HDMI which stands for High-Definition Multimedia Interface is a system developed for transmitting uncompressed digital signals between a host of compatible audio video devices. The HDMI to DVI cable was introduced late in 2003 around about the time that High Definition Television was becoming popular.
This cable is capable of connecting DVD players, set-top boxes, Play Stations, Xboxes and Audio Video receivers to HD televisions, computer monitors and countless other AV devices.
On one cable, any PC or TV video format can be supported. This includes up to eight channels of uncompressed or compressed digital audio and a CEC (Consumer Electronics Control) connection. This CEC connection has the capability of allowing various high definition devices to control one another and gives the user the ability to operate several devices using only one remote control.
Due to the fact that HDMI is compatible electrically with DVI (Digital Visual Interface), there is no need to convert the signal. There is also no degradation of the quality of the video when using the connecting cable. The high definition standard has all but replaced such diverse standards as composite video, coaxial cable, SCART, S-Video, VGA and D-Terminal.
This interface is rapidly becoming the de facto connection standard for HDTV's and according to the electronic market intelligence group In-Stat, about 90 percent of the digital television sets produced in 2007, included the connector. In-Stat also estimated that in 2008 about 229 million of the devices had been sold and the estimate for 2009 was 394 million with the prediction that by the end of 2009 all digital television sets would be fitted with at least one of these connectors.
The connector is manufactured in four different types, namely A, B, C and D. Type A has nineteen pins and is compatible with DVI-D. Type B has 29 pins and will transfer double the bandwidth of the Type A. Type C has a mini connection with 19 pins like the A type and was designed for portable equipment. Type D is a micro connector also with 19 pins but the plug has been shrunk to look more like a micro-USB one.
There are several versions of the HDMI standard with each version being allocated a number. Currently versions 1.0 to 1.2, 1.3 and 1.4 are available with all of the versions using the same cable but having increased bandwidth and capabilities for each subsequent version number. Although a maximum length for the cable has not been specified, resistance in the cable and the way it has been manufactured together with the materials used, places a limit on usable lengths. HDMI to DVI cable is currently manufactured in lengths ranging between 5 and 15 meters.
Thursday, February 17, 2011
How to Best Hide Speaker Cables
For most people with a home theater system installed in their house, the cables are one of the biggest logistical challenges. The cords and cables for all the various components inevitably become a tangled, jumbled mess, making it nearly impossible to change the configuration of your system or any of the components. Most families don't put in the time to organize and hide their cables to improve the aesthetics and safety of the home theater room. With just a few simple changes, your home theater cabling mess can be easily cleaned up and put under control.
All of the components in the home theater system have a power cord that must find its way to a wall socket, surge protector or power strip. To keep the power cords neat and tidy, use a label machine to identify the cord before you plug your home theater components in. This will help when you need to know which plug to pull to move your speaker system or to replace your DVD player.
To clean up the knots and clutter caused by the constant wrapping and unwrapping of cables around each other, start by unplugging everything, including the cables that connect each component to the others, and separate them out. Figure out exactly where you want each component to go, and then set them up again and neatly run the cables without twisting them around each other. You may need to write down reminders for where everything goes if you are not accustomed to setting up the theater. Use twist ties or zip ties to the cables every foot or so when there is more than one cable running in the same direction to keep them from becoming tangled and out of control. This same organization can be applied to the power cords that lead to the same power outlet.
If your home theater is set-up such that some of the cabling must come out from behind an entertainment cabinet or floor speakers, it is recommended that some sort of cable hide be used to ensure that these cables do not become snagged by people walking by or grabbed by small children or pets. To keep power cords out of view and safe from tampering, use a cable hide designed to run along the wall and keep your cables protected and covered. These cable hides can be great for anywhere that your cables hang out in the open. If you are building your home theater from scratch, you can ask the installer to build the cabling into the wall or molding of the room in much the same fashion. You will not have to worry about tripping hazards or about your new puppy chewing through your power cables if the cords are neatly hidden and out of the way.
