Cables & Leads

As with most things these days’ things get smaller and faster but they seem to come with more features or more potential for expansion. Even the humble network or Ethernet cable hasn’t managed to escape from this trend. There is a drastic need for this though and that is with the take up of digital devices within our homes and the need to transmit vast amounts of data between these digital devices.

Whether you are using your computer connected to your TV for watching High Definition Movies or listening to MP3’s stored on your computer on your home entertainment system you will be able to do all of this and potentially a lot more as time goes by.

So what are the differences between Cat5 Cable and Cat6 Cable?

Cat5 cable has been around now for many years, although they have managed to keep pace with what was needed from them being able to transmit at either 10 or 100 mbps. Unfortunately this is now just too slow, with all the changes in the equipment that has gone on. There is also a enhanced version of the cat5 cable called cat5e which is capable of transferring at up to gigabit speeds (1000mbps) also offering better shielding and less corruption of data although they can not be certified to run at these speeds.

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Cat6 cable on the other hand has been developed to allow for far greater transfer speeds while offering even better protection against data loss. This has been achieved by changing the way that the cables are made offering a separator which runs the full length of the cable. Cat6 Cable is certified to at least gigabit speeds and most Cat6 cables are more than capable of running at 10gigabit.

To achieve the faster speeds stated previously from a Cat5e cable or Cat6 cable it is not just a case of plugging the cable into existing equipment as many people believe it to be. A network connection is only every as fast as the slowest component, so if your existing equipment is not able to run at the faster speeds then it will not be any faster than it is at present. With all of that said you would be able to expand in the future without having to get new cables if you chose Cat6 cable now.

Related Articles:
What is SCART
What is DisplayPort

Cables & Leads

SCART cables have been a popular way of connecting devices to your TV in the UK and Europe for years. Although it’s use in other parts of the world has been less popular. It was developed in France and allows the transfer of digital sound and video files from one device to the other. Commonly used to connect video recorders to you TV to allow the recording and play back of programmes.

Many popular Video’s come with two SCART sockets allowing them to connect to other devices such as older gaming consoles and set top boxes. Costs are relevant to its technology with  SCART cables starting at  for less than £3.00 but then for specialist equipment it is possible to pay around £300 for a cable.

The SCART connector is composed of 21 pins. Each one of these pins is assigned an analogue video or analogue audio signal which can be used to pass through S-Video, Composite or RGB analogue signals, making it a highly adaptable cable designed specifically to connect digital components to televisions.

SCART Cable

A  SCART to RCA converter is another example of a SCART connector. The SCART to RCA converter allows for connections to some of the older types of devices including game consoles such as the Sega Saturn. Since the cable is designed for simplicity, the cable itself will not be able to handle high quality data transfers like a HDMI, but will still be able to provide a solid performance at the cost of some colour and quality loss.

While SCART has been around for so long it is still popular today with its ability to allow conversion from many formats to allow the connection of a variety of devices to your TV in a simple way. Although by today’s standard particularly the use of HDMI its quality is not brilliant. Colours don’t seem as vivid and the sound quality just looses its edge. But for most it is of perfectly acceptable standard but it certainly won’t have you in awe at the images coming from your console as something with a more modern connection would.

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What is Display Port
What is HDMI

All of this equipment means that we need to move vast amounts of data securely between these devices while leaving in enough room for further expansion in the future. Not so long ago this meant having hideous amounts of cables trailing all over your home. This is not only hazardous from people tripping but can also cause all manner of problems with everyday tasks like cleaning or just moving things around.

DisplayPort Cable

In recent times this need has seen a large number of new faster and more secure ways of connecting all of these devices together. The common standard in recent times has been HDMI. While there is nothing wrong with this as it is more than capable of moving all the data you need securely and at good speeds, manufacturers haven’t liked the idea of the licensing fees which they are charged for using this proprietary technology. This is where DisplayPort technology comes in as it is free which means that manufacturers can use it without paying the licensing fees and are able to pass on these savings.

But is DisplayPort as good as HDMI?

Definitely yes! It can easily handle everything that HDMI leads can and due to the take up of its use by the manufacturers since 2008 and development by companies like Intel it is likely to be more common than HDMI in the near future.

So what exactly can it do?

Utilising a USB connection supporting 1 of 4 pairs of data including audio, video, and clock signals, the Display Port Cable boasts a maximum resolution of 1080p. Although the Displayport cable itself is compliant with other HD systems such as DVI and HDMI, the Displayport connector itself is not cross compatible.

