Dishonest sales tactics?

[Stuart]

I was in my local Currys today. They had two 40 inch Samsung LCDs displaying the same scene from a Harry Potter movie.


One had an excellent picture. The picture on the other was washed out.

The blurb near the LCDs said the one with the excellent picture was hooked up with a "Pure AV" HDMI cable (an expensive one). As if to illustrate the fact, they had hung one over the sign. The other was hooked up via a "Basic" cable, and had the kind of cheap composite cable you get with camcorders draped over the sign.

I had a look at the back. It did appear to be hooked up with a composite cable, but actually an expensive one. Not a cheap one.

Now, I think this is dishonest. First, it's not a fair comparison. Regardless of price, and HDMI cable will *always* give a better picture than a composite cable. The wording on the display implied it was because they used an expensive HDMI cable. A far better comparison would have been with a cheap HDMI cable. But then, at those lengths, there would have been no difference.

Second, I have worked with devices connected via Composite connections for many years. The image does not generally look washed out. Also, that washed out effect could have been achieved by adjusting the contrast control on the TV..

While spending more on AV gear undoubtedly *can* produce better results (we have £8000 Sony EX3 camcorders at work that certainly produce better video than any cheaper consumer camcorder), a combination of the profit margins in the business and the fact that consumers are easily blinded by technical jargon, means a lot of snake oil sellers have been attracted to the home cinema market.

This is unfortunate because there are a lot of people in the industry who do genuinely want to give people good service at good prices, and they get a bad name as a result of this.

[jb66]

If have went through the menu of the tv an corrected it then asked for the manager