Educate me on a TV purchase..

[OverlandZJ]

The Mrs has been wanting a large flatscreen TV for awhile now, with black friday coming up were looking at whats available.

We figure something in the 50-55" range. I'd like to get something decent for about a grand or under.

As i understand it the three options are Plasma, LCD and LED in that order of technology. What do i want, and what do i stay away from?

The kids have their own TV's for the Wii so no gaming.

 

[Lowrange2]

Don't get an Insignia.

I have a Vizio LCD (still cheap) that I haven't had any trouble out of. The only thing I don't like about the Vizio is that it only has 2 aspect ratios. Wide and Normal. Neither of which are what I want. That's the only downfall I've found. I do suggest a surround sound with any TV set up.

I also have a Sony LCD that I haven't had trouble from. No complaints at all.

Kinda wanting one of the new 3D tvs.

 

[iwannadie]

A buddy of mine worked for Denon and always told me to stay away from plasma. He said they look incredible but have a short life span. He said with plasma expect to replace it in 2-3 years because the color will start to diminish. Maybe most people won't notice the color starting to lack in their tv but if you are serious about the TV you will.

If I were to buy a TV today I would go LED or OLED(I forget if they are down in price or that big yet). I would also not buy any of the typical black friday oddball TV brands. Most places offer these crazy sansui/westinghouse brands that are junk and you only see them around back friday.

Also, please don't hang your TV on the wall 5 feet off the ground or over a fireplace lol. I don't understand why people mount their TV at eye level while standing up. You end up looking Up at it while you watch sitting on the couch. Get a nice stand 18" off the ground.

 

[RedHeep]

The rumors about the longevity of a plasma died with the first generation. The heat issues have been resolved in the later generations. Most of your first gen plasmas died because companies weren't using big enough heatsinks to compensate for the heat.

Most of your newer plasmas are not only designed to run cooler, they also have sufficient passive cooling to keep the boards from overheating.

I have two samsung plasmas, a 42 in the bedroom and a 50 in the living room. The 50 is on probably 4 hours a day during the week and 12-16 hours during the weekend. It's almost 4 years old and looks just as good as the day I bought it as a 1 yr old display model.

The lower priced LCD's have ghost issues, especially during high speed stuff like sports and you'll end up replacing the backlight bulb about every 2 years or so. My FIL has a sony LCD that he's had 4 bulbs in and it's 5 years old.

I don't know much about the LED stuff, other than it's expensive. If you're not going to have the TV on 24 hours a day, it's hard to beat a Samsung 50" 1080p plasma for the price.

And if you purchase the correct mount and tilt it towards the couch, mounting it up over the fireplace doesn't detract from the picture at all.

 

[Johnnie Walker]

THe best place to buy will most likely be your local Costco. You can go online and see what they have and go in and see for yourself. They have the best warranty around.
The 2 brands I have most recent experience with is Toshiba and Sharp. Both make great TV's. IF you can go LED (as long as it is not edge-lit). Samsung makes nice LED's as well.
From my understanding Insignia is actually made with Samsung hardware, but I do not by stuff from Worst Buy, I mean Best Buy.

 

[Doc Holliday]

The half-life for most plasmas is around 40-50,000 hrs (4.65-5.7 years of continuous, never being turned off) half-life refers to when the tv will be half as bright as when it was new. People also talk about burn in being a problem for plasmas, but that was also mainly with the first gen. I use my Panasonic plasma for internet, hulu, netflix and games, applications that leave a static image on the screen for a long period of time and have not had a problem going on 2 years now. A couple advantages of plasma are deeper blacks and more accurate greens, which the human eye is more sensitive too, along with 600Hz refresh rate.

 

[rocknxj]

I have two Panasonic plasmas and I love them both. However, I bought a 50" at Best Buy and sort of wish I got the 55" at Costco. The other one is a 42" for the bedroom that does not get much use, but is pretty spectacular.

The new plasmas are lighter, cooler, and cheaper than the original versions. Best Buy actually gave me some good info when I bought it. I even paid to have the 50" plasma tuned and the colors are amazing at all angles.

 

[420BlackXJ]

Go with plasma. It has a much faster screen refresh rate, so there is no blurring of fast moving images often noticed on LCD/LED tv's.
I have 2 Samsung plasma tv's, a 50" and a 42".
The smaller one is on 12+ hrs a day, and there are no burn in images visible on the screen. The big one downstairs stays on for days at a time, when it is forgotten to turn it off. During this time, the broadcast will switch to the black bars on top and bottom/sides, and there is no difference in the uniformity of the screen so far. That tv is a full 2 years old. I would personally stay away from LCD, as I feel they are inferior in picture quality. Plasmas have richer colors, and deeper blacks.

 

[Ivan]

I've had my Panasonic plasma for about 4 years now and it still works great. I opted for Plasma in this particular situation, because of the wide viewing angle, where my tv is located in the famility room. No matter where I sit, I get a great picture...

When chosing a tv format, consider where you are going to place and what the viewing angle would look like.

Now, nothing against LCD tv's as I have 4 of those in other locations of my house and they work great in those situations. Viewing angles are not an issue there....

 

[bdahlg]

LED has the best picture quality IMHO. Don't buy anything in 60hz with that size TV. 120 or 240 or you will just hate life with the screen lag and "ghosts" as others have mentioned. With a smaller TV, such as one on the 30" range 60hz is ok, but with a bigger screen, you neeed the faster speed of the higher processors to keep the picture crisp. I'm anal as all hell when it comes to electronics; the cheap stuff doesn't last and the maufacturers use shitty components to produce them, rendering a lower-quality picture and performance.