Your home theater speakers provide another potential problem, since you might want speakers around the room with speaker cables becoming a huge problem. To keep this problem down, the best option, though complicated, is to run the wiring for the speakers through the walls. This prevents them from dangling or getting in the way, and if you have the necessary tools and skills, you can run your speakers just about anywhere in the room.
Cleaning up home theater cabling does not have to be a chore. With some simple changes and proper storage, you can have a clean looking, safe home theater room for your family.
All of the components in the home theater system have a power cord that must find its way to a wall socket, surge protector or power strip. To keep the power cords neat and tidy, use a label machine to identify the cord before you plug your home theater components in. This will help when you need to know which plug to pull to move your speaker system or to replace your DVD player.
To clean up the knots and clutter caused by the constant wrapping and unwrapping of cables around each other, start by unplugging everything, including the cables that connect each component to the others, and separate them out. Figure out exactly where you want each component to go, and then set them up again and neatly run the cables without twisting them around each other. You may need to write down reminders for where everything goes if you are not accustomed to setting up the theater. Use twist ties or zip ties to the cables every foot or so when there is more than one cable running in the same direction to keep them from becoming tangled and out of control. This same organization can be applied to the power cords that lead to the same power outlet.
If your home theater is set-up such that some of the cabling must come out from behind an entertainment cabinet or floor speakers, it is recommended that some sort of cable hide be used to ensure that these cables do not become snagged by people walking by or grabbed by small children or pets. To keep power cords out of view and safe from tampering, use a cable hide designed to run along the wall and keep your cables protected and covered. These cable hides can be great for anywhere that your cables hang out in the open. If you are building your home theater from scratch, you can ask the installer to build the cabling into the wall or molding of the room in much the same fashion. You will not have to worry about tripping hazards or about your new puppy chewing through your power cables if the cords are neatly hidden and out of the way.
Your home theater speakers provide another potential problem, since you might want speakers around the room with speaker cables becoming a huge problem. To keep this problem down, the best option, though complicated, is to run the wiring for the speakers through the walls. This prevents them from dangling or getting in the way, and if you have the necessary tools and skills, you can run your speakers just about anywhere in the room.
Cleaning up home theater cabling does not have to be a chore. With some simple changes and proper storage, you can have a clean looking, safe home theater room for your family.
Offshore Cable Leading To High Failure Rates
Offshore cable when first looked at from a price perspective seems like an excellent idea. The difference in price between untested offshore cable and tested USA made cable can be substantial. But, the old saying "you get what you paid for" is unfortunately true in this instance. Much overseas cable is untested. Weaker signal, cross-talk, and signal noise are consequences of almost all untested offshore cable, leading to occasional system failures.
In one occasion, a Fortune 500 company came to us asking to help us regarding their cat 5e system which their internal IT people had installed from offshore cable that had been bought for the task. This cable, when we came in as a consultant, did not follow UTP cable standards. The Fortune 500 company tried to contact their offshore manufacturer, but the manufacturer said there was no guarantee of quality. We eventually had to remove all the offshore cable, which cost them over $70,000, before putting in our 100% tested USA made cable.
Without testing, between 1% to 5% of all cable will be completely unusable. Quality control measures to test for cable failure do not exist in Taiwanese and Chinese cable manufacturing plants. Server Racks and Cable Inc. has seen cases where untested offshore cable in Fortune 500 companies that were trying to cut costs have caused system wide failures.
Cheaper inferior material has resulted in cheaper products in almost all cases. Server Racks and Cable strongly recommends all of our clients to purchase USA made cable where quality control methods using advanced testing devices occur.
In one occasion, a Fortune 500 company came to us asking to help us regarding their cat 5e system which their internal IT people had installed from offshore cable that had been bought for the task. This cable, when we came in as a consultant, did not follow UTP cable standards. The Fortune 500 company tried to contact their offshore manufacturer, but the manufacturer said there was no guarantee of quality. We eventually had to remove all the offshore cable, which cost them over $70,000, before putting in our 100% tested USA made cable.
