The big "How do I choose an HDTV?" thread.

Panasonic VIERA TC-P55ST50 55", I picked up one of these recently. Loving it so far.

I still need to go through and actually set it up/calibrate it. Out of the box setting have been working good so far.

Yellek wrote:

We just got a free Samsung 60" Plasma PN60E530 with our furniture purchase at rooms to go. I think scrolling through the last few pages that it wasn't a bad choice. The other I was looking at was the Panasonic VIERA TC-P55ST50 55". Seems we lost 3D (which I don't give a damn about) and gained 5". We also lost the wifi capability stuff but we don't need that either since we use the PS3 for all the media stuff.

What say the great goodjer mind meld? :)

Pretty much any plasma on the market today is going to be awesome. Enjoy it.

TigerBill wrote:

Panasonic VIERA TC-P55ST50 55", I picked up one of these recently. Loving it so far.

I still need to go through and actually set it up/calibrate it. Out of the box setting have been working good so far.

I thought out of the box it was blue and fake looking to my eyes. I'd recommend starting from the Cnet calibrations. I tried a couple of others on some forums, and liked these better.

Make sure to set them on each input.

Is there a HDTV make out there with a good tv and above average twitter client? I find myself watching sports with twitter going on the iPad, and thought it would be neat with that stream actually on the tv. Something about the community aspect of twitter is appealing when it comes to sports.

That's a cool idea.

I have a dumb question. Got a friend wanting to buy a 32 inch LCD to use as TV/computer monitor. If it's 1080p everything will run and look fine at 1920x1080? He will be connected through hdmi with a radeon 6950.

If it's 1080p everything will run and look fine at 1920x1080?

Yes, absolutely.

If it's a 'real' TV it will only run a couple of resolutions (1366x768 and 1920x1080 probably) and nothing in between. At least my TV didn't when it doubled as my computer screen.

There are combo's on the market as well. I'm currently using a Samsung B2430HD. Very happy with it. It's not 32", but there might be alternatives out there.

My TV began to die today. At almost six years I'm not too upset, but the timing stinks. Basically, I'm getting color distortions like you would see in a dying video card. It was a Toshiba Regza 37", 720p set.

I bought this today on Amazon for $650. It's a slight upgrade to 40" and 1080p, but basically the same set.

I would have liked to go bigger, but we do have a small front room, and had to convince my wife that 37" was not too big before. I didn't go plasma because of size and the fact that it will face a large window. The Toshiba was pretty much aces for us until today.

Watching the CES updates, looks like 4K tvs are the next big thing, but OLED should finally be launching as well. TVs are definitely getting bigger, seems 60+ LCDs will be quite common in a year or two.

I'd avoid the first gen 4K sets like the plague though, as they lack the connectivity needed to support higher than 24p content, and with this many makers the price is sure to drop like a rock.

The good news is normal sized TVs are going to be ridiculously cheap from now on.

Well, gosh darn it. I have a column of pixels which seems to have gone out on my 40" Samsung LCD last night (all inputs and it affects the OSD). Anyone have this happen before? I'm assuming I'm SOL on the TV, but I figured I'd ask on here. Mostly, I just want to know what failed. I bought it from my brother awhile back, and it's out of the 1 year warranty period.

So sad.

I can't see replacing my Plasma until OLED becomes affordable. Unless it breaks.

Tuffalo, usually when you just up and lose a bunch of pixels at once like that yeah you're out of luck.

IMAGE(http://nooooooooooooooo.com/vader.jpg)

Ah well, I had it for 8 months or so and only paid $400 for it. I got my money's worth out of it. I don't really want to buy a TV this year, so I'll probably just keep using the damn thing when I'm desperate to be in the living room.

My new TV won't be here until the 16th, it seems. So now every night is like the Walter tripping on acid episode of Fringe. Weeee!!!!

tuffalobuffalo wrote:

Well, gosh darn it. I have a column of pixels which seems to have gone out on my 40" Samsung LCD last night (all inputs and it affects the OSD). Anyone have this happen before? I'm assuming I'm SOL on the TV, but I figured I'd ask on here. Mostly, I just want to know what failed. I bought it from my brother awhile back, and it's out of the 1 year warranty period.

