What TV? (again! but with a difference)

[LancelotSA]

The other bad thing about plasma is that it uses more power than lcd, but that doesn't bother me.
Not sure how much more, but apparently it's the same as a crt.

Ahh, yes I am aware of that. I was wondering whether it'd increase me electricity consumption but I see you say you think it might be the same as my current CRT. Perhaps someone knowledgeable can comment? I see the LG plasma says "consumption (Typical W) 320W" and the Samsung plasma says "Operation power consumption 240W"

 

[Ou grote]

Ahh, yes I am aware of that. I was wondering whether it'd increase me electricity consumption but I see you say you think it might be the same as my current CRT. Perhaps someone knowledgeable can comment? I see the LG plasma says "consumption (Typical W) 320W" and the Samsung plasma says "Operation power consumption 240W"

What I got: http://www.samsung.com/my/consumer/...v/PS42A450P1XXM/index.idx?pagetype=prd_detail
It has some power saving settings, not too worried about using them.

 

[LancelotSA]

HD is superb and there is HD Discovery now too. It's difficult to appreciate the difference in quality between SD and HD until you actually have both setup, at home in your own environment. Personally I absolutely love HD, software bugs included

That is what I am scared of! ha ha. There are only a few HD channels and if I get addicted to it I will not be able to watch SD again!

Burn in and reflections off the screen. That's possibly LCD's biggest advantage over Plasma. If you in a room full of light and windows etc etc Plasma is going to mirror all that light...

Burn in seems to be more prevalent with the larger plasma's (speculating here). My 50" suffers with IR while my 42" (PS42B430) works brilliantly without any symptoms and it gets hammered....

Hmm, you see my view is that the reflection problem can be remedied with a curtain while as stated burn in does not seem to be an issue on the smaller screens. I am also hoping not to have static images on the screen as I will not use it for the PC (much ).

The blurring of sports images on an LCD can't be remedied (as far as I am aware).

 

[PostmanPot]

Or, you could get a 32" HD-Ready LCD and a HD-PVR and join the world of HD sports That's my setup and I am more than happy watching divx movies on it too

Now if only they still had 32" plasmas.

 

[LancelotSA]

What I got: http://www.samsung.com/my/consumer/...v/PS42A450P1XXM/index.idx?pagetype=prd_detail
It has some power saving settings, not too worried about using them.

Did a search and came up with this :

No discussion of TV power use would be complete without a bit of perspective. For households that pay somewhere near the average retail cost for energy--11.36 cents per kilowatt per hour in 2008--and that watch near the average amount per TV--about 5.2 hours per day--the cost to watch a 50-inch 1080p plasma TV is about $63 per year in the calibrated light output mode (see How We Test). A typical 52-inch LCD TV costs about $27 per year for the same light output, and of course, smaller TVs use less energy. Sure, both electricity costs and average daily TV use are increasing steadily every year; however, those amounts still don't take a major chunk out of most household budgets. According to the Department of Energy, for example, the average refrigerator uses nearly $90 worth of energy per year.

http://reviews.cnet.com/green-tech/tv-power-efficiency/

So yeah, not really something I will factor in.

 

[sand_man]

That is what I am scared of! ha ha. There are only a few HD channels and if I get addicted to it I will not be able to watch SD again!

All the top series, movies and sport events are now broadcast in HD. What shows/series/documentaries are you currently watching?

The blurring of sports images on an LCD can't be remedied (as far as I am aware).

LCD's with refresh rates of 100htz and higher don't exhibit blurring, or at least that is the theory. All in the refresh rates and response times... apparently... The PS42B430/450 have response time ratings of 0.001ms and 100htz refresh rate. Coupled with HD it is bloody lovely!!!

 

[LancelotSA]

All the top series, movies and sport events are now broadcast in HD. What shows/series/documentaries are you currently watching?

For myself rugby and cricket mainly. Obviously if the latest MNET movie was in HD the GF would watch it. Kids mainly watch the cartoon network. Some of our viewing is Xvid/DivX one or two CD AVIs.... don't have the bandwidth or speed to download HP series.

The plasmas I mentioned are both 720p so I am lead to believe that I'd be able to watch HD TV if I got the decoder. Is this correct?

These are them :

Samsung PS42B430
LG 42PQ10

 

[sand_man]

The plasmas I mentioned are both 720p so I am lead to believe that I'd be able to watch HD TV if I got the decoder. Is this correct?

These are them :

Samsung PS42B430
LG 42PQ10

Correct. All HD content is broadcast in 720p in any event. I'm not sure Full HD has much purpose other than for bragging rights... Movies on HD channel all the latest MC's broadcasting yes and most of the time with surround sound. You got a surround sound set up? If not you'll have to add that to the list

Personally not a fan of LG products but that's due to bad experiences with their DVD recorders. Samsung's pretty solid set (42").

 

[Ou grote]

Don't worry about curtains until u get the tv.

I bought some dark lined curtains a few days before getting the tv, as I only had some blinds in the lounge.
And my walls are white. so it's rather bright in there.

The room faces east and I can watch just fine with the curtains and blinds open in the morning.

 

[sand_man]

http://www.bidorbuy.co.za/item/18304103/Sony_5_1_Channel_Home_Theatre_Component_System.html

Nice compact neat unit.

 

[LancelotSA]

Correct. All HD content is broadcast in 720p in any event. I'm not sure Full HD has much purpose other than for bragging rights... Movies on HD channel all the latest MC's broadcasting yes and most of the time with surround sound. You got a surround sound set up? If not you'll have to add that to the list

Yeah I have a "entry level" surround sound system. Will definitely look at setting it up properly if I make the purchase.

