HDMI to DVI adapter?

Yes, I so much do like the robust DVI connector that I am sorry they didn't stick with it when they decided to include audio and came up with HDMI. My own NEC 50XM5 Plasma monitor has no speakers so I am not at all interested in a cable to it that includes audio, anyway.

Winston, I would suspect that any improvement you might somehow find in a cable will be defeated by using adaptors as they will weaken the signal.

"The more stuff along the way, the more there is to contend with."

I can tell you that my own picture quality does improve a bit when I went from a Radio Shack Gold DVI/HDMI to a Varastarr cable with the same terminations.

Unkie Jeff-

You are so very right about the best connector being NO connector! I couldn't agree with you more.

I'll be comparing the Better Cables Silver Serpent HDMI with a BJC HDMI in a few days or so. We'll see if there is any difference.

But I can tell you that the greatest home theatre image anyone in our little 'group' has ever seen was on a Sony RP-LCD with a Kimbre Kable DVI cable connected to a Marantz DV-8400. On the movie "Solar Max", the image of the sun burnin' and turnin' literally hung out in space in full 3D about two feet in front of the Sony TV, slowly rotating in utter resolution. It was like the sun literally came out of the TV and just hung there in front of us, slowly turning. All of us had to pick our jaws up off the floor after that. No one could believe what we had just seen, so we watched it again, immediately. Same thing happened. We were blown away, pure and simple. Next we watched a DVD of the remastered "Alien", as described below. Another mind-blowing experience beyond anything we had ever seen or imagined possible from in-home video.

A couple of years later, when one of our group got a new TV and DVD player, supposedly better than the models I owned and that we had creamed our jeans about a year or two earlier (as described above), and both from the same manufacturers (RP-LCD TV from Sony; top-of-the-line upscaling DVD player from Marantz), we decided to compare the performance of the newer HDMI-based system versus my two year old TV/DVD combo described above. It wasn't even close: the DVI picture on my old Sony/Marantz/DVI combo clearly topped my friend's new HDMI-based system on the identical source material ("Solar Max"; "Alien"; and some Hi-Def skiing video that was really spectacular!)

For clarification, when we first watched my TV/DVD combo described above, we had just seen "Alien": The Director's Cut, in the movie theatre only a few days before seeing it on my then-new DVI-based system. At the movies we had sat really close just because we wanted to see every detail to compare with the Sony TV/DVD player I had just bought back then. To our utter amazement, DVI-based playback was significantly better than the movie house experience, and when a year or so later we compared these same DVDs on the newer HDMI-based system, the DVI-based system's performance clearly bested the newer HDMI-based picture. Now, mind you, this was very, very early HDMI, possibly some of the first units that offered it. But the difference was significant, thus causing me to seek the performance of a DVI cable in an HDMI format. As far as I was concerned, HDMI was a giant leap backward, and utterly unacceptable compared to a DVI-based viewing experience.

If you look, you'll see I posted requests for someone to help me make a DIY HDMI cable that deleted the audio information from the signal, thus sending only video signal and thereby hopefully matching or exceeding the performance we got using that old Kimber Kable DVI cable that rocked our video world so strongly. No chance. The HDMI interface would require a digital engineer to split and segregate out the various signals that the HDMI-based system passes along its individual wires. Oh well!

Yet my curiosity still compelled me to inquire if anyone had tried using a DVI cable in an HDMI format (with adaptor cables at both ends --yeech!, if such a comparison is possible.) If DVI still bested HDMI in this circumstance, even with HDMI going straight in as opposed to the DVI cable using TWO adaptor connectors, then the superiority of DVI for video transfer would be so resounding, so complete, so very utter, that we might get a few digital engineers and cable makers out there to design a cable that was basically a DVI cable, but with HDMI ends (i.e., no adaptor connectors and no audio signal.) That's what this was all about. Nothing more. Just a crazed attempt to optimize my video set-up, that's all.

Thanks for all your posts. They are appreciated. And....

HAPPY LISTENING/VIEWING!!

Winston;

Yes. Over at AVSFORUM.com there are many who lament the HDMI-thing that has become the 'norm'

---I almost feel like the (jarhead) tube guy who hates the transistor(which,I am...)

Suggestion: Watch the occasional auction where the guy starts at $1.00 who claims he 'bought out' all of the Verastarr cables and get his DVI/HDMI cable for roughly $85.00.

Compare this with what you got.

Yes, of late, my listening/viewing has been happy.

Unkie jeff-

Glad to hear listening and viewing are tickling your fancy. Excellent!

Thanks for the hot tip on the HDMI cable! Will-dooski, soon. Sounds like a great idea. One problem for me: the folks who promised me a Pioneer Pro Elite 60'' Kuro jobbie can't seem to deliver. Bought it 12/24/07; they charged the card and the whole nine yards, but never could deliver. My sales associate say the unit is so popular and scarce that he had two literally swiped out from under him by unscrupulous salespeople. (Is there no honor among salesmen?) He swears he'll have one here by next friday (yeah, sure), and he did refund the charge to the card very promptly, so I'm no longer out-of-pocket for an item that has not been delivered yet.

Still, I've got this Samsung BD UP-5000 dual format player which I just bought and can't friggin' test out because I have no hi-def TV that accepts HDMI input. If you've followed the threads on the AVS Forum about this player, it is somewhat hit and miss about playing Fox movie titles. I'd like to verify I got one that plays all titles (some do), but must wait until my silly Pioneer Kuro arrives (I'm holding my breath. Really.)

I'll keep you posted. Hopefully, I'll get my TV soon and can start checking things out regarding the various HDMI cables. I need some HiFi Tuning fuses from the Cable Company, so I'll just rent the Wireworld and Audioquest big boy HDMI cables and compare them as well. I'll simply return them when done (cue evil chuckle) and use the mandatory 10% charge for in-store credit to get the HiFi Tuning fuses. (I hope it is still only 10% they charge; I haven't done any cable comparisons through the CC in about 15 years, so things could be different, i.e., more expensive. I hope not. We'll see.)

But all must await the arrival of the Kuro. Like I said earlier, I'll keep ya posted.

All the best! And........

HAPPY LISTENING/VIEWING!!

Anyone have experience with monoprice.com cables? Looking at an hdmi to dvi cable. They have a few inexpensive options. Wondering if anyone has tried these, and if they've seen differences between AWG sizes.

Thanks