You can't go wrong with a Samsung, Sony, or even Panasonic. Stay away from the Vizio and Westinghouse bullshit, it just doesn't cut the mustard.

I just bought a 46" 120hz 1080p Samsung LED Smart TV. It's the tits. I would have gotten the 55" but i would have nowhere to put it in my tiny ass place.

 

[Wallyman]

I dont buy anything that is a black friday special. After working retail and seeing the junk they ship in for that one day, you really are getting a stripped down device that is not as capable as regular items Essentially you get what you pay for.
My brother worked for Ciircuit city for a couple years and discovered the same thing. the model numbers have an extra letter or number at the end that denotes the "black friday" special. Just price compare like you usually would. I got my 42 inch sanyo LCD which is just fine for the watching we do here. Of course i have two young boys and its usually PBS kids or netflix on there so i wasnt looking for anything spectacular. Its actually a nice television in my opinion.
They should all have HDMI cable inputs, the regular CATV screw on connector, and some more higher end ones have actual network connectivity so you can get certain services like hulu, netflix, facebook (of course :/) right on your television. More things to look for, it depends on what you would like to have.
Unless you are a serious videophile i would go LCD as it provides a better picture than a CRT for the most part if you get a 1080p resolution.
My buddy bought a nice LED television and that picture is amazing, almost makes you motion sick if you arent used to it it has so much depth. crazy.

 

[DrMoab]

I see the marketing genius has snagged all of you.

An LED tv is an LCD TV. The only thing the LED part means is how it's back lit.

An LED back lit TV is completely awesome for black levels but it's expensive. The reason it works so well is that the whole back of the TV is lit by thousands of LEDs They can locally dim these for areas where there is a lot of darkness and leave them on for areas that are bright. It may not quite be as good as Plasma but in today's world, 99% of us couldn't tell the difference.

The biggest determining factor you should consider when going with either a plasma or an LCD TV is how dark is your room and how well can you control the light. Plasma is great in a super dark room where you can completely control the light. An LCD TV is much better in rooms where there is a lot of light coming in from uncontrolled sources...windows and such.

 

[bdahlg]

Yep. Technically they are LCD/LED, backlit with LED whereas the screen is liquid crystal. I still think they look cleaner than plasmas when looking at the wall in Best Buy, but I'm probably just biased :shhh:. I think the main determining factor is the brand by far. Not quite sure of what DrMoab means by how dark the room is. My Samsung adjusts its brightness automatically as the light in the room darkens/gets brighter.

Wasn't there problems with plasma's as far as "burned in" images? Probably solved it by now, but who knows.

Oh and btw, that 'Smart' stuff i have on my TV, the Netflix, YouTube, blah blah, is kind of cool, although i don't use any of it because you can't get an HD picture and its a pain in the ass typing things in with the remote.

 

[iwannadie]

I think the main determining factor is the brand by far.

I went with Sony thinking they are a top name compared to a lot of the others out there now. My old sony 32" tube tv is still going strong and it was a 24/7 tv for many many years.

Turns out there was an issue with my new sony tv after like a year maybe 2 and they did a recall, only they didn't notify anyone. I actually started seeing odd symptoms on my screen (green clouds) and checked their site when I saw the "recall". I was lucky and got a service ticket a few days before the recall ended, how they can have a window for a recall is weird first off.

The repair guy came out and said that it was a common issue and he can fix it no problem but he said it will just happen again in the same time frame. Sony paid for the first repair but didn't resolve the root cause of the issue and will not of course pay for the future repair(s). How a company can issue a "recall" that only repairs the part that was broken and not fix the cause or offer to replace the TV with a model that doesn't have the issue is beyond me.

 

[NW-ZJ-SCOTT]

I have a 42" LG Plasma, a 32" Vizio LED and a 40" Sharp LCD..

love them all, dont see a difference from any of them.. Not that knowledgeable, the LG is 2 years old.. runs 18 hours a day 360 days a year..

The Vizio gets used for about 2 hours a night as i'm going to bed, full surround sound hooked up, Wife likes movies in bed with popcorn

and the sharp is in a guest room.. Mainly used for the kids to play PS3 and Wii..

Like i said, Other then size, i dont have a favorite..

 

[Nealio240z]

I bought a LG 47" 1080p, LED, 124Hz yesterday and LOVE it!!!! Excellent quality and amazing picture from anywhere in the room. Buy it once and buy QUALITY

 

[Darky]

I have a 32" Sony Bravia LCD and it's been great for us. I bought it maybe 3 yrs ago and it gets a lot of use running PS3, DVDs, and Hulu/Netflix via HDMI from my laptop. Other than a dead pixel caused by

 

[Metal XJ]

I have a 42" Vizio lcd and love it. Got it at Walmart of all places but it was a good deal so i couldnt pass it up. Eventually i do wanna upgrade to an LED now that the proces on them seem to have dropped recently.

 

[rocknxj]

I have two Panasonic plasmas and I love them both. However, I bought a 50" at Best Buy and sort of wish I got the 55" at Costco. The other one is a 42" for the bedroom that does not get much use, but is pretty spectacular.

The new plasmas are lighter, cooler, and cheaper than the original versions. Best Buy actually gave me some good info when I bought it. I even paid to have the 50" plasma tuned and the colors are amazing at all angles.

Oh yeah, I forgot. We play a lot of Halo 360 on XBox and it looks amazing on the Plasma.

 

[OverlandZJ]

Thanks for the reply's gents.

From what i'm gathering from this thread and talking to a bud who uses large screens at work for video conference routinely is i shouldnt be too concerned about today's Plasma units. If i get 10 years out of a 55" i spent 1K on i'll be happy.

Something nobody touched on, glare and the matte vs mirror like screens? Matte would be better at cutting any potential glare?