So sad.

I have the same problem with my 40" Samsung LCD (LN40A450, IIRC): a single vertical line of pixels would be cyan or magenta, then correct itself after 10-20 minutes. It slowly got worse—more lines, staying on the screen longer, and has now (16 months later) settled on the left 3 inches of the screen (about 9.5% of the viewing area) being permanently black, white, or stripes of colours (it changes as the TV is left on), with a couple of other lines of single-colour pixels that eventually correct themselves.

Obviously we've learned to live with it, and often don't even notice it unless there's a UI element in a video game I can't see. It happened just after our TV turned 3 and left warranty, started very slowly and unobtrusively, and has seemed to have plateaued. So we'll keep using this TV until it's totally unusable, or we find a killer deal on a replacement.

Since it's 90.5% usable, and no one would buy it, we feel a repair—even to load it in the car to pay labour to have someone look at it—would just be losing money on it. Maybe it's a warped board, but it's not worth it to find out.

Jayhawker wrote:

My new TV won't be here until the 16th, it seems. So now every night is like the Walter tripping on acid episode of Fringe. Weeee!!!!

I've got the same old TV as you. Only problem I have is only on MSNBC, about 1/4 of the way from the left of the screen, it looks like a torn piece of paper at times. Only on that one channel, though, so hopefully it's just something with their feed, but it's the same place every time.

Just to double check, in the US, Samsung's standard warranty is 1 year, correct? That's what I gathered from a quick search.

Bonus_Eruptus wrote:
Jayhawker wrote:

My new TV won't be here until the 16th, it seems. So now every night is like the Walter tripping on acid episode of Fringe. Weeee!!!!

I've got the same old TV as you. Only problem I have is only on MSNBC, about 1/4 of the way from the left of the screen, it looks like a torn piece of paper at times. Only on that one channel, though, so hopefully it's just something with their feed, but it's the same place every time.

I think my wife's mega Lego LotR marathon this weekend killed ours. At least that's the story I'm selling her.

Basically the colors are just out of whack and getting worse. I verified that it it was getting the same distortion from all sources, including our Wii which is plugged directly into the TV and not through the receiver. Even toshiba menus screens are distorted, so it is not cable or an external source.

Everything on regular TV has weird teal discoloration and sunburst effects that make clouds and such look surreal. There seems to be some colors missing, is my guess. It's old enough that it was worth just getting a new and not spending money on it. I may put it up on Craigslist to see if somebody wants to fiddle with it.

I'm finally planning on getting a tv, I've search around and decided this smart tv craze is not for me, but now I'm left with trying to figure out what's the best panel 1000 or less can buy. It's going in a basement with little natural light so plasma seems a good choice... Beyond that I'm lost. Help!

Blotto The Clown wrote:

I'm finally planning on getting a tv, I've search around and decided this smart tv craze is not for me, but now I'm left with trying to figure out what's the best panel 1000 or less can buy. It's going in a basement with little natural light so plasma seems a good choice... Beyond that I'm lost. Help!

Plasma is about as far as you need to look. What size do you want? You can easily get a 50"+ 1080p panel for under $1000, or a higher end 42-46" one. Panasonic tends to have a slight edge in picture quality, but you probably wouldn't notice unless you have them side-by-side. Samsung might be a bit cheaper and is still great.

Samsung had great options in last year's models, but this year's it's all Panasonic all the time from what I've read. The 50 inch in the ST series is widely regarded as one of the best values on the market and is $999 right now on Amazon.

Thin_J wrote:

Samsung had great options in last year's models, but this year's it's all Panasonic all the time from what I've read. The 50 inch in the ST series is widely regarded as one of the best values on the market and is $999 right now on Amazon.

I just wish Kuro was still around. From what I gather they are still unmatched. /sigh. It was nice to have something that was considered unbeatable and stripped of all those silly features and just an amazing panel. It made a great comparison for people reviewing TV sets.

