I have a samsung DVR, TV and a HD cable box what is the preferred connection method: cable out, A/V out etc ?

Question

What is the best way to connect my DVR to a hd cable box and tv that is already installed? what is the best media to make this happen, cable out, A/V out, s video etc?

Answer 1

This depends on what you have available. I'll run through the cable types in order from best to worst and you can use that to determine what cable you should hook up what with.

HDMI/DVI - These are considered the best. No real difference between HDMI and DVI except HDMI carries sound and uses a different connector. These cables transmit the data digitally so there's no loss in the conversion to analog. However, some may argue that if the device delivering the digital signal has better circuitry to convert to analog than what your TV has built in, then component cables would give a better picture, but if all things are given equal, like you have the same quality TV and same quality HD box then these cables are the best. They're also the most expensive ;-)

Component video cables - These cables look like your standard audio/video cables, just that there's more of them! Red, Green and Blue and that's just for the video. You still need the L and R audio just like you do with a DVI cable. Component video cables are the analog means of transmitting an HD signal. It breaks down the video signal into seperate .... components! There are losses inherant to analog cables and they are susceptible to interference but most of the time/for more people they work just fine provided you get a decent quality cable and no dollar store junk. Progressive scan DVD players often have component video outputs even though they're not true high definition sources.

S-Video - This is similar to component video in the sense that it splits up a composite video signal to transfer video in higher quality. S-video separates the chroma from the luminance signal which are combined in composite video. S-Video is NOT HD however. It's the best you can do with standard definition, though.

Composite Video - a.k.a. you're standard plain vanilla A/V cables. It's a single yellow cable that has the whole video signal on it, and the audio are on their own left and right RCA jacks, just like S-video, component video and DVI. It's not the worst you could do, but its headed there. Compared to S-video, sharp lines have dot crawl, there's colour crosstalk due to the luminance and chroma being combined and the quality is just plain worse. Some devices like an old VCR this was the best output or input they had. Still it is commonly used although with the advent of HDTV we'll start seeing less and less devices that require composite video use.

RF / cable out - This is the worst. Basically the audio and video signals are fed internally into an RF modulator that turns these into a broadcast TV signal. Many RF modulators output mono sound instead of stereo. Best case scenario the picture quality looks the same as what you get on basic analog cable. Only use if you have to. It's good for carrying multiple channels to multiple TV's but if you can use any of the other above options, use them.

Answer 2

Once, I happen to believe those connections are inextinguishable.