[sjt78]

My wife and I plan on purchasing a new television in the nest month or so. This is to replace the 15 year old 25" Magnavox we currently have in our living room. We are looking at 42-50" televisions as that is what our new television stand can hold and we sit only about 9' from the TV so I don't want to go any larger than 50". My wife would actually be happy with 42", but as a guy I'm always pushing for bigger

Anyway, we have been looking at the Samsung DLP HDTV rear projection televisions as they look decent are are priced fair. The only problem with them is that you can't really see the picture well off axis. We have a dining room that adjoins the living room and often we spin our current television to watch television while we are eating. With the size of the DLP's we would not be able to do that. So I started looking at LCD and Plasma HDTV's that have stands that can swivel. They cost a bit more, but may be worth it for the convenience. Due to having a large window to the right of the television, it would be nice if the TV had a matte finish instead of a glossy finish to diminish reflections. Any advice would be helpful as there are so many televisions to choose from. Our price range is max $2200 and as for stores nearby (we don't want to buy from internet) we have the usual suspects: Best Buy, Circuit City, Sears, etc. Thanks in advance.
-Steve

 

[Canman]

At a 9' viewing distance a 42" widescreen TV would be good. The hardcore home theater guys would say go for a 50" but I think a 42" is ideal.

I just bought a Panasonic TH-42PX60U 42" plasma which I am really happy with. High Def and DVD look amazing and standard def looks decent on this panel. I spent a lot of time looking at different screens and I feel the Panasonic is one of the best, especially for the money. I bought it at Circuit City for $1,980. (They had it for $2,199 and I found a 10% off coupon on the internet.)

The only projection units I like are Sony's SXRD screens. Sony makes a 50" (KDS-R50XBR1) that retails for $2,999 but street price is lower.

I haven't had any problem with reflections on my plasma but I don't have windows right next to the TV.

 

[sjt78]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Canman At a 9' viewing distance a 42" widescreen TV would be good. The hardcore home theater guys would say go for a 50" but I think a 42" is ideal.

My wife would love to hear you say that, lol

Most likely we will be getting a 42" television anyway as I'd rather buy a nicer 42" TV than an average 46-50". I even saw a 44" RCA rear projection HDTV yesterday at Target...kind of a weird size. I usually avoid the RCA brand at all costs, so I won't be looking at that one. I'm a little worried about how regular non HD broadcasts will look on the TV. It almost seems like non-HD content looks better on non-HD televisions than on HD TVs. Watching non-HD content on my step-father's high end 60" Sony HDTV is rather painful, but part of that is he has the couch only about 8' from the TV. He really should have gone for a smaller television.

 

[JaGWiRE]

Not to thread jack or anything, but the lowdown on DLP, LCD, and Plasma is that they all have their weaknesses and flaws, their have been many good comparisons of them, and some of which explain the weaknesses in pretty good detail. I remember this one link, if I can find it, I'll post it.
SDTV doesn't look too good on HDTVS, that's for sure. All my experiences have been pretty painful too. Bad stretching and everything. Just I guess the huge resolution difference.

 

[sjt78]

I hate the look of stretching 4:3 content to fit 16:9 screens. I'll have to watch non 16:9 content with the bars on the sides. I hear plasmas are no longer prone to burn-in, anyone know this for sure?

 

[JaGWiRE]

Quote:

Originally Posted by sjt78 I hate the look of stretching 4:3 content to fit 16:9 screens. I'll have to watch non 16:9 content with the bars on the sides. I hear plasmas are no longer prone to burn-in, anyone know this for sure?

From the last I've heard on the plasma discussion, the final word was that they have improved greatly and that many of the older issues needn't be worried so much about now (but I am no expert in this area, and this is just from a few chats I had with some friends 6 months ago when we were looking at tvs.) And yes, stretching 4:3 does look awful, I like to leave it in it's original state, which is annoying, but atleast the image isn't totally stretched to disgust. DLP is getting popular, but the question really is are you willing to replace the bulbs? That's the same for LCD projection I believe too.

 

[darkninja67]

Quote:

Originally Posted by sjt78 I hate the look of stretching 4:3 content to fit 16:9 screens. I'll have to watch non 16:9 content with the bars on the sides. I hear plasmas are no longer prone to burn-in, anyone know this for sure?