Likely I'll try and find a Panasonic, thanks all.

My brother has a Pioneer Kuro 60".

Blotto The Clown wrote:
Thin_J wrote:

Samsung had great options in last year's models, but this year's it's all Panasonic all the time from what I've read. The 50 inch in the ST series is widely regarded as one of the best values on the market and is $999 right now on Amazon.

I just wish Kuro was still around. From what I gather they are still unmatched. /sigh. It was nice to have something that was considered unbeatable and stripped of all those silly features and just an amazing panel. It made a great comparison for people reviewing TV sets.

Likely I'll try and find a Panasonic, thanks all.

If the Kuro was still around you wouldn't be getting it for $1000 or less. It'd be right there alongside the Panasonic VT series in pricing, so over $1500 for the 50 inch and on up from there.

Thin_J wrote:
Blotto The Clown wrote:
Thin_J wrote:

Samsung had great options in last year's models, but this year's it's all Panasonic all the time from what I've read. The 50 inch in the ST series is widely regarded as one of the best values on the market and is $999 right now on Amazon.

I just wish Kuro was still around. From what I gather they are still unmatched. /sigh. It was nice to have something that was considered unbeatable and stripped of all those silly features and just an amazing panel. It made a great comparison for people reviewing TV sets.

Likely I'll try and find a Panasonic, thanks all.

If the Kuro was still around you wouldn't be getting it for $1000 or less. It'd be right there alongside the Panasonic VT series in pricing, so over $1500 for the 50 inch and on up from there.

VT? ok googling brb,

ok back. Its so hard to tell who's charging more because of there stupid smart TV implementation and who actually has a better product. I wont this unit off as the first, I admit I might have been hasty there.

Just ignore the Smart TV stuff. It's on my TV, but I've never used it, and all TV's with decent panels pretty much include it now whether you want it or not.

I'll also go with the recommendation for the ST model Panasonic plasmas. Reviews say picture quality is pretty much as good as the GT and VT models, for quite a bit less money. I bought a 60" ST this summer and am very happy.

Yeah, I don't really get the drive to make TV's smart. The devices I connect to my TV are smart enough. And I don't want my choice in devices restricted to whatever the manufacturer decided to include, which could go obsolete at any time, forcing to me to buy a new device to connect anyway.

I can say now that the TV I just bought to replace our old one is rock solid and as good as we need. Toshiba has been a little like Onkyo receivers for us, in that they deliver really good performance for lower cost.

tuffalobuffalo wrote:

IMAGE(http://nooooooooooooooo.com/vader.jpg)

Ah well, I had it for 8 months or so and only paid $400 for it. I got my money's worth out of it. I don't really want to buy a TV this year, so I'll probably just keep using the damn thing when I'm desperate to be in the living room.

Well, to follow up on this. Today, the line mysteriously disappeared. Weird. I know it's probably gonna come back, but I can't help but go:

IMAGE(http://chrisblog.gr/wp-includes/js/crop/lucille-bluth-gene-parmesan-gif-i16.png)

I just hope it stays away so that I can play Ni No Kuni in my living room rather than on a monitor in my room.

The only downside of our Samsung plasma is the glossy screen. It gets very bad window glare during the day, as we recently moved and haven't gotten curtains or blinds for those windows yet.

Quintin_Stone wrote:

The only downside of our Samsung plasma is the glossy screen. It gets very bad window glare during the day, as we recently moved and haven't gotten curtains or blinds for those windows yet.

I was going to joke about getting an anti-glare screen protector for it, until I found out it was a real thing.

Quintin_Stone wrote:

The only downside of our Samsung plasma is the glossy screen. It gets very bad window glare during the day, as we recently moved and haven't gotten curtains or blinds for those windows yet.

Yeah, that's always an issue. They give you glossy screens because it ups the number they can put in the contrast box (although it doesn't up the actual contrast), and it creates tons of problems. The last TV I bought, a Samsung LCD, I had to specifically search out a matte screen variant -- a rare, not usually seen in the wild 630 instead of the typical big-box 650.

Plasmas, though, always have a glossy screen.