I am again lead to believe that even when watching Blu ray the human eye will battle to tell the difference between full HD and 720p. Apparently only when really close to a huge screen.

Personally not a fan of LG products but that's due to bad experiences with their DVD recorders. Samsung's pretty solid set (42").

Yeah, I know, some people share that sentiment as I got a lot of comments when purchasing an LG laptop. Touch wood, no problems yet...

Don't worry about curtains until u get the tv.

I bought some dark lined curtains a few days before getting the tv, as I only had some blinds in the lounge.
And my walls are white. so it's rather bright in there.

The room faces east and I can watch just fine with the curtains and blinds open in the morning.

Ha ha that is the GFs area of expertise anyway. But the TV will be on the window side so it should not be an issue... hopefully. I can't see that it will be much worse than a CRT anyway.

 

[greg_SA]

I really think you should try to view some normal SD DSTV on the 42" Plasma that you choose... some of the highly compressed channels on DSTV can look terrible... some friends that bought LCDs and plasmas were quite disappointed when watching normal DSTV. A CRT hides the compression artifacts much better (also because the screen is smaller).

Also look at the Panasonic range of plasmas - a bit more expensive though, but much better (reliability and picture).

Personally, I'd only consider a flat panel screen if I was going to watch more HD video (and proper Widescreen material) than SD video.

 

[LancelotSA]

some of the highly compressed channels on DSTV can look terrible... some friends that bought LCDs and plasmas were quite disappointed when watching normal DSTV. A CRT hides the compression artifacts much better (also because the screen is smaller).

Which channels would those be?

 

[PostmanPot]

Correct. All HD content is broadcast in 720p in any event. I'm not sure Full HD has much purpose other than for bragging rights... Movies on HD channel all the latest MC's broadcasting yes and most of the time with surround sound. You got a surround sound set up? If not you'll have to add that to the list

+1

Full HD's only purpose is full HD/1080 content. Blu-ray, PC, and consoles that do 1080p.

HD DSTV will be with us at least 5 years before we get full HD DSTV.

 

[greg_SA]

Which channels would those be?

Unfortunately it varies... AFAIK DSTV change the bit rates depending on their requirements.

Discovery often looks bad, as well as many of the sports channels... you'll probably never have noticed it on your CRT for 2 reasons... the CRT is relatively small, and the CRT "smooths" the image out. I saw some soccer on a friends flat screen recently which had a blocky "halo" around each player on the field... looked terrible.

 

[Smooth Criminal]

Hmm, if my current one was 74cm then holding out would perhaps be an option, but 54cm is making me feel inferior! ha ha The budget is currently there so I'm trying to decide whether to take the plunge. Obviously it would be stupid to buy a new CRT as I have no doubts that my needs will change in time. Already that HD sports channel holds appeal (although that will mean a new decoder too! )

Then don't blow the whole R8000 on just the TV! Rather get a 32" LCD plus an HD PVR decoder

To be honest, I can't say that I've noticed blurring when watching sports, especially on the newer models. It is possibly the case for older LCD sets which had higher response times. From what I've seen, most of the current sets seem to have response times of 5ms, which should be perfectly fine. It'd be best to go a few stores and have them put on some sports channels to demo the sets.

 

[sand_man]

Unfortunately it varies... AFAIK DSTV change the bit rates depending on their requirements.

Discovery often looks bad, as well as many of the sports channels... you'll probably never have noticed it on your CRT for 2 reasons... the CRT is relatively small, and the CRT "smooths" the image out. I saw some soccer on a friends flat screen recently which had a blocky "halo" around each player on the field... looked terrible.

Agreed. I never used to give SD or the quality of the picture much thought but the deficiencies are very well asentuated by 1.) Plasma and LCD tv's and 2.) HD content.

SD content is like having poor eyesight, blurry and smooth but put your glasses on and you have HD content, sharp and crisp..

 

[sand_man]

What you can do is keep the crt and the old decoder and move it to the bedroom with the new kit and decoder in the lounge. Subscribe to extraview and you pay an extra R70 I think it is but you have 2 decoders running.

 

[iceman23]

Which channels would those be?

Trace TV is especially bad if you watch it.

 

[LancelotSA]

Well I popped into Hirsch today to take a look at the Samsung PS42B430 and the LG 42PQ10. I spent 45 minutes there (it was all the time I had). Unfortunately they were not able to hook up the LG at the time but I checked out the Samsung for a fair whack of the time. The sales lady was a definite fan of Samsungs though....

I checked out some SD channels first - super sport 1 with some IPL cricket on, a movie channel, discovery and a cartoon channel - and they all looked fine. I had a bit of an issue with the picture not being 100% (there was some "blurring/bleeding" around the edge of the writing on the cricket broadcast) but this was explained as being caused by them splitting the signal between a number of sets. Is this true?

I then made the mistake of asking them to switch onto an HD channel. We checked out one of the movie channels and some HD sport ... and damn I see what you guys mean! It looked great!

The price for both models was the same at R7400. Which direction would you guys lean?

What you can do is keep the crt and the old decoder and move it to the bedroom with the new kit and decoder in the lounge. Subscribe to extraview and you pay an extra R70 I think it is but you have 2 decoders running.

Obviously then both decoders work independently of each other? And how much is HD DSTV? Is it the same price but you just pay more for the HD decoder?