need a new tv

[eddie_van_earache]

I want a bigger screen 42"++ and want it to be PAL/NTSC multivoltage.

Should I try to find a plasma, LCD What?

Too much stuff out there... any advice?

[Musician78]

I was going to buy a smaller (27") LCD. Then I saw the price. I will have tube TVs for as long as they last I think, lol.

[GinSonic]

Tube user here. Still rockin' with the old format 32" Toshiba I scored a decade ago. In fact, my whole system is old.

I've got one of those all in one, dual cassette, triple carousel cd, am/fm radio Sony mini stereos that has 5.1 dolby digital. The old Toshiba dual disc DVD player, a Zenith VHS and a $99 throwaway turntable. Does me just fine for now.

I'd like to upgrade my TV to a plasma or LCD as well. For my middle aged eyes, I'm thinking minimum 46", but a 50"+ would be better.

I hear good things about the Sharp Aquos series of LCD's. Plasma TV's I hear have longevity issues.
G.

[dannyr]

Get a flat-panel, either plasma or LCD. Both have pros and cons and you can read all about them on the internet. Just do a search and all kinds of info will come up.

I prefer plasma, and to me they have a better picture. I have a 42" that I have had for 5-6 years and a 50" that I have had probably 8 months. Both are awesome and I haven't had any issues.

[thetroy]

The new plasmas are supposed to be fine. I would probably go with a plasma model if I were spending 1k+ on a TV.

Also I would make sure it can display 1080p resolution (1900x1080 I believe).

[iced_earth]

PAL/NTSC and multivoltage? I didn't know anyone made anything like that...

[SEEGERMANY]

"fuck solid state man, gotta have tubes!"

[Ripley7t]

You could check out the 42 inch phillips LCD. Both the 42 and 47 are great LCD's. I looked long and hard before I bought. The nice thing about the 47 is that it has a usb port. You can do firmware updates as they are released by the manuf. I looked at alot of tvs before I bought this one. It doubles as my monitor for my pc for surfing the net and using riffworks/Toneport, lol.

[Venomboy]

I just got a Panasonic 50" plasma. 1080p. Killer.

You will find something that sucks about every brand and every technology.

In general, plasmas have deeper blacks.

Some people say LCDs look more vivid. Some say they look unnatural.

Prices have dropped a lot in the past year.

Go as big as you can afford.

Even on a 50" TV when watching a widescreen movie, the movie is often filmed in a different aspect ratio than 16:9. It will often have bars on top and bottom. So the bigger the screen, the bigger the picture.

I had a 32" Panasonic tube TV for 10 years. The 50" doesn't feel gigantic in comparison. At first it feels big but when you see both tvs near each other, the 50 doesn't look that much bigger.

HDTV is strange. NBC and CBS in my area have nice clean and clear signals. Super sharp. I watched some movies on Spike HD and I think TBS HD or TNT (one of those "lesser" channels". Picture was so-so. Not super sharp. Saw Nacho Libre on Showtime HD. A little grainy, but not bad. Some shows are full 16:9, some aren't. Commercials and bumpers will be all sorts of aspect ratios.

www.avsforum.com has all the geeked out info. Think if it as if the pre-pro crowd applied their nerdiness to TVs and then some. There's so much info about the pros and cons that it makes you not even want to buy a TV.

Everyone will tell to to calibrate. Burn in your set. Break it in. Don't use black bars. Use black bars. HDMI is the devil. Component connections are the devil. Blah blah.

When you go to a store to check out the TVs, it's difficult because you never know if someone tweaked the settings, if the source signal is good. At Magnolia by my work they show ESPN HD which is super awful. Pixellated, grainy. Makes you not want to buy a TV.

Find your size, determine a budget, read some reviews. Then take the plunge!

[OnlineStageGear]

Find your size, determine a budget, read some reviews. Then take the plunge!

+1.

[eddie_van_earache]

I just got a Panasonic 50" plasma. 1080p. Killer.

You will find something that sucks about every brand and every technology.

In general, plasmas have deeper blacks.

Some people say LCDs look more vivid. Some say they look unnatural.

Prices have dropped a lot in the past year.

Go as big as you can afford.

Even on a 50" TV when watching a widescreen movie, the movie is often filmed in a different aspect ratio than 16:9. It will often have bars on top and bottom. So the bigger the screen, the bigger the picture.

I had a 32" Panasonic tube TV for 10 years. The 50" doesn't feel gigantic in comparison. At first it feels big but when you see both tvs near each other, the 50 doesn't look that much bigger.

HDTV is strange. NBC and CBS in my area have nice clean and clear signals. Super sharp. I watched some movies on Spike HD and I think TBS HD or TNT (one of those "lesser" channels". Picture was so-so. Not super sharp. Saw Nacho Libre on Showtime HD. A little grainy, but not bad. Some shows are full 16:9, some aren't. Commercials and bumpers will be all sorts of aspect ratios.

www.avsforum.com has all the geeked out info. Think if it as if the pre-pro crowd applied their nerdiness to TVs and then some. There's so much info about the pros and cons that it makes you not even want to buy a TV.

Everyone will tell to to calibrate. Burn in your set. Break it in. Don't use black bars. Use black bars. HDMI is the devil. Component connections are the devil. Blah blah.

When you go to a store to check out the TVs, it's difficult because you never know if someone tweaked the settings, if the source signal is good. At Magnolia by my work they show ESPN HD which is super awful. Pixellated, grainy. Makes you not want to buy a TV.

Find your size, determine a budget, read some reviews. Then take the plunge!

Thank you very much for taking the time to write all of that and especially the link to the TV nerd forum.

[Spivonious]

I bought an LCD a little over a year ago, and here's what I learned when doing my research:

Plasmas offer the best contrast since they (unlike LCDs) can do true black. They're also the most power hungry (use more than a tube Tv). They are also prone to burn-in.

