Friends don't let friends buy Monster cables

[sara_tanaquil]

One of my recent favorite mini-timewasters has been surfing Gizmodo. It's surprising how much actual useful information I've picked up along with the dross.

I was reading yet another article about how $2 HDMI cables are just as good as $150 cables (I really wish I had known that before I bought my two HDMI cables last year, at least they were on the "low" end of Best Buy's line...), and came across a passing comment:

"Overpriced cables get hilarious reviews on Amazon..."

... with a couple of links. Half an hour later, and I'm sitting here with tears of laughter streaming down my face.

The whole page is made of awesome, but I was particularly fond of:

My cats chewed on this cable and now they can both speak. One of them is gay and the other wants to kill me. I would have rather not known.

(The cable in question lists for $8,450. Yep, you read that right.)

ETA: Don't miss the Tags Customers Associate With This Product.

Comments

[sara-tanaquil.livejournal.com]

Well, the short version as I understand it from reading posts on Gizmodo and Lifehacker:

The expensive cables are made out of better material, are more reliable and will last longer, especially if you plug/unplug them a lot or run them through the wall.

However, if you're looking at 10 foot cables or less, the signal is digital and any two cables with the same rating (preferably, say, HDMI 1.3 and Category 2) will carry the same signal. It's only at greater cable lengths that sensitive machinery can detect any degradation of signal, let alone the human eye.

So, if you're running 20 ft or more of cable through the wall and plan to leave it there for 15 years, it might be worth paying through the nose. For any other use, you might as well buy the cheap stuff first. If it breaks, it won't cost that much to replace or upgrade.

[mvrdrk.livejournal.com]

If you're only running 20 ft of cable and not connecting and disconnecting twice a day, do yourself a favor and buy cable from Home Depot for 20 cents a foot. The detectable difference is nil.