Monster HDMI-400 400 Series HDTV HDMI Cable (2 meters)
by Monster
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of Monster HDMI-400 400 Series HDTV HDMI Cable (2 meters)
Customer Review: I wasted money on these - learn from my mistake
Summary: 2 Stars
These are really silly. The signal is digital. Any cable meeting the HDMI spec will do the same thing. This is not an analog signal that needs to be handled carefully. I spent a bunch of money on my home theater system and bought into the hype about Monster cables. I bought two four meter HDMI cables and a six meter HDMI cable - all 400 series. I should have saved my money and just purchased the cheap versions. Sometimes "Just a Guy" is an idiot. Learn from my mistake.Customer Review: Great Monster Quality, BUT NOT NEEDED!
Summary: 2 Stars
Basically a HDMI cable transfers a digital signal from a source(HD DVD) to an output(TV). Unlike the old RCA cables, HDMI cables do not suffer from signal loss. Yes these cables look beautiful, and you will have bragging rights but they are NOT worth the price at all. Unless you are running the absolute top of the line equipment, will the purchase of this cable be justified.
Save your money, buy a generic HDMI cable. It all works the same.
Customer Review: A good cable, but not a good value
Summary: 2 Stars
What matters is using the cable with the highest capability your gear will support (HDMI, DVI, component), and using a decent quality shielded cable. But don't waste your money on "features" that won't affect the performance of the cable.Customer Review: FUD - a perfect example (applies to the 2-meter cable)
Summary: 1 Stars
FUD - Fear, uncertainty, doubt.
According to Wikipedia, "the term originated to describe disinformation tactics in the computer hardware industry and has since been used more broadly. FUD is a manifestation of the appeal to fear."
Still Wikipedia, quoting Eric S. Raymond: "The idea, of course, was to persuade buyers to go with safe [...] gear rather than with competitors' equipment. This implicit coercion was traditionally accomplished by promising that Good Things would happen to people who stuck with [...], but Dark Shadows loomed over the future of competitors' equipment [...]".
HDMI is all-digital for both sound and picture. As such, it either works or it doesn't and, when it doesn't work, you will know immediately. There's really nothing in-between. If a claim is made that the Monster is 'more reliable' or that it 'lasts longer', I can't see how such claim can be backed - does the hundred-dollar cable last 20 times longer than than the five-dollar cable? And, if it does, do we REALLY care that a cable supporting a standard that may be obsolete in 5 years COULD last for 100 years?
By the way, I do not challenge the claim of high quality for this cable. It appears to be well built. However, it is quality not needed and, in my view, not worth paying for. The way most of us use cables is: we plug them at the back of our electronic boxes and, if they work on 'day one' they are likely to work in the exact same fashion on day 1000 because they are not going to be subjected to any physical or thermal stress and the materials used to build them are not easily degradable. While 'quality' was important for analog cables where good quality made all the difference in the world, the digital wires either transmit the digits or they don't. If they do, they all work the same, the $1 HDMI cable gives you the exact same 'performance' the $100, gold-plated cable does.
The claims that seem to suggest that these expensive wires allow more Gigabytes of data to pass through and the implied suggestion that you would get a less bright image or a less crisp sound if you used a two-dollar cable are NOT true. The HDMI is a published standard and there is a minimum data throughput that must be supported. If it is, then the device is HDMI compliant and you will get everything that HDMI promises to deliver. If some cable exceeds the specified throughput, it's nice but it's irrelevant because no electronic component that's HDMI compliant would attempt to push more bytes through the wire than the standard specifies. If they did, they'd violate the specs and would not sell very well. If your electronic component had an HDMI port that called for an HDMI cable that exceeded the HDMI published standards, then it would no longer be called an HDMI port but a proprietary, non-standard solution.
The following are the HDMI 1.3 specs and ALL certified HDMI 1.3 cables (including the five-dollar wires and the Monster) are going to support them. Whatever 'extra' the M Series offers is useless because no HDMI-connected hardware component is going to ask for more.
