HD TV Advice

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ice4444

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Hi All

I want to take the leap into the wonderfull world of HD tv but cannot seem to make up my mind.

I am looking to spend in the area of R 7000 on a TV.

Question:
Do I go for a HighEnd 32" tv, a HD Ready 42" TV or an Entry level 42" Full HD?

I will be using the TV for everything from console gaming, pc gaming and movies to sport and normal tv viewing, dont plan on getting a Blueray player but will play the occasional Blueray movie directly from pc or external hard drive. Also keep in mind my TV will be aproximately 5m away from my couch. Also the room is not a "dark" room so I would prefer LCD to Plasma.

Thanks

Morne
 
Last edited:
I'd definitely go for the HD Ready 42" TV. Preferably Plasma.
At that size, you're not going to notice the difference between HD Ready and Full HD anyway so there's no need to fork out the extra cash.
Also, plasma handles SD much better than LCD/LED so if you can, definitely take that option. Since most of your stuff is going to be SD, you have to consider the fact that the LCD/LED models tend to look a lot worse when displaying SD content.
These days, light is not too much of an issue anyway unless you're talking about a very bright room.
 
Plasma is on it's way out. I would rather Have a good quality 32 inch then one of those lesser known brands because there is always a risk of having hdmi compatibility issues. If you plan to watch blueray movies Full HD is the way to go.
 
mmmig said:
If you plan to watch blueray movies Full HD is the way to go.
Click to expand...
Not true at all unless the screen size is bigger than 50". Smaller than that and you're not going to notice the difference.
You'd have to have two identically-sized screens, one Full HD and one HD-Ready, then you'd have to have a Bluray playing to both, then pause and scan the picture line for line before noticing any difference and even then you'd be hard-pressed to spot anything.

mmmig said:
Plasma is on it's way out.
Click to expand...
Not for a few years still so since currently most content is still SD, it makes sense to invest in a TV that displays SD very well. In a few years, you can replace it again once the technology improves and the content becomes more readily available.
 
Paid R3500 for 32 Sinotech lcd - spent money I saved on HDMI 5.1 Sony AMP and DSTV HD, Blu- Ray writer - freakin awesome.
Sinotech are about the lowest brand name I would go to - although I have seen the new Hisense led TV's and they look very good.
 
Any recommendations?

I was looking at a Sinotec but the Contrast Ratio is fairly low at 4000:1. Audio Vision had a Telefunken 42" Vegas Plasma which looked very impressive but I cannot find any specs online.

But these are all Full HD - none "big name brands".

Should I not rather look at a "big name brand" like Samsung, LG or Sony HD Ready?

What is more important at 42"; resolution (HD) or quality (contrast ratio; refresh rate, HD engine) ?
 
I got a full hd LG lcd for R6999, no problems and more than happy with it in every way.

Watch for specials
 
Also I know Sony LEDs have wifi. Does any of the smaller brand LEDs have wifi? Could proove to be useful in theory.
 
ice4444 said:
Hi All

I want to take the leap into the wonderfull world of HD tv but cannot seem to make up my mind.


Question:
Do I go for a HighEnd 32" tv, a HD Ready 42" TV or an Entry level 42" Full HD?

I will be using the TV for everything from console gaming, pc gaming and movies to sport and normal tv viewing, dont plan on getting a Blueray player but will play the occasional Blueray movie directly from pc or external hard drive. Also keep in mind my TV will be aproximately 5m away from my couch. Also the room is not a "dark" room so I would prefer LCD to Plasma.

Thanks

Morne
Click to expand...

I am looking to spend in the area of R 7000 on a TV.
If you spend an extra R999 there is a really good full Hd samsung on special at Game this weekend for R7999 its a 40" Im buying one on thusday.
http://www.game.co.za/portal/game20...tryleaflets/rsa/leaflet-rsa-2010-06-17-02.gif
 
The sinotech I have - HD channels and blu-ray look very good, BUT I would probaly if budget allowed go for a larger 42 size TV as 32 is just too small for Blu-Ray and I think HD dstv would look nice on a bigger screen.
The sinotech's are cheaper and also come with 5 year warranty
 
Those LED TV's look amazing as well, Hisense and some other brands (cheaper) are bringing in LED versions of there TV's, I have only seen 1, was very surprised.
 
Hemps said:
Those LED TV's look amazing as well, Hisense and some other brands (cheaper) are bringing in LED versions of there TV's, I have only seen 1, was very surprised.
Click to expand...

You can get a Hisense T18 LED 42" Full HD for R 10031 from Sahara
 
ice4444 said:
But these are all Full HD - none "big name brands".

Should I not rather look at a "big name brand" like Samsung, LG or Sony HD Ready?

What is more important at 42"; resolution (HD) or quality (contrast ratio; refresh rate, HD engine) ?
Click to expand...

Well, seeing that picture quality was important enough for me to go and spend R40K on a panel, I think I am actually in a position to answer your question. I bought a R30K Samsung fullHD 50" plasma when they first came out. I was NOT happy with its overall performance (contrast levels, image processing when panning sideways across scenes etc.) I eventually paid another R10K in and got a 50" HD ready Pioneer KURO. I still think that was the best 10 G's I have ever spent on my theatre. ... and yes I do watch a lot of BluRay's running off an Oppo BDP-83. The KURO's superior image processing and deep blacks puts any other panel to shame. I sit 3m away from a 50" panel, believe me, you will not see a difference on 42" panels at that distance, even with a side-by-side fullHD and HD ready setup.

So, you decide whether you want to spend the extra bucks so you can answer 'yes' to every uninformed oke who will ask you "Wow, is it full HD?" ... or wheteher you rather want to spend the extra bucks where it makes a real difference.
 
TYR said:
Well, seeing that picture quality was important enough for me to go and spend R40K on a panel, I think I am actually in a position to answer your question. I bought a R30K Samsung fullHD 50" plasma when they first came out. I was NOT happy with its overall performance (contrast levels, image processing when panning sideways across scenes etc.) I eventually paid another R10K in and got a 50" HD ready Pioneer KURO. I still think that was the best 10 G's I have ever spent on my theatre. ... and yes I do watch a lot of BluRay's running off an Oppo BDP-83. The KURO's superior image processing and deep blacks puts any other panel to shame. I sit 3m away from a 50" panel, believe me, you will not see a difference on 42" panels at that distance, even with a side-by-side fullHD and HD ready setup.

So, you decide whether you want to spend the extra bucks so you can answer 'yes' to every uninformed oke who will ask you "Wow, is it full HD?" ... or wheteher you rather want to spend the extra bucks where it makes a real difference.
Click to expand...

While you obviously know what you are talking about, you are in a very small bracket of people.
Its like everything in consumer goods, once the price starts going up the price/value gets lower.
For the vast majority of people spending that much on a tv is just silly. buying a similar one for 10-15k would make them just as happy.
 
Rocket-Boy said:
While you obviously know what you are talking about, you are in a very small bracket of people.
Its like everything in consumer goods, once the price starts going up the price/value gets lower.
For the vast majority of people spending that much on a tv is just silly. buying a similar one for 10-15k would make them just as happy.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I'm not trying to convince anybody to go and spend huge amounts on TV's. The point I was trying to make is that "full HD vs HD ready" is so unimportant that I still prefered the more expensive HD ready over the full HD panel because of all the other factors that actually made noticeable differences. Most people don't have the time or energy to go and do side by side comparissons, but I did and can tell those people honestly that just about every other spec on a panel is more important than the "full HD vs HD ready" spec, which seems to be the only one some people look at.
 
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