is when the TV arrives - just concerned as my Foxsat (non-PVR) came with a gold one. Re the remote, I use the now withdrawn Phillips SRU5170 to work the current TV, Foxsat PVR, a Freeview PVR, and a DVD/VCR combo (although it struggles with the latter at times, however its yonks since I used it anyway). The Foxsat PVR remote isn't that bad, I have in the kitchen to work a Samsung Freeview TV and the Foxsat (non-PVR) - although for some of the less than daily used TV stuff have to use the Samsung remote.

As others have said, it makes no difference whatsoever, supposed 'quality' leads offer no improvement - other than massive profits for the seller (on a £5 lead you might make £1, on a £50 lead you're more likely to make £45 profit!).

No difference at all, its digital, either the picture gets there or it doesnt.

The only way you should get a more expensive one is if you are getting break up due to interference.

Bet your new TV won't have a gold HDMI socket though.

Almost certainly not, some of the expensive leads are a complete rip-off. If the lead you have works then that's good enough.

Rip off cables surely not...

http://www.futureshop.co.uk/wireworl...0m-p-3479.html

Wonder how many idiots they con out of 7 grand for that

i thought the £1k kettle type power lead was a rip off.

It just proves theres a lot of morons about with too much money. Even if i was a millionaire, i wouldnt pay that for a cable.

Or it gets there wrong since there is no error correction or detection in the HDMI standard.

Break-up only happens with the MPEG compressed data used for DTT and DSat transmissions. HDMI carries raw un-compressed data. Errors only show up as noise, and can be totally unnoticed by those not looking for them.
It is certainly true though that it is pointless spending a fortune on a cable for a digital interface like HDMI (if the cable works then there is nothing that could be done to make it better). However, spending peanuts may give you a cable that manages to connect but doesn't actually work very well. Though of course you may not even notice and you'll have saved yourself a few quid
Lastly, to Gold - the most misunderstood cable feature. If you gold plate the contacts it doesn't improve the signal but it does stop oxidisation. This will only come into play if you expect the connection to remain in place for years - the connectors will slowly oxidise and cause a loss of signal. Gold works by preventing this oxidisation but only works if both sides, plug and socket are gold plated. With non-gold connectors you may need to clean them every year or two to maintain a good signal but these days who leaves things alone for long enough for this to matter? Gold is used these days just to make it look nice

And with the current price of gold I should imagine that the plating is getting thinner and thinner ..... it will probably simply rub off if you clean it!

Gold plating is used to prevent oxidation when the connectors are NOT mated, in storage, often used for protecting PCB edge connections with low-level signal paths.

The gold plating is probably cut through by the first insertion of the connector. Once made oxidation should be high-on impossible as air is excluded from the parts in firm contact.

A complete waste of money on most domestic connectors. Looks smart though

And can someone please explain the point of gold plating a Toslink cable?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Ultimate-Opt.../dp/B001P9TCYU

I mean does optical fibre corrode?

It looks impressive to those who don't know the facts - so it can command a higher price (profit).

Awwww why spoil the game with logic and good sense?

I was hoping for something along the lines of...

"It aligns the photons in the fibre so they travel through the cable more smoothly thus enhancing the sonic qualities of the audio."

or some such BS

Hear Hear

You'll notice when the HDCP key negotiation fails!!!

Expensive cables are a con-trick for the naive. Any HDMI 1.0 or standard or category 1 cables exceed the requirements for 1080i50.

Of course you can buy knock-off versions of anything on eBay that don't work - but the genuine article bearing a legitimate HDMI trademark only costs a few quid.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HDMI#Cables

Cheers,
David.

That all happens on the control channel which operates at a very slow data rate compared to the video data. The control channel does have error detection and correction capabilities whereas the video and audio data channels don't.
This is why a v.cheap HDMI cable might allow connection but could provide poor video.

No, this is why a FAULTY HDMI cable (regardless of price) 'could' provide poor video.

HDMI leads have to meet a certain specification, if they do then no matter the cost the picture won't be any different.

If it doesn't meet that spec, then it's faulty.

As it says in one of Amazon's customers reviews of this product ...
'If it were possible to have "sexy" optical leads, then these would be the "weapon of choice".'

Okay,cable works fine, but have had a strange episode with the Foxsat - it was recording 2 HD channels, tried to switch it on so that I could play one of the recording from the start. It failed to handshake with the TV so I manually set the TV to it - just a blank screen. It was only when one of the recordings stopped that an image appeared on the TV

If my HDR is recording 1 or 2 channels, and I switch on the TV it will not see the Humax via HDMI. It is necessary to power cycle the TV, or unplug & replug the HDMI cable. Just a funny within HDMI protocol (I think).

From what I have seen reported some makes of TV are more prone to this issue than others.