I finally got my home theater. It's a mid grade Onkyo system with built in 5disc pro scan. I was looking at component cables and am under the impression that Monster Cable is the best stuff. Is the THX monster 4 better than the monster 3? It seems it would be, but the 4 is cheaper? That doesn't make sence to me.

 

Monster Cable is good stuff. To tell you the truth, you are not going to notice a huge difference. I went with the Monster 3 series i believe for my sat receiver (HDTV). Very nice cealn crisp pictures.

 

The only advantage that Monster cable and similar products have is that they are aesthetically pleasing.

You can get what you need for a fraction of the cost from Radio Shack or Best Buy even in their connectors and cables section.

Compare and you will see.

You won't be able to tell the difference between monster and generic.

You just need cables with quality shielding to prevent electro magnetic interference .

 

check out partsexpress.com for a bunch of different grades of cables. i think monster would be wasted on a mid range system. but i think monster cable is over-hyped anyway. I think you can make kick-a$$ cables yourself for much less. the best thing about those expensive cables are the quality of the connecters. good quality shielded cable is not that expensive!

 

For speakers, you won't be able to tell the difference between high-priced wire like Monster and Romex, the stuff they wire house electrical outlets with. In fact, I would actually choose Romex over monster because it's a nice, fat wire for 1/100th the price.

For video, well, don't skimp too much on that. Video, especially anything that carries analog video should be of a decent quality due to the frequencies used. Digital video isn't much of an issue since the receiving end will clean up the 1's and 0's with no loss in quality (assuming the wire is of sufficient quality to get a decent digital signal through, so again, you can't go too cheap, but cheaper than analog video). Any decently shielded cable will do fine for standard definition TVs (analog or digital), but I would go to a higher quality cable for HDTVs if the connection is analog.

 

Thanx guys! The component connection is for DVD pro scan to my Mitsu Gold plus TV. The TV is a pretty high end piece of equipment for rear projection (I'll get plasma and DLP and all that stuff when I start making some real $). I also have heard that you need a high quality Subwoofer cable. What do you guys know about that?

 

I will go along with the advice about genetric cables. If you make them yourself you can get the lengths of the cables just right for your installation. I have been on and off working with audio for 50 years and consider monster cables ETC. to be a big ripoff.
Andy

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by SeaDoXPL
[B]The only advantage that Monster cable and similar products have is that they are aesthetically pleasing.

You can get what you need for a fraction of the cost from Radio Shack or Best Buy even in their connectors and cables section.

Compare and you will see.

 

You can choose one of the cheapest cables for subwoofers...it's extremely low frequency. The thicker the cable, though, the better off you are.

 

If your handy with a soldering iron build your own video cable. Buy some coax and solder on the connectors yourself. You will get a really well shielded cable with flat response over the video baseband at any length you wish (within reason ).