If all HDMI cables are basically the same design, pinout, etc. how have they been able to double, quadruple, etc. the bandwidth on them over time?

Question

Going from HDMI 1.4 to 2.1 there is a 5x increase is bandwidth. Is it because the cables themselves were never the issue but it was the connectors/chips in the devices themselves that couldn’t handle it?

I know part of it is the actual quality of the cables themselves and tighter tolerances, more twists in the wires, material purity, etc. but I can’t imagine that alone would be enough to fully account for this.

In: 565

Answer 1

The quickest and easiest explanation of this is that basically the end points of those wires keep improving to be able to send and receive more data at the same time. It’s the same reason the cable internet that comcast put in your neighborhood in the 90s that ran at 1.2mbps can now do 1gbps with the same wire. Honestly it’s cool what we come up with.