Top Ten Lies in HDTV Sales - Lies 5 & 6
Top 10 Lies in HDTV Sales
Lies are spun in consumer electronics sales for a variety of reasons: sometimes it's to make the sale and sometimes it's just well meaning ignorance. Protect yourself from misinformation with GizmoCafe's guide to HDTV.
6: Up-converting DVD players turn DVD Video into HD: Bad, bad sales people tell this blatant lie all the time. Up-conversion / up-scaling or up-sampling DVD players are a new development. Some of the so called up-converting DVD players don't up-convert at all, just having an HDMI or DVI output on a DVD player is enough for many to be marketed as an "HDTV DVD Player." Don't believe the hype. DVD video is 480P at best, so you will never get 1280 x 720 pixels out of a DVD even if it up-converts. If you want HD from a video disk you'll have to buy either a Blu-ray or HD DVD player.
5: Use X-brand video cables for superior image quality: This is a lie that's been around since the early days of hi-fi audio. The only attribute to a cable that will allow it to provide better image quality is that cables format. Brand or fancy materials in a cable do nothing for the image quality. Cabling formats have an explicit ascending order of quality that goes like this:
- Composite Video Cable: The worst possible video connection capable of only 480i.
- S-Video Cable: A step up from Component, still only capable of 480i.
- Component Video Cables: This is where video is capable of progressive scan. Component is an analogue video connection and provides the best possible image quality from 720P or 1080i sources.
- DVI: Is a digital video format that is Component's equal; it is no better or worse than Component.
- HDMI: Like DVI, HDMI is a digital video format also providing your HDTV with equal image quality to component Because HDMI is very high bandwidth, it's also capable of streaming multi-channel audio with HDTV video. It's said to be capable of streaming higher video resolutions than Component or DVI, but that would require a source and display compatible with that particular resolution.
The digital progressive scan video connections are no better than component at bringing your HDTV a 480P image from a DVD player, or 720P/1080i images from an HD source.
