On 12/28/05, Chesty Puller <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > Ok, that makes sense about the Plasma. Tigerdirect's got a 27 inch HD LCD > for $599 after rebate. That makes me want to buy now, but I think I'll wait > until after I finish the remodel of my office. > > Thanks for the info. > > - Matt
Others have bashed TigerDirect. I'll just point out some things about that TV they have. First, it doesn't have a HDTV tuner. It's what's known as "HDTV-Ready". It only has a standard analog TV tuner and any digital signal will have to be processed with an external box. For most people that will be either their cable box or a dish receiver. If you're already using a dish, then you're good. If you have cable, you'll probably have to pay an extra fee for their HD service to get only a handful of channels, half of which are the local channels which you could get for free in HD if your HDTV has a ATSC tuner. You can get an external tuner ($300-$1000) or put an HD tuner card into a computer for around $100 if you want to use that to drive the TV. Second, the price on that TV is throwing up a ton of red flags. The average price for a HDTV Ready 27" LCD that I've seen is about $700-$1000. One with a tuner will run about $1000-$1500. Third, the resolution may or may not be an issue. It's 1024x768. Most HD afficionados look for 1366x768 because if you're looking for a 16:9 widescreen, that fits the ratio. Of course, it presumes square pixel elements on the LCD screen. Many TVs have rectangular pixel elements, so trying to figure out if there's some jiggery-poke with resolution going on behind the scenes gets to be tricky. And that leads me to my last point: With these new digital TVs you really need to see the screen first hand to really know if it will look good to you. There's a lot of difference in the quality from one TV to the next, much more so than in analog. And when you look at the screen, be sure to be honest with yourself about what you will actually use it for. In my case, 90% of my TV viewing is old analog cable channels. When watching those on an HD set, they have to upscale the image and that produces artifacts (take a 72dpi picture in photoshop and rescale it to 200dpi and you'll get a sense for what kind of artifacting happens). For instance, In hours of comparing TVs I noticed that the Panasonic was much worse at the artifacting than a Sony or Samsung (with Sony barely beating the Samsung). With digital cable, the results may even be worse since most digital cable is still standard definition resolution and also highly compressed to boot. An old tube TV is VERY forgiving of artifacting but I can even see it on my analog TV. A digital TV is going to show those artifacts, not blur them like an analog tv does. Also be aware that Congress has staggered deadlines for TVs to include digital tuners: - July 1, 2005: All TVs with screen sizes over 36" must include built-in ATSC tuner - July 1, 2006: 100 of 25-35" TVs must include ATSC DTV tuner (right now only 50 required) - July 1, 2007: 100 of 13-24" TVs must include ATSC DTV tuner - July 1, 2007: 100 of all interface devices must have ATSC DTV tuner (VCR, DVD player/recorder, DVR) This may drive prices back up, but I think it will just slow their drop. It could account though for the discount price you're seeing and we will probably see more price incentives on 25-35" TVs without tuners as July gets closer. Crap. I've written a novellete. Sorry. I'm just in the market too and it's frustrating me all to hell. I'm basically thinking I'm going to wait another year. I don't think the quality of picture will get much better, but I think the prices will drop considerably. Last year at this time a 42" TV (with tuner) I've looked at cost about $1000 more. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Find out how CFTicket can increase your company's customer support efficiency by 100% http://www.houseoffusion.com/banners/view.cfm?bannerid=49 Message: http://www.houseoffusion.com/lists.cfm/link=i:5:190000 Archives: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/threads.cfm/5 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/lists.cfm/link=s:5 Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/cf_lists/unsubscribe.cfm?user=11502.10531.5 Donations & Support: http://www.houseoffusion.com/tiny.cfm/54
