Friday, February 22, 2008

The Time Has Come!

Last night I retired to the bedroom and clicked the remote to turn on the TV. There in all of its glory was Fox News, for about a minute. Then the “picture” became a thin line in the middle of the black screen. I did various low-tech things, to no avail. It seems the bedroom TV has finally heard my pleas and given up the ghost.

So, I’m off, with a clear conscience, to start shopping for a flat panel HD for the living room so that I can replace the now, RIP 20 incher that lies post-moribund in the bedroom with the 36 incher CRT from the living room.

So, all of your thoughts and counsel with respect to size (I’m thinking 42”), plasma v. LCD, 720 v. 1080, 1080i v. 1080p, etc., etc. will be appreciated. Also, get a stand, mount it on the wall? Ah, I’m in pre-tech, male heaven.

9 comments:

fermicat said...

At 42", you'd do better to go with LCD over plasma. We went through the same research process to replace an older TV and went with a Toshiba 42" LCD TV about a year ago. Also got some fancy HDMI cable to hook up the DVD player to it, and optical cable for audio from the TV to the sound system. We were not sorry we upgraded. Looks and sounds fantastic! We upgraded to HD cable very soon thereafter. Beautiful picture.

Look up the stuff in Consumer Reports, but also go and look at the display models. Have fun!

Hedy said...

At the trade show in New York we met with a vendor who makes custom computer systems for day traders. He said the Samsung HDs are the best - I'd never heard that. Good luck in your hunt for HD! Let us know what you end up with.

Posol'stvo the Medved said...

Dave - establish your budget first. Then let's talk about all the other details.

But if it were me and money were no object, I'd go LCD, 1080p, looking for the best contrast ratio I could find. Probably a Sony Bravia.

I'd go to a higher end store -- not a Best Buy or Circuit City -- and look at what they had to offer. After wasting a sales person's time for an hour or so, I'd do research on the Internet on what that I saw. Then I'd go back to him/her and say "Here's the best price I found online. What can you do?"

Keep in mind, having a local person in a local store can benefit you greatly. A few years ago, my subwoofer - just out of warranty - went out on me. I brought it back to Tweeter where I bought it. Because I had a relationship with Morris and because I had sent other people to him as well, he replaced my subwoof right then and there. o cost.

Dave said...

The drama is over. I did a combination of the things you suggested. I did the research and started off this morning. Atlanta has three main TV outlets, Brandsmart, Frys and HH Gregg. My thought was to spend about a thousand but I realized that that wasn't going to get me what I wanted.

I ended up with a Samsung 4071F,
40" 1080p, 25,000 to 1 contrast ratio, 120 hz refresh rate (or some such thing), PIP and a bunch of other stuff. It has really good ratings on various sites and the picture, at least in the store was the best of what they had by a good margin.

So, now I have to buy a stand, I don't want to mount it on the wall.

Having done all this, I'm a bit dissapointed in the available HD channels. I may just get an indoor antenna initially and get the local broadcast channels in HD.

Dave said...

I forgot, its an LCD.

fermicat said...

Congrats! We have never regretted buying our TV - very similar to the one you bought.

Curious... are you disappointed with the quantity of available HD channels, or their quality? Our cable provider has been slowly adding in more HD channels, although not every program on those channels is in HD.

Dave said...

My comment is about quality and "quantity." I have DirecTv. I says there are 90 HD channels; and, I'm sure this isn't a lie. They include all of the premium channels and various pay per view channels, which I don't subscribe to or don't pay to watch on a pay per view basis. When you get down to the channnels I do watch, there aren't that many of them. And, of them, I can't see the "added value of the Bloomberg News Channel in HD. It really comes down to the "Discovery" channels and ESPN. I'm not sure that's worth $10 a month plus $100 for the new dish and receiver I need to get them in the first place.

Dave said...

Hey Eric, thanks for commenting. I have to confess that, though I know housekeepers get tips, I don't, though I feel a bit conflicted about it. Though I do tip the shuttle bus driver from the lot to the terminal and the skycap when I get there.

Kathleen said...

I'm pretty sure your TV gave up the ghost because it didn't want to display Fox News anymore. ;-)