DVI-HDMI cable blew up my dvi port of Laptop?

hi guys,

I have this problem, hope u can enlighten me. To connect my new Panasonic Plasma with my Dell xps gen 2 laptop (separate graphic card, not on board) I bought a hdmi-dvi cable. As I connected the cable (with power off) sparks where coming from the dvi port. As u guessed, no luck getting image on my Plasma.

But then I discovered the Monitor would not accept dvi signal from laptop (signal error) anymore AND HDMI ports on TV didnt work with my blu-ray anymore (worked before). The supplier claims the cable can NEVER have caused the dvi problems from my laptop and so they wont pay damages. I hooked up my laptop at another monitor and still no luck (vga is working fine).

As the plasma was working correctly with blu- ray on the hdmi port (so did the laptop dvi port with monitor) before use of this cable, my conclusion is that it must have been caused by a faulty cable (and not by high voltage hdmi ports as the supplier claims). Do u agree or am i missing something? Thnks for help.

regards,
Peter