This $150 HDMI Cable Boosts Image Quality.. WHAT??
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2018-05-06
·
1,492 words · ~7 min read
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I gotta be honest guys I don't really
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know what to say here it's like I don't even know which way is
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up anymore I mean I looked in the right direction but I think you get what I
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mean okay so Marseille claims that it's
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special em cables can improve image
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quality for both games and video content
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but surely it's snake oil I mean the
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claims on the box couldn't possibly be true
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could they well we've done literally
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hours of video capture so you can see
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for yourself
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Corsairs Boyd pro gaming headsets feature microfiber mesh fabric and
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memory foam ear cups as well as custom tuned 50 millimeter neodymium drivers
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check them out at the link below from the get go the m cable stands out as a
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little different from the other HDMI x'
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on one end and HDMI connector labeled
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source okay I'm with you so far
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then on the other end an HDMI connector
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and a USB connector well what it turns
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out is that this is to power the digital
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signal processor that marseilles claims to have designed from the ground up for
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video processing and then built into the
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cable I mean to say that my BS detector
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got true good would be a gross understatement we all I mean literally
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everyone in the office thought that this thing would be great fodder for our
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useless tech over a hundred series I mean look at the obviously faked results
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in the marketing materials I mean if if if those are real you are getting some
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magic grade upscaling on the cinema one and for the gaming Edition you're
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getting anti aliasing without any performance loss spoiler alert it is not
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as good as the Box might indicate but don't turn that dial folks this one gets
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real interesting before we get to testing though a set-up guide and cables
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upscaling only works if the output matches the content resolution so for a
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480p game or movie you have to actually
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set your TV or monitor to that
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resolution rather than just stretching it to your native one in software second
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the m cable cinemas 1080p to 4k
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upscaling relies on detecting a 1080p 24
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FPS signal this is their film mode recognition feature starting with the
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gaming Edition hmm at native resolution
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they're processing isn't doing the Windows desktop any
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favors that's a drawback now let's fire
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up some games what the frak this is rise of the Tomb Raider at 720p
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you're seeing this right it looks like
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anti-aliasing is on well okay let's just
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grab a regular HDMI cable and whit's seriously and this is not isolated to
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Tomb Raider we're looking at significantly smoother diagonal lines
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across the board and look at these cables at the beginning of the Deus Ex
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mankind divided benchmark at 1080p the
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improvement is noticeable as well if a little smaller so it looks like it's not
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just upscaling but actually providing AAA and pretty decent anti-aliasing at
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that I mean compared to running 8x msaa
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on your video card in Deus Ex we're not quite there but we're doing way better
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than FX AAA and stacking 8x NSAA with
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the end cable gives us even better results as for running two M cables in
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series though most people probably wouldn't like the over sharp effect but
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csgo players take note of these shimmering model outlines let's go back
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to one cable then but let's throw some older games like quake 2 or unreal at it
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whoa at 480p the difference is night and
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day it basically looks like 720p and at
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720p it's not as dramatic but the improvement is there so at this point we
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were thinking well ok the lower the resolution the better then right well
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while an M cable would go great with a
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Playstation 3 or a Playstation 2 even on
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an HDMI converter unfortunately you can
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only go back so far Super Mario World really didn't look its best with the M
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cables current scaling algorithm anyway and we think one with a scan
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line generator or pixel art scaling like hqx ----builtin would make it much more
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ideal for retro gaming assuming that
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Marcy's claims with respect to input leg hold true and actually more good news if
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there's any leg our 240 FPS camera can't
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detect it so that's another win for M cables marketing so other than the still
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clearly faked screenshot comparisons on the Box the gaming Edition somehow
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passes the snake-oil test but what about
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the cinema version at 480p upscaled to
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1080p anime really sees a major bump in
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visual fidelity although color banding can get
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exacerbated somewhat pay particular attention to the lines of inori's face
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and the cracks in the ground Big Buck
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Bunny sees significant smoothing of its blockiness especially around the edges
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of objects which is what we'd expect from this filter by now and as for a
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480p YouTube rip from Brandon's red weapon review take one look at the
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difference in this scene with max in the forest and tell me that that doesn't
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look significantly better when shown
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these results the Universal response at
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the office was and I quote what the [ __ ]
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that's 480p are you sure you didn't mix
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it up yeah we're sure as for 720p
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sharpened edges still give the edge haha
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to the M cable in anime while Big Buck Bunny sees details that were fuzzy in
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480p subscale that now looked relatively sharp and meanwhile our red capture
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still looks pretty good at 720p on its own but depth and sharpness of smaller
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details both get a big boost check out the reflection on Max's eyes
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and her hair in this shot at 1080p on
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like the gaming edition the sharpening effect just isn't as necessary or
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pronounced but what it does do is remove
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blocking artifacts and improve the dynamic range of compressed content
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since 1080p content typically has fewer
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artifacts on YouTube than lower resolutions we're seeing a more
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pronounced effect which is great news for internet streaming when upscaling to
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4k our 1080 footage looks noticeably
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sharper compared to a normal HDMI cables 1080p output and here we can see clearer
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improvements on small details like Max's hair though compared to true 4k output
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there is visible fringing on the edge of her face so it's not as good as clean 4k
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but definitely better than 1080p now a
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prime helpfully pointed out that these are all things that he could do with
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Premiere and Photoshop but until he can
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do it 224 to 60 scenes per second
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without a noticeable delay I'll continue being impressed by the EM cable
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leading us to the conclusion then these
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things actually work but would I
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recommend them for a hundred and fifty US dollars with a couple of improvements
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it actually becomes a no-brainer I'd like to see a scaler toggle on the
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gaming edition so that doesn't mess with my text on the desktop and I'd like to
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see flashable firmware with specialty filters for certain applications like
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retro gaming but there are definitely
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folks out there that I'd recommend it for today like anime fans with large low
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resolution collections console gamers as
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long as you don't go to retro and anyone
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who does a lot of web content streaming keeping in mind of course the display
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resolution caveat so I can't believe I'm
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saying this but great job Murr say it doesn't go down like this often but you
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shocked us mass drop is the place to go
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to get great deals on curated items sourced by the community for the
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inches corner-to-corner it features an four wide resolution of 34 40 by 1440
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for a 100 Hertz refresh rate a 2500 to 1
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contrast ratio and it's available right
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now through mass drop for only 5 $49.99
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whoa so check it out at the link below
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so thanks for watching guys if this video sucked you know what to do but if
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it was awesome get subscribed hit that like button or check out the link to
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where to buy the stuff we featured in the video description also down there's
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our merch store which has cool shirts like this one and our community forum
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which you should totally join