For Christmas, I received a brand new Apple TV system courtesy of my brother-in-law! A fine gift as I’m sure you’ll agree.
I was disgruntled to find that Apple don’t ship the Apple TV with any sort of connection cable. It arrived with the power cord, a remote and the unit itself. I can understand the reasoning behind it – why waste bundling peripherals with a unit like Apple TV when there are such a wide range of connectors for televisions.
Will it be connected to a TV or a monitor? Does the screen have a HDMi socket? or will it be connected via DVI? Is it Scart or Component? And that’s just the TV side. On the AppleTV unit, you can still send the signal out via the component sockets or the HDMI. There’s also a dedicated digital-audio out too!
So there is a reason to the lack of signal out cable – but surely they can bundle even a basic connector? say a set of component cables. Just to get things up & running when it’s unboxed.
Anyway – I digress.
Today, I popped to the shops with the intention of picking up a HDMI to HDMI cable to connect the AppleTV with our HD-TV to get the best picture quality possible.
After battling the crowds hunting for bargains, I found myself in the TV peripherals section of Currys. The cheapest HDMI to HDMI cable I could find was £40 (that’s $65 for our American friends). One cable I saw was £105 ($170). PC World next door was the same! I don’t like being ripped off so I left empty handed.
I jumped onto Apple.com when I got home and they had cables which topped out at £20. A lot cheaper and what I was expecting to pay for a cable. But delivery was between 2 & 4 weeks! Next stop, Amazon. I found a HDMI to HDMI cable for £2. Bargain. So I ordered it straight away and then later pondered the quality of said cable. Can a £2 cable really do the same job as a £40 cable?
I decided to do a little reading up on the quality. I want to get my Apple TV up & running asap. I don’t want a cheapo cable arriving only for it to be no good & I’ve got to wait another couple of days for a better cable to arrive.
A lot of comments I’ve read have brought up the same message. Because HDMI cables are digital – they’re only sending 0’s & 1’s. It either gets there or it doesn’t. There’s no half signal like on an analogue cable.
Some of the comments on this Ars Technica article all say the same thing. Big retailers make their money on cables. Some retailers putting as much as 500% profit on cables.
Apple.com are selling a white Belkin HDMI to HDMI cable, 1.8m long (6ft) – £18. Curry’s are selling a white Belkin HDMI to HDMI cable only 1m long (3ft) – £80.
Wow. That’s one hell of a profit margin!
So I’m going to wait for my £2 cable to turn up, and I’ll plug it in & then update with the outcome.
Previously: Getting My Hands Dirty
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MrQwest | Jan 11, 07:21 AM | Permalink
UPDATE – I received the HDMI cable that I paid £2 for from Amazon it works a treat! Can’t understand how people can charge ‘Currys’ prices for a cable twenty times cheaper!