Story:I was looking at the Sears flyer the other day when I did a double take.
There was an HDMI cable, the type of cable you need to connect your cable box or Blu-ray to high definition TVs these days, on sale. For the one metre length, it was only $129.99, a savings of $20. For two metres of cable, you could also save $20 and pay just $149.99.
These weren't just any cables, you see, they were Monster Cables.
Monster Cables, the company and its products, are proof that, with enough marketing, you can up sell anything.
What got me going was that I had just picked up a two metre HDMI cable the other day for my computer monitor. It wasn't a Monster, however, it was a Belkin, maker of all sorts of electronics and computer cables and accessories. I paid something like $20 for it.
Having learned from experience that a cheap man pays twice, especially when it comes to things like professional camera gear, it is often worth the money to pay for quality hardware. But this is beyond absurd. One of Monster's features is 24 karat gold contacts, which, according to the website, "can withstand 10,000 insertions."
I must point out that once a HDMI cable is hooked up, it's likely not going anywhere. It might get inserted, oh, twice. Perhaps five times, if you move. Maybe more, if your wife leaves you and takes the big screen.
Their cable can withstand "over 4,000 extreme bends," because, "HDMI cables must perform, even under demanding conditions. For example, custom installers need to pull them through walls and have them make difficult turns."
Maybe those installers are using the cables for Jump Rope for Heart, too.
Here's what I remember from my electrical engineering classes many moons ago: the teeny tiny little electron bouncing down the wire doesn't much care what brand the cable is. As long as its impedance is within spec and the thing is not broken, it will pretty much do the job.
And yes, all you techno-weenies who feel you can out-nerd me, I realize there are different specifications for cables.
I believe what the audio video salesmen do when they try to up sell you on something like the Monster Cable is wrap you up in a little fairy tale. That little tale is one I tell my daughter every so often. It's called "The Princess and the Pea," by Hans Christian Andersen.
As Wikipedia condenses it, "The story tells of a prince who wants to marry a princess, but is having difficulty finding a suitable partner. Something is always wrong with those he meets, and he cannot be certain they are real princesses. One stormy night a young woman drenched with rain seeks shelter in the prince's castle. She claims to be a princess, so the prince's mother decides to test their unexpected guest by placing a pea in the bed she is offered for the night, covered by 20mattresses and 20featherbeds. In the morning the guest tells her host that she endured a sleepless night, kept awake by something hard in the bed; which she is certain has bruised her. The prince rejoices. Only a real princess would have the sensitivity to feel a pea through such a quantity of bedding. The two are married, and the pea is placed in the Royal Museum."
The same can be said for HDMI cables. If Mr. Testosterone with the 52" inch LED TV required for watching the NFL from the next room can truly differentiate between the Belkin and the Monster HDMI cables connecting his components, than he must be a true princess. Perhaps he also has a royal dowry to afford such cables, too.
- Brian Zinchuk is editor of Pipeline News. He can be reached at [email protected].