Maximum signal bandwidth (MHz) 340
Maximum TMDS bandwidth (Gbit/s) 10.2
Maximum video bandwidth (Gbit/s) 8.16
Maximum audio bandwidth (Mbit/s) 36.86
Maximum Color Depth (bit/px) 48
Maximum resolution over single link at 24-bit/px 2560×1600p75
Maximum resolution over single link at 30-bit/px 2560×1600p60
Maximum resolution over single link at 36-bit/px 1920x1200p75
Maximum resolution over single link at 48-bit/px 1920×1200p60
sRGB
YCbCr
8 channel LPCM/192 kHz/24-bit audio capability
Blu-ray Disc video and audio at full resolution
Consumer Electronic Control (CEC)
DVD-Audio support
Super Audio CD (DSD) support
Deep Color
xvYCC
Auto lip-sync
Dolby TrueHD bitstream capable
DTS-HD Master Audio bitstream capable
Updated list of CEC commands (only on HDMI 1.3a,b,c)
My suggestion: search Amazon for "hdmi cable 1.3" and make an informed price/quality decision before you buy.
NOTE 1: I noticed a typical FUD statement that has been posted on this page in the form of a video. The presenter suggests that all signals, including 'digital' get degraded when passing through a wire because of the 'laws of physics'. The key word in his presentation is that 'IF YOU HAVE A REALLY LONG CABLE' then you may get into trouble. This is true. You can't have a 100 ft. HDMI cable or a one mile-long cable. Eventually, unless your signal, digital or analog, is boosted in some way, it's going to die and you won't be able to decode it at the other end.
However, this is NOT the point. This HDMI cable is NOT 'really long'. In fact, it is REALLY SHORT and, no matter how much FUD is inserted into the discussion, on 6 ft. or 8 ft. cables, you are NOT going to get a 'better' picture just because you pay 100 times more for a wire.
Unless the vendor comes up with some unbiased tests showing that, on 6 ft. or on 8 ft. cables the less expensive brands loses 'bits' to the degree that the receiving device can't correct for the loss while the expensive brand does not, this is nothing but FUD.
NOTE 2: All of the above applies to the 2-meter cable. When ordering the 4-meter and especially the 6-meter lengths, I would make sure that the cable is certified as "HDMI Category 2" or "High-Speed" FOR THAT SPECIFIC LENGTH.
Customer Review: Try less expensive cables before you go for "Designer" brands
Summary: 1 Stars
I have been an audio / electronics enthusiast for over 50 years now (am giving away my age I guess) and I have tried or owned a number of different expensive brands including Monster. These "designer brand cables" (I call them) are the biggest ripoff in electronics. I do not doubt that some of them may sometimes have more durable connectors or sometimes stronger construction. I remember seeing speaker cables selling for $20,000.00 for a 12 foot pair made out of silver or some cables in the multithousands that looked like they could power a city. Just ask yourself when you test by listening or looking can you hear or see an immediate difference for the price or is it all "the emperor's new clothes". I think that if you hookup a $12.00 cable and a $100.00+ cable and you have to switch back and forth in order to try to see or hear a difference that should end the search because for that difference in money there should be no if's. ands, or buts. BTW I have never seen or heard a difference in these comparisons unless one of the cables was defective. I used to go to the Audio shows starting in the 50's and met the legends of audio, like David Hafler, Ed Villchur, and Saul Marantz, I cannot help but reflect on what they would think about all this marketing baloney these cable companies put out. I am certain they would be amused and shocked and finally outraged. In those days,it seems to me, there was a greater value on honesty, ethics, and integrity. High priced designer brand cables are pushed in all the audio stores by and large because of the enormous profits there is in this business of cables and quite often because of incentives given to the salesmen and retailers to promote them by the manufacturer. There has, to my knowledege, NEVER been a valid scientific study that confirms anything these designer cable manufacturers claim. Many of these manufacturers say that known science or scientific testing doesn't matter for reasons they make up because they wont admit that truth to tell only their outrageous overcharging and profits matter.
I suggest you let your ears and eyes be the judge, don't fall for the marketing hype. Don't allow yourself to be fooled by "the emperors new clothes".