Security measures implemented into the cable includes DPCP, or otherwise known as DisplayPort Content Protection. DPCP allows for users to optionally enable content protection that can help protect transmission data from being intercepted and sent to unauthorized users from a distance. The Displayport system is also being constantly upgraded, with its development backed up by Intel is releasing new versions to the market much like the way HDMI does so.

Although you have probably used DVI and VGA cables before, you probably didn’t know what they were. In there simplest form the difference between them is that one of them uses older analogue technology and the other more modern digital signals.

VGA is the oldest technology and has grown since it’s inception in the late 90’s. It was a way to pass information from computers to there displays, even though the technology is relatively old there is still many uses for it today in one form or another for the various things that need to display images on screen. Digital cameras and mobile phones use this technology even today.

VGA is based on analogue technology and requires changing to a digital signal at either end. Obviously this slows things down and little. With the increase in the needs of users we needed a faster more accurate way to transfer this data.

Enter DVI offering the ability to transfer a complete digital signal allowing more accurate transfer without the loss in performance or quality that a VGA cable can cause. This is still used regularly today, as it is a good performer and proven technology.

Since it was first introduced DVI has changed a little and different versions have been released to help out with certain problems and offer variety of solutions. One such variety is DVI-D which is digital only and DVI-I which is both analogue and digital.

HDMI (High Defininition Multimedia Interface) has grown in popularity since its first release in 2003; nowadays it is the choice of professionals and high end digital equipment. This is due to the speed and accuracy that the data is transferred with good quality HDMI cables transferring data at up to 5gigabits per second, this is twice as fast as the recognised standards for digital products.

What makes it shine above many other connection options is that HDMI can transfer audio aswell as video data and does so securely without data loss by using High Definition Data Protection. Making it a very popular choice with high end home entertainment systems surround sound TV’s, gaming consoles etc..

A standard HDMI has two types of wire – ‘Type A’, utilizing 19 wires, and ‘Type B’, which holds 29 wires. Many professionals and enthusiasts will always go for the 29 wire HDMI cable as in theory these can have more accurate data throughput. Allowing for better sound and display, this in reality is negligible for most enthusiasts and home users.

So what kind of products come with HDMI capabilities?

HDMI cable

As was said above the HDMI standard is fast becoming the connection of choice for both professionals and home users alike. The boom in people updating there home entertainment systems   to the new digital age as seen the uptake of HDMI taking off allowing the transfer of high quality digital without the need for a lot of cables running around the area.

Such things as Blue ray devices, high end dvd players, gaming consoles are to name but a few. With the advent of more types of communication needed by more and more digital devices HDMI technology will become common place in our homes in the not so distant future.

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While this was fine when it was developed it soon became apparent as computer user’s needs grew that it wouldn’t hold enough data to allow the viewing of high quality images. This has lead over the years to the original standard being developed into a number of different styles that allow different amounts of information to be displayed on the users display.

The amount of information that can be carried in the array allows the display of more pixels the more pixels you can display the more clearer and crisper the image will look. As technology has progressed people want more and more from there displays with better looking games and movies at higher resolutions.

Some of the display standards that have evolved over the years are:

XGA: This was the next step and is still used today for displaying images on many digital cameras and other small devices that need crisp and clear images at small resolutions. Things such as mobile phones and hand held gaming devices for example make use of a XGA displays. Allowing the use of more colours than was previously used, and using more pixels, but still nothing like modern computers use nowadays. It allows 800×600 displays at 16bit colour or 1024×768 display with 256 colours.

SVGA: Developed as an extension or update of the original VGA display to allow the use of far better display equipment on their PC’s. Originally to allow the use of true colour 32 bit displays but now the SVGA standard is continually being improved to allow for the fast advancements in display technology.

There are other acronyms used to talk about different displays especially with laptops and other portable devices. But the main ones are the ones that are talked about above.

Other terms used to describe VGA are:

Resolution: used to describe the size of displays in pixels for example a 800×600 display is 800 pixels wide and 600 pixels in height.

Pixel: a small dot on the screen the size of these dots is related to how clear the image appears. It can be any combination of colours.

Colour depth is measured using a number of terms these are normally mentioned as “bits” and describe the amount of colours that a pixel can contain. 16 and 32 bit are common place wit. 16 bit can contain up to 65,536 colours with a true 32 bit display capable of displaying 4.2 billion. Although true 32 bit systems are available they are very rare. Most displays that say 32 bit are actually 24 bit with a couple of extra features. 24 bit displays are capable of showing 16,777,216 and are probably the most common at this time and with over 16million colour combinations are more than enough for the human eye.