As far back as I can remember, every monitor I've bought has a big honking ferrite choke on at least one end of the video cable. VGA versions as well as DVI. I haven't purchased a monitor in a few years and am wondering: Is this still common for monitors bought today that ship with a DVI cable? What about monitors that ship with a HDMI cable?

I cannot answer your question directly, as I haven't purchased a monitor in some time, but you can buy clamp on style ferrite chokes such as the one linked below. However I am not sure if all chokes are made equal and what frequencies they address? Would anyone like to chirp in?

http://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail/TDK ... TQwUzjNRcm

As for your original question, perhaps you can find visual confirmation by checking reviews and un-boxings of your favourite monitors.

Still common on both DVI and VGA, and with HDMI as far as included cables go. If a cable is included with a monitor they'll want to avoid getting customer complaints in some odd situation. Otherwise there are plenty of non-ferrited HDMI cables out on the market and I haven't seen a problem with them. (I quite like the flat, flexible types myself) Should be mainly an analogue signal thing unless there's unusual interference near where the cable needs to be routed and then the ferrite might not help anyway. But then again I'm certainly no cable guy.

My older DVI cables have chokes, but I've got a coupl've new cables with lower-profile heads (no "box" behind the connector) that do not, and none of my HDMI or DP cables have chokes.

I'm sorry if this is entirely off-topic (it is), but I initially read the title of this topic as "ferret chokes on monitor cables....an informal poll". I thought someone might be seeking medical or legal advice related to an accident involving their pet ferret and and a display device. It was only after clicking through that I realized the error of my ways.

Somewhat back on topic though, aren't these usually called ferrite "cores"? In any case, I have them on my VGA cables and on a DVI-D cable that all came with monitors. My HDMI cables don't have them, nor do my HDMI to DVI cables, and I don't suspect they would make any difference with a digital interface, unless there was some extreme electromagnetic interference, or the cable were extremely long.

These points can be issues. Maybe not when you have a 2m cable but having used special gold 25m cables before, it definitely is an issue then.

Ferrites can be bought separately and clipped on the outer of cables if you have problems.

Just saw this thread. On my Samsung TV, the ferrite cores came not attached to the cable, in a separate little bag with instruction on how to attach them.