Austin360 blogs > Digital Savant > Archives > 2006 > December > 01 > Entry
HDTV advice: the bare basics
I’ll probably go into more detail about this soon, but since I’ve been asked by a few people at work for advice about HDTV buying, I thought I’d post an e-mail I just wrote to someone on the subject. It’s been three years since I was in the market for an HDTV and I know prices and some features have changed (on the whole, the quality of HDTVs is generally much better than when I bought mine and some features [such as HDMI] have become fairly standard).
So, here’s my quick three-minute advice for buying an HDTV for the holidays:
I’d start by going to A&B TV and just asking some questions there based on your needs. We have a rear-projection 50-inch Toshiba that we bought about three years ago and has served us well. It’s not as fancy as an LCD or DLP or whatever. But A&B tends to stock higher-end stuff than your Best Buys or Circuit Citys and they have a very good five-year warranty for $99 (at least, they did at the time). Most HD devices now have HDMI outputs (HD-DVD players, Blu-Ray, etc…), so make sure you have at least one of those inputs.
I’d definitely say get something that goes up to 1080p resolution, and I’d probably stay away from plasma altogether. LCD and DLP seem to be good choices now. And don’t be fooled by how bright the display is in the showroom — they tend to set them a lot brighter than they’re supposed to be. Focus on the image quality itself and saturation of colors/clarity of darks. Even then, if you’re serious about the picture quality and settings, you’ll need to have someone come in and calibrate it a month or so after the picture has settled in. (About $300-$400; we never did it, but serious A/V geeks seem to think it’s an important step.)
Also, if you don’t have a lot of windows or sunlight in your place, consider an HD projector. You can get a lot more size/bang for your buck if you don’t have a very bright room or have heavy curtains.
If you decide on a set or brand you like, do some research online. CNet and the AVS forum are good places to start. It also doesn’t hurt to check out customer reviews on Amazon or Epinions to see if owners have had any major problems with their set.
Permalink | Comments (1) | Categories: Shopping, TV
Comments
By Lou Ann Roth
December 4, 2006 11:47 AM | Link to this
Regardless of the technology, companies and reviewers need to talk to women about TV's and home theater systems. Basically know this: We do not want a bleeping elephant in the living room. We want sleek, unobtrusive and easy to use. It's time for the "snowblower" (read rediculously complicated) mentality to go the way of the dinosaurs. We don't want to see wires, blinking lights, multitudes of remotes and big bulky boxes. We do want to be able to read English labels on knobs and buttons that don't require a miner's headlamp and magnifying glass. Think sleek! Think simple! Think elegant!
REPLY FROM OMAR: Thank you so much -- that's a very good point. My wife has made note of the rats' nest of wires behind our TV and we're been looking at replacing our (rather oversized) rear-projection TV with something that takes up a lot less space at the same screen size. I think products like the Harmony Remote (which is still pretty complicated, but is a step in the right direction) and products like TiVo are trying to address issues you mention. But yes, on the whole, many home theater products are amazingly ugly.