Ears On

If you hate the vulture's nest of ridiculously expensive cables lurking behind your rack, relief is spelled with four letters: HDMI. Someday signal sources will connect with just one HDMI cable. However, depending on what audio formats you want your system to support, you may have to seek out specific versions of HDMI. Having just nailed this for the next edition of my book (not out yet, to appear on Amazon sometime in the next 30 days) I might as well give you this little cheat sheet:

HDMI 1.0: Primarily used for video. Supports stereo audio.

HDMI 1.1: Adds Dolby TrueHD, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby Digital 5.1, DTS-HD High Resolution Audio, DTS 5.1, DVD-Audio.

HDMI 1.2: Adds SACD.

HDMI 1.3: Adds DTS-HD Master Audio. HDMI 1.3 also "supports higher bandwidth, greater color depth, a new mini-connector for camcorders, and automatic lip-sync to keep soundtracks coordinated with faces speaking onscreen," says I, quoting myself. But it hasn't penetrated product yet because manufacturers are waiting for the chipsets. Even when they become available, the wise consumer will check spec sheets for the version number, or call manufacturers if they're being cagey about it. Note that the new lossless Dolby and DTS codecs are listed under 1.1, not under 1.3, as it says in the HDMI.org FAQ. Why is that? More tomorrow on the HD DVD and Blu-ray angle.