Without testing, between 1% to 5% of all cable will be completely unusable. Quality control measures to test for cable failure do not exist in Taiwanese and Chinese cable manufacturing plants. Server Racks and Cable Inc. has seen cases where untested offshore cable in Fortune 500 companies that were trying to cut costs have caused system wide failures.
Cheaper inferior material has resulted in cheaper products in almost all cases. Server Racks and Cable strongly recommends all of our clients to purchase USA made cable where quality control methods using advanced testing devices occur.
Protecting Your Electric Guitar Sound
Guitarists have a lot of fun toys...stomp boxes, effects racks, the list is endless. However, your tone can suffer if your cables get out of control. This article will give you some quick tips to help you preserve your sound.
Let's look at a somewhat elaborate setup, and let's pretend it's a live playing situation. It will help point out some strategies. Suppose your rig looks like this;
Guitar - wah wah pedal - distortion pedal - pitch change pedal - amp - effects loop with chorus and reverb - speaker cabinet
The guitar cable should be long enough to walk around on stage with. But it should never be more than 25 feet in length, since it's an unbalanced cable* (longer lengths will degrade your sound quickly). Maybe 20 feet is a good length. However, since you have a floor pedal setup, you can use this to your advantage to shorten your cable length. Select a 10-15 foot cable for your guitar and a 10-15 foot cable for going from the floor pedals to the amp. That gives you 20-30 feet total, which is plenty for most live club circumstances. (If you have larger stage needs than that, look into wireless setups and balance boxes).
The cables going between the floor effects pedals should be as short as possible. They make some as short as six inches, with nice flexible wires which makes the connection between pedals easy. You can get hung up on how fancy they are. My experience for this part of the signal chain is that new cables are better than old ones. So pick ones that connect your pedals easily, and then replace them periodically. One of your floor pedals might require a battery. That can be a good thing- it can help keep your signal strong on its way to the amp.
As mentioned earlier, the cable going from your floor pedals to your amp can be about 10 to 15 feet. A really good brand for this cable is Mogami. You can use Mogami for your guitar cable as well. Another good brand is Monster Cable.
The cables that connect your effects loop box can probably be about 3 feet each, and you can simply put the effects rack unit on top of your amp head. You may be lucky to have a floor pedal extension box. Try to see if this floor box passes signal, or if it is merely a controller to send instructions to the master box. If it's a controller, that's good news. In this case you can have a long cable run from the controller to the effects rack unit, and it won't degrade your actual guitar signal. It's only sending instructions to change program numbers, turn effects on and off, etc.
The key takeaway is this: when you are playing electric guitar, you are typically working with unbalanced cable runs. Unbalanced cables are fine. In fact, many super-expensive stereo systems use them. The key is that you do not want unbalanced cables to be too long. If the cable is too long, the signal can degrade and you can get extra noise on the line. The setup strategies I showed you above will keep your unbalanced cables at strategically short lengths, but still give you plenty of room to roam around on stage. Now go rock the house!
Let's look at a somewhat elaborate setup, and let's pretend it's a live playing situation. It will help point out some strategies. Suppose your rig looks like this;
Guitar - wah wah pedal - distortion pedal - pitch change pedal - amp - effects loop with chorus and reverb - speaker cabinet
The guitar cable should be long enough to walk around on stage with. But it should never be more than 25 feet in length, since it's an unbalanced cable* (longer lengths will degrade your sound quickly). Maybe 20 feet is a good length. However, since you have a floor pedal setup, you can use this to your advantage to shorten your cable length. Select a 10-15 foot cable for your guitar and a 10-15 foot cable for going from the floor pedals to the amp. That gives you 20-30 feet total, which is plenty for most live club circumstances. (If you have larger stage needs than that, look into wireless setups and balance boxes).