Pixel shifting solves part of the burn in problem. Most burn in occurs when the settings are not changed from OOTB. Calibrate the set with Avia or DVE first. I run my plasma at near half brightness in a darkened room with no burn in issues whatsoever. As far as glare goes, you should definitely look LCD panel (not going to get a good 45" at the $2000 price range though) or the newer Sammy DLPs. I forget the model designation but they have a thin black bezel and do well compared to the Sony SXRD sets IMO.

Also, do not put much faith into what you see in retail stores. Most are not set up properly.

 

[vpivinylspinner]

Depending upon the capabilities of the unit you can generally decide how to stretch 4:3 images. I stretch just the edges and it looks pretty decent on my Plasmas. As far as DLP vs. the others, you will get a better picture with a DLP rear projection than any Plasmas but you have to give up some space. Plasmas are capable of providing usable images much longer now than they used to. The half-life of a Plasma is probably longer than most people keep TVs. While it appears you tend to stick with your TV for an extended time you will probably not even notice the degradation of the image over time unless you compare it to a new one. I have two Philips 60" Plasmas and I get a pretty good off-axis image and have much better reflection elimation than any of the rear projection units I have used. The ambilight thing is also very good and makes more of a difference than you would think.

 

[jefemeister]

Careful, a lot of the 50" TVs in this price range are "only" 720p. 42" may be 1080. Also make sure you budget in about $400 for the optional protection plan as I feel it's worth it for these TVs especially considering it covers a bulb replacement which you will eventually need.

THX specification quotes a 50" screen is the minimum size for an 8 foot viewing distamce. This is for watching a lot of films and HD content though. If you watch a lot of SD material I agree a smaller screen will be better. If you predominantly watch SD stuff, you may just want to skip HD alltogether but that's another topic.

I also would avoid RCA. IMO it's Panasonic and Sony for LCD and Samsung for DLP. As far as stores, I think Circuit City has better prices and selection. Pretty much everyone will price match though.

 

[Canman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by JaGWiRE SDTV doesn't look too good on HDTVS, that's for sure. All my experiences have been pretty painful too. Bad stretching and everything. Just I guess the huge resolution difference.

Some HDTVs are better at displaying SDTV than others. As you noticed on your step-father's 60" Sony, SD looks worse on larger TVs. This is another reason to go with the 42" rather than the 50" if you watch any amount of SDTV.

 

[jefemeister]

As far as stretching 4:3 to 16:9, my Hitachi CRT has a 4:3 zoom mode which fills the entire screen by zooming in on the picture instead of just strectching it out. I much prefer this, and it is very watchable. Maybe only once or twice did I feel I missed some action by chopping the top/bottom of the frame. Not sure if other TVs have this feature.

 

[darkninja67]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jefemeister Careful, a lot of the 50" TVs in this price range are "only" 720p. 42" may be 1080.

As you go up in screen size you get more resolution generally. 1080i is what you may be thinking about though.

 

[JaGWiRE]

Quote:

Originally Posted by jefemeister As far as stretching 4:3 to 16:9, my Hitachi CRT has a 4:3 zoom mode which fills the entire screen by zooming in on the picture instead of just strectching it out. I much prefer this, and it is very watchable. Maybe only once or twice did I feel I missed some action by chopping the top/bottom of the frame. Not sure if other TVs have this feature.

Yeah, I've seen this feature too, and it does seem to chop off a small amount.

And yes, I also heard smaller tv's are better for standard definition, I remember posting about a denon dvd-2200 I had been looking at (didn't end up getting it), and the response was that on the 26" HDTV I may get in the future, the screen is too small for a very big difference even if the dvd player is only SD.

Also, I think that their are a few 42" tv's on the market now that are actually 1080p.

 

[Canman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by darkninja67 As you go up in screen size you get more resolution generally. 1080i is what you may be thinking about though.

Not true. Most fixed pixel displays (from the same manufacturer) have the same pixel count, no matter what the size. Since pixel count is generally the same, pixels will be spaced farther apart on a larger display. For this reason, larger sets only look good if you are far enough away so that the space between pixels is not discernable.

Most fixed pixel displays have a native resolution of 720p (720 or 768 horizontal lines). The availability of 1080p displays (1080 horizontal lines) is becoming more widespread but still more expensive and harder to find than 720p displays.

 

[sjt78]

Any other model specific recommendations? Thanks.