Quote Originally Posted by Sir Terrence the Terrible View Post
Jitter increases, and signal strength is reduced once past 15' without a signal amplifier in the chain.

I stated that HDMI brands don't matter three years ago when debating with Peabody on the issue. He stated that one HDMI cable sounded better to his ears than another. I said that cannot be possible because there is no conversion taking place before the DAC in the HDMI cable, so no difference were possible. When it comes to video, either the cable could pass the signal, or it would fail to pass the signal. That is it - as there is no "signal quality" improvements to worry about with HDMI.
That's why I've never liked HDMI turning into the default digital AV standard. The connector design sucks, and performance begins to breakdown well within normal distances. It just reeks of design-by-committee, with little attention to how it performs in real world applications. There are so many more robust connection standards out there for carrying digital data, why the HT industry standardized around HDMI is just puzzling (aside from the HDCP considerations).

Tests I've seen indicate that certain cables will indeed show signal loss sooner than others, and the expensive cables weren't always the best performers. But, that still doesn't make up for the fundamental flaw of HDMI's poor performance over long runs. In my old configuration, I was using a 25' S-vid cable connected to the receiver. At that distance, there was no issue with S-vid or component video, and installers would routinely use much longer runs with analog cables. Those distances are far from routine with HDMI. In my current configuration, I am using a 15' HDMI cable along with an Oppo HM-31 switchbox (which has an equalizer and signal booster), and fortunately, I've not had any issues.