The cables going between the floor effects pedals should be as short as possible. They make some as short as six inches, with nice flexible wires which makes the connection between pedals easy. You can get hung up on how fancy they are. My experience for this part of the signal chain is that new cables are better than old ones. So pick ones that connect your pedals easily, and then replace them periodically. One of your floor pedals might require a battery. That can be a good thing- it can help keep your signal strong on its way to the amp.
As mentioned earlier, the cable going from your floor pedals to your amp can be about 10 to 15 feet. A really good brand for this cable is Mogami. You can use Mogami for your guitar cable as well. Another good brand is Monster Cable.
The cables that connect your effects loop box can probably be about 3 feet each, and you can simply put the effects rack unit on top of your amp head. You may be lucky to have a floor pedal extension box. Try to see if this floor box passes signal, or if it is merely a controller to send instructions to the master box. If it's a controller, that's good news. In this case you can have a long cable run from the controller to the effects rack unit, and it won't degrade your actual guitar signal. It's only sending instructions to change program numbers, turn effects on and off, etc.
The key takeaway is this: when you are playing electric guitar, you are typically working with unbalanced cable runs. Unbalanced cables are fine. In fact, many super-expensive stereo systems use them. The key is that you do not want unbalanced cables to be too long. If the cable is too long, the signal can degrade and you can get extra noise on the line. The setup strategies I showed you above will keep your unbalanced cables at strategically short lengths, but still give you plenty of room to roam around on stage. Now go rock the house!
Superior Quality Industrial Control Cable
With industries like construction, transport and communications growing at a fast speed, each and every part that contributes to these sectors is important and that goes for industrial control cables as well.
Each and every component of instruments used in these fields need to be a hundred percent accurate and of high quality. It will ensure that there are no errors when it comes to machines that might become an important part of day to day life.
Use Of An Industrial Control Cable
Cable and electrical control wire are used in almost all applications that are involved with electricity. Each one of them is designed with a specific purpose of interconnecting separate equipments and to control and regulate signals when used for these purposes.
There are various types of them and each one is specific to the types of needs. In an environment where there is very light stress on the cable and in moist or dry conditions, these cables will be able to take the pressure. A telecommunication cable can be something like this.
Similarly, there are other types of industrial control cable that can be used in applications where there is a necessity of equipment which will work without any interference or stoppage at all. Such cables need to be able to take high pressure and are hence installed with multiple cores and tinned copper wire braids that will protect the control cables from stress and external electromagnetic pressures.
Some of the toughest cables come with galvanized round steel wires or galvanized flat steel strips that make them compatible enough for the hardest of applications.
All types of control cables are equipped with plain copper conductors and AC voltage rating up to 1100 V and DC up to 1500 V. They are also armored with a covering of PVC compound for added strength. Rigid tests and standard checks make sure that each and every industrial control cable that is in the market is able to adapt to the application and able to take the pressure that is applied to it.
Each and every component of instruments used in these fields need to be a hundred percent accurate and of high quality. It will ensure that there are no errors when it comes to machines that might become an important part of day to day life.
Use Of An Industrial Control Cable
Cable and electrical control wire are used in almost all applications that are involved with electricity. Each one of them is designed with a specific purpose of interconnecting separate equipments and to control and regulate signals when used for these purposes.
There are various types of them and each one is specific to the types of needs. In an environment where there is very light stress on the cable and in moist or dry conditions, these cables will be able to take the pressure. A telecommunication cable can be something like this.
Similarly, there are other types of industrial control cable that can be used in applications where there is a necessity of equipment which will work without any interference or stoppage at all. Such cables need to be able to take high pressure and are hence installed with multiple cores and tinned copper wire braids that will protect the control cables from stress and external electromagnetic pressures.
Some of the toughest cables come with galvanized round steel wires or galvanized flat steel strips that make them compatible enough for the hardest of applications.
All types of control cables are equipped with plain copper conductors and AC voltage rating up to 1100 V and DC up to 1500 V. They are also armored with a covering of PVC compound for added strength. Rigid tests and standard checks make sure that each and every industrial control cable that is in the market is able to adapt to the application and able to take the pressure that is applied to it.
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