British cable and connectivity supplier QED is looking to make serious inroads in the Australian market. Brand manager Jack Fox speaks to Paul Skelton about the road ahead for one of the oldest surviving cable brands.

There are very few technologies from this sector that have truly become part of the social lexicon. HDMI (or, ‘High Definition Multimedia Interface’ if you want to be all technical) is one of them.

However, thanks to a rocky introduction (12 years ago, mind you), some people still insist on propagating mistruths when talking about the Standard. This comes from all levels of the industry, as well as from outside sources.

It’s a real concern when associations like Choice promote the use of cheap cable that can be found in bargain bins at The Reject Shop and the like, saying there is no difference between a $7 and a $70 cable. Even more concerning is overhearing professional integrators agree.

But there are a handful of groups that are fighting back, and they are doing a pretty good job in doing so – HDMI Licensing, for one, Australian manufacturer Kordz is another.

In the UK, British connectivity company QED says that it too is proudly flying the HDMI flag.

“In the UK, a BBC program called Watchdog came out saying that HDMI is just ones and zeros, that there is no difference if you spend more,” QED brand manager Jack Fox says.

“But we can disprove this immediately, and quite simply, just by discussing cable length. If all HDMI cables are the same, then why can some 15m cables only transmit 720p signals and others do 1080p Full HD?

“Unfortunately, this isn’t always enough to convince some people.

“A real change in culture is needed with installers – all around the world there seems to be an acceptance to just buy the cheapest stuff you can find. You would never do that with your hi-fi equipment, so why would you do it with your installs?”

Many readers of Connected Home will be all too familiar with the QED brand. The company started in the ‘70s and was popular among Australian home hobbyists, in particular for its affordable digital-to-analogue converters (DACs).

“The reason we called QED a ‘connectivity’ company rather than a ‘cable’ company is because we’ve always done more than just cables. We didn’t even start off doing cables,” Jack says.

“QED was founded by a chap named Bob Abraham, who started the company doing tape switching units and volume controls for speakers. It was in the mid ‘70s that we launched our first two speaker cables, which featured 42 strands.

“Up to that point there weren’t any specialist hi-fi speaker cables so people were going and buying lighting flex and power cable and wiring their speakers with that, and of course blowing them up.

“It was really a turning point for the industry and we are quite happy to have led the way. We started to educate the market and made people understand that if you do upgrade your speaker cable with good quality conductors and good quality insulation dielectric, which helps maintain the energy of the signal flow, then you’re going to get much better control of your speakers and your amplifier. We are very proud to have led the way with that, so much so that we keep 42 strand cables in the range today.”

QED was purchased in 2003 by Armour Home, which also owns Q Acoustics, Myryad, Goldring, and Systemline.

“Bob is still overseeing things and making sure his vision is being kept as it was at the start back in 1973,” Jack says.

QED really found its foothold in the speaker cabling market in the mid-1990s, when the market was being flooded with suspect product.

“At that time there was a lot of speculation about speaker cable and a lot of international companies were making claims that just couldn’t be proven.  So, we decided to conduct the most extensive ever research investigation into speaker cables, which was called ‘The Genesis Report’.

“We really looked into the science behind speaker cables. We made sure people knew not to believe everything they heard and it actually helped us get a much better foothold into our market.

“That’s really why one of our brand values at QED is technical leadership; we like people to think and know that what we do is all based on science. All of our products are all designed and engineered in the UK. Nothing we do is ‘off the shelf’ and that’s part of our QED ethos. Everything has scientific and technical merit; we take a really scientific approach and we’ve got some of the world’s leading engineers that work for the QED brand.”

Jack says QED has invested a lot of money in digital assessment equipment, to ensure its products are the best they can be.

“What this equipment enables us to do is actually send phenomenal amounts of data down our HDMI and other digital cables and measure its digital performance. The thing that we look most closely at is digital jitter, which is timing errors in the signal.

“Also, it is this equipment that helps us to prove shows like Watchdog wrong when they say that HDMI is all ones and zeros. We can prove scientifically that that is factually incorrect and the reason is digital jitter.

“Yes, the ones and zeros will often arrive in the same order, but it’s actually the timing errors between those zeros and ones that is the difference between a good and bad HDMI cable.

“The worrying question is: if we are one of only a very small number of companies in the world with this equipment, then what the hell everyone is else doing?”

Unfortunately, since the ‘90s, the company’s popularity in Australia has waned, despite performing well in its homeland. Now, with a new distribution agreement in place with Audio Visual Revolution, the company is bent on reviving its Australian presence.

“In 2014, QED has launched two new products into the Australian market – the Signature Audio 40 and Reference Audio 40 (the number ‘40’ is used here to highlight the company’s 40th anniversary).

“We also have some new optical technologies. In our Reference category, which is what we call our premium category, we use a new technology called QED Glasscore whereby instead of using one optical fibre we use 210 individual pure quartz fibres.

“The next thing we have done is develop a new plug called QED Analogue to replace conventional phono plugs.”

So, given the amount of scientific research the company has invested into the development of cables, will it ever get to a point where they’re as good as it gets?

“I’d say no, because we don’t like to accept defeat,” Jack says.

“There’s always scope for science. Our ethos is always trying to deliver the best possible performance, both scientifically and measurably by the ear, at good value. If that means ultimately we have to engineer products that would usually be at a really high price point and we make less money as a company, then we’d actually do that.

“I think the ultimate question for integrators, though, is why QED? There is definitely and affinity in Australia with British brands, which is great, but really it’s because we have gone through a change of distribution in Australia so now the brand can be given more time and attention.”

QED connectivity solutions are available now through Audio Visual Revolution.