What do I look for in a good VGA cable?

Willeth

I have my PS3 and 360 hooked to a switcher and going into my monitor, but the VGA cable that I'm using for the switch to the monitor is a POS and it's making the signal all blurry. I want to get a decent quality cable to fix it but I've no idea what makes a VGA cable good.
Any tips?

JustinSane07

A new one.

Really.

Cables can wear out, and some can be defective, and some can break down sooner because of poor quality, but a VGA cable is a VGA cable is a VGA cable. Anyone that tells you spending 400 dollars for a cable is an idiot.

http://forums.audioholics.com/forums/showpost.php?p=15412&postcount=28

I know this is for audio cables, but it applies to video as well. The last large paragraph is what you want to read.

Just get one from a reliable brand and you'll be fine. No need to spend crazy money.

Willeth

I was under the impression that VGA was analogue, not digital, and so cable quality was indeed a factor - as opposed to HDMI, which is digital, and so carries the same quality no matter how shitty your cable is.

Mmmm... Cocks...

Willeth wrote: »

I was under the impression that VGA was analogue, not digital, and so cable quality was indeed a factor - as opposed to HDMI, which is digital, and so carries the same quality no matter how shitty your cable is.

Did you read the article? They were talking about an analogue connection... with coat hangers. No difference over the monster cable to their ears. Classic story mentioned all the time when it comes to cables.

kpeezy

They're all metal. Copper carries signal from point A to point B.

Improvolone

www.monoprice.com

Willeth

Alrighty. I'll order one tonight, although there's no British version of monoprice AFAIK.

ben0207

"What do I look for in a good VGA cable? "

The right number of pins on both ends and the right amount of wire between them. It really is that simple.

Willeth

I'll probably borrow a cable from a neighbour and see if his gives the same result before I go buying new ones then.

JustinSane07

That's a good move. That way you can make sure it's not the monitor.

Which you hope it's not.

Airan

What switcher are you using Willeth? I've been looking for one but not sure what to look for :?

Improvolone

Willeth wrote: »

Alrighty. I'll order one tonight, although there's no British version of monoprice AFAIK.

www.amazon.co.uk should have some comprarable deals from 3rd party vendoors

ZackSchilling

I love monoprice.com

And with VGA, the quality of the cable is sort of important. The higher the resolution and the longer the distance, you need a properly made cable. Monoprice's VGA cables are great for anything 25 ft or shorter. Longer than that, look for something nicer.

As for the coat hanger example, the coat hangers are not long enough to exhibit some of the bad behaviors we see in low-quality signal cable.

Willeth

It's the MayFlash something or other. It's a VGA/Component switcher. Given these issues I wouldn't recommend it right now.

And yeah the length it needs to be is maybe a foot. :P

Azio

My third party Xbox 360 VGA cable has a wire-thin lead to the D-sub plug with virtually no insulation, and the picture is quite horrid. Ghosting ahoy.

For hooking up a monitor to a PC, you don't have to go all-out. A five dollar cable will likely do. For consoles you might be looking at a bit more money because, well, console peripherals are obscenely overpriced. Just make sure the cable is insulated. It should be at least 5mm thick from end to end.

Willeth

Well I know it's either the cable or the transcoder, as the 360 worked fine through VGA before.