I purchased a "6ft 28 gauge gold plated connector HDMI cable" from monoprice in Apr '05. Invoice from back then says nothing about 1.1, 1.2, or 1.3 certification. Just bought a new XBR4 tv, and I'm wondering if I should buy a newer HDMI cable that is 1.3 certified. What are your thoughts?

I wouldn't worry about it until you are using sources that can support Deep Color or bitstreamed TrueHD.

All HDMI cables are forward and backward compatible. There is no difference in the connections. 1.3 certification just means is that it has been certified to carry the higher frequencies required by 1.3. But it doesn't mean that older cables can't handle 1.3 signal frequencies. It just means they haven't been certified for those frequencies.

If you plug a PS3 into the XBR4 the data rate will automatically be at the deep color rate 2.23Gbps (per lane) for 1080p at 60Hz or 1.11Gbps if you have the PS3 set to 720p or 1080i (why would you do that?). Any data rate above 1.65Gbps is considered an HDMI 1.3 rate.

That being said the XBR4 has built in equalization that helps boost the signal. In the lab I am running 50ft of 26AWG HDMI cable between the PS3 and our XBR4 with error-free transmission. Unless your 6ft cable is defective, you will have no problems with HDMI 1.3 deep color operation.

Thanks, thats quite a lot of info. I'll use this cable, assuming that even though 3 years old, should receive the same benefit. I don't have a PS3. Just going from cable box to tv forcing 1080i.