LCDs are not susceptible to burn-in. They cannot display a true black. This is because LCDs work by blocking certain wavelengths of light and cannot completely block it. They use very little power compared to a tube TV. LCDs are the thinnest of all flat panels.

DLP works by tilting a bunch of tiny mirrors and shining the light through one or more color wheels. The first generation of these suffered from the "rainbow effect" where some people could see a rainbow of colors in white images. They have since fixed this by having the color wheel spin a lot faster. They cannot do true white. DLP is the thickest of all of the flat panels. The image quality is fine, but the worst of the three.

Which one is the best? Well, LCDs are difficult to make in large sizes, so anything over 42" and the price skyrockets. Plasmas are difficult to make in small sizes, so you won't find any plasma under 42". DLPs are a good bang for your buck if you want a large screen, but you will sacrifice some image quality.

As far as 720p vs 1080p, the human eye cannot tell the difference unless the screen is over 50" (or you're sitting extremely close to the screen). In addition, the only thing that currently outputs at that resolution are Blu-Ray discs and the PS3. If you don't have either of those and don't plan on getting one of them soon, 1080p is a waste of money. Also, if you're looking at TVs under 50", don't bother with 1080p.

Most devices these days use HDMI for connections. Make sure the TV you get has at least two. If you're looking to get surround sound with this, make sure the TV has an optical audio out.

Finally, don't let the TVs in the store fool you. The factory settings are usually crap and will need to be tweaked once you get the set in your home. LCD panels are made by two companies and are all the same quality, so choose a TV based on its features, not it's image quality in the store. With that said, once you start looking you'll notice that there are two price groups, a low and a high. The high group will offer a slightly better image than the low group, but unless you're willing to tweak you won't notice it in everyday use. I agree with Venomboy that ESPN HD picture quality is pretty bad. Try to get PBS on the TV...it's the best picture for HD networks in my opinion.

The TV I settled on was a 32" Vizio LCD. It has tons of inputs, image quality that was comparable to the Panasonic that cost twice as much, and a good size for the distance I sit away from it (6-8 feet).

edit: Oh and make sure you get a TV with a built-in ATSC/QAM tuner.

[eddie_van_earache]

I bought an LCD a little over a year ago, and here's what I learned when doing my research:

Plasmas offer the best contrast since they (unlike LCDs) can do true black. They're also the most power hungry (use more than a tube Tv). They are also prone to burn-in.

LCDs are not susceptible to burn-in. They cannot display a true black. This is because LCDs work by blocking certain wavelengths of light and cannot completely block it. They use very little power compared to a tube TV. LCDs are the thinnest of all flat panels.

DLP works by tilting a bunch of tiny mirrors and shining the light through one or more color wheels. The first generation of these suffered from the "rainbow effect" where some people could see a rainbow of colors in white images. They have since fixed this by having the color wheel spin a lot faster. They cannot do true white. DLP is the thickest of all of the flat panels. The image quality is fine, but the worst of the three.

Which one is the best? Well, LCDs are difficult to make in large sizes, so anything over 42" and the price skyrockets. Plasmas are difficult to make in small sizes, so you won't find any plasma under 42". DLPs are a good bang for your buck if you want a large screen, but you will sacrifice some image quality.

As far as 720p vs 1080p, the human eye cannot tell the difference unless the screen is over 50" (or you're sitting extremely close to the screen). In addition, the only thing that currently outputs at that resolution are Blu-Ray discs and the PS3. If you don't have either of those and don't plan on getting one of them soon, 1080p is a waste of money. Also, if you're looking at TVs under 50", don't bother with 1080p.

Most devices these days use HDMI for connections. Make sure the TV you get has at least two. If you're looking to get surround sound with this, make sure the TV has an optical audio out.

Finally, don't let the TVs in the store fool you. The factory settings are usually crap and will need to be tweaked once you get the set in your home. LCD panels are made by two companies and are all the same quality, so choose a TV based on its features, not it's image quality in the store. With that said, once you start looking you'll notice that there are two price groups, a low and a high. The high group will offer a slightly better image than the low group, but unless you're willing to tweak you won't notice it in everyday use. I agree with Venomboy that ESPN HD picture quality is pretty bad. Try to get PBS on the TV...it's the best picture for HD networks in my opinion.

The TV I settled on was a 32" Vizio LCD. It has tons of inputs, image quality that was comparable to the Panasonic that cost twice as much, and a good size for the distance I sit away from it (6-8 feet).

edit: Oh and make sure you get a TV with a built-in ATSC/QAM

tuner.

Thanks a lot. I appreciate the input.

[DonP]

You could check out the 42 inch phillips LCD.

Phillips left a bad taste in my mouth. I have a regular tube 27" flat screen that the picture started messing up after less than a year.

Like most companies, they use the cheapest parts they can find. Why use a 1/4 watt resistor when you can save .0000001 cents of cost by using a 1/8 watt resistor? Who cares if the resistor blows out in less than a year, the customer will have to buy another TV.

All I'm saying is buy either from a reputable company (this isn't a safe choice these days since every company is getting cheap with parts), or get a good warranty. And watch out for b.s. clauses in the warranty as well.

I'd be really pissed if the POS Phillips was a pricy flat panel and it lasted less than a year before having issues. You don't want to be buying a new TV every year because of crappy quality.

[Partial @ Marshall]

LCD 1080p 40" Sony Bravia, W series...and in a side by side, I could tell the difference between 1080p and the 720p. Blacks aren't as good as Plasma but far more durable and I live at 7000 ft...Some Plasmas have problems at high altitude. Not cheap, but Sony is the only stuff that hasn't crapped out on me. Looking to get Bluray soon.