The Devil's boots don't creak - Scottish proverb
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Kogan takes aim at retail giants over HDMI cables
ELECTRONICS FIRM Kogan has set out to expose major retailers for selling over priced HDMI cables to unwitting consumers.
Kogan is on the warpath to help consumers realise that they don't need expensive HDMI cables. It is set on highlighting that large companies are only after the upsell and tricking people into spending more money.
In its blog Kogan said, "We challenge Currys and John Lewis to set up two of their so-called 'Premium 3D TVs,' one with their overpriced £100 HDMI cable, the other with the Kogan £4 HDMI cable. Put them side by side and let their own 'spokespeople' try and pick which one uses which cable."
Earlier this week Kogan announced it was offering anyone who bought a TV at John Lewis or Currys a free HDMI cable.
In response to the challenge, Currys told The INQUIRER, "We will not be changing our position as a result of the Kogan blog." It also said, "We sell a large range of HDMI cables with different specifications and prices tailored to our customers' needs. Our entry level HDMI cable is currently on sale at £7.99 and our most expensive cable is at £100.99."
A spokesman for John Lewis said, "We aim to provide our customers with a wide range of options when choosing accessories for their TVs. By providing our customers with a range of different cables which offer different specifications, we are able to help them find one to suit their specific needs." It hasn't confirmed whether or not it will be taking up the challenge or not.
We spoke to Ruslan Kogan himself, who told us that the campaign has been really successful and that lots of people have taken up the offer of a free cable. Kogan told us, "I don't expect them to take up the challenge. It would be silly of them to show customers that they are ripping them off."
We have also contacted cable giant Monster Cable to ask it what the difference is between a cheap and expensive HDMI cable. In a rather large document on HDMI it said, "Monster may cost more, but it's worth it." It claims that its products are made with precision manufacturing techniques and exceed current specification so that they don't need to be upgraded.
Kogan confirmed with us that the main reason for the campaign is to expose what it thinks is a con. Kogan said, "We don't care where people buy their equipment, truth is the winner in the end." µ
Tags: Hardware
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I have never paid more than $5 for an HDMI cable. For all practical purposes, they do the job what you are looking for.
@Richard Home
All mags need advertising revenue, subscriptions and sales do not always cover costs and lead to profits. So if you play ball and say nice things about their products they spend more !!
@all
Kogan should challenge this guy to a dual, makes the High Street look like a bargain basement
http://www.russandrews.com/
None the less, a properly shielded cable is still very very cheap. The $100 HDMI cable is a complete farce that some people fall for.
The humble HDMI cable has helped expose the sham and snobery that to some extents infests the hi-fi industry. I've often wondered whether some of the high-end kit really deserves all of the praise it gets, or if some of it is not imagined. Flicking through a well-known hifi magazine I found a list of reviews of HDMI cables, in which the authors reported "more vivid colours" and so on for the better products. Of course, digital cables do no such thing. Either they work or they don't, and signal loss is usually clearly visible as specific artifacts on the screen; it certainly doesn't give a general reduction in quality.
You can see it in this online review here: http://www.whathifi.com/review/thatcable-hdmi.
The author is clearly imagining things, and not only that, but if you look at the comments on the article you will find that a lot of the buyers do as well.
That was exactly my style, you were great, i also hate those charlatans. But without any fanfare my cable cost me even less :)))
Contact me and we will discuss much more crazy similar campaign aimed at much larger pie and much more famous ripoffers of consumers. I will be happy with just the couple millions for the idea, you roll the business, the rest 10-20 billions in 10 years will be yours. rrr2005r at aol dot com
Hey Kedas, that's not exactly right. Cheaper cable introduce more noise at higher bit rates which causes signal loss and the error correction kicking in which you can see on a TV as artefacts or loss of fidelity. I agree though, some HDMI cables are priced to take the money off people without much sense!
and let the license free Display Port rule
The problem is that not many people understand the difference between analogue and digital data transfer.
Otherwise they would already have figured out that a more expensive or cheap cable delivers exactly the same bit 1 or 0 to the other side.
Below is a link to a TV show, CBC's Market Place, where they looked into over priced HDMI cables in 2008
http://www.cbc.ca/marketplace/2008/02/20/packing_the_deal/