Today we discuss more HDTV buying tips, how to select the right TV for you.  Then we cover Phillip Swann's top ten HDTV predictions for 2007.

 

 

 

How to select an HDTV

We talk quite a bit about how to select the right HDTV.  The one that's perfect for your needs.  But that's not always the full story.  Screen size, display technology and price will narrow down the field, but they won't make the call between two or three TVs that may seem equal, or have some equivalent trade-offs.  For example, how do you decide between a lesser price, lesser quality LCD TV and a higher price, higher quality one?  When would you pick one over the other?  Those are the emails we can't answer directly, but we can point you in a general direction.  Here's what we usually do.

So you've decided what size screen is right, what technology (plasma, LCD, DLP, LCoS, etc.) is right for you, and established a budget.  Now what?

First, watch the TVs.  Go to a store that carries each one.  If you're lucky, you'll find a store that has both or all of the units you're interested in so you can see them all, if you can't find them all in one spot, try to hit all the stores in a small time span, so each set will be fresh in your mind.  Unless you go to a specialty retailer, all of the TVs will be uncalibrated, so you'll need to compare them relative to one another.  Don't compare color - difference there can usually be calibrated away.  Look for detail, crispness, any artifacts like crawling moss, halos, mosquitoes, etc.  Watch fast action to see which sets can keep up better.  See if there are details available in one set, especially in very dark or very bright scenes, that you can't see in the other one.  Try to get an overall impression of one relative to the other.  Make sure you see DVD and SD content, not just HD stuff.

When you visit the store, make sure you take the finance committee.  Often the finance committee will double as the aesthetics committee, so you'll need that input.  Look at the overall design of the television.  Where are the speakers located, are they detachable?  Will the TV fit where you want to put it?  Maybe they both fit, but one fits better than the other, or just looks nicer than the other.  If they seem equivalent in picture, and are roughly the same in price, as much as it pains us to say it, the look of the TV off may be the deciding factor.

Last, but certainly not least, do your homework online.  Visit Cnet.com, AVSForum.com, Amazon.com and read reviews until you can't read any more.  Our advice is to get the overall impression from a professional review, but to look more heavily at the user reviews.  First, throw out all of the 27-star, 'this is the greatest TV ever invented' reviews.  Then toss out all of the negative-8-star, 'I'd rather watch a 13 inch black and white CRT than this TV' reviews.  Read what the honest users with no axe to grind have to say.  See if any patterns emerge.  Look for reliability information, common frustrations, stuff like that.  If all the reviewers are frustrated because the remote is a piece of junk, but you're going to use a universal remote anyways, you can disregard that.  If all of the reviewers are frustrated because the TV stops working after 90 days, you may not want to disregard that.

Examples from real life:
Does anyone remember the RCA Scenium TVs?  They were really hot about three years ago.  They have since faded into oblivion, but I'm sure RCA sold quite a few in their heyday.  What happened?  They had huge reliability issues.  Once all the user reviews came out people knew to steer clear of them.  The professionals reviewers loved them because they looked great and were cheap, but they only had them for a couple days.  The people that bought them found out a few months later that they got a little less than they bargained for.

We had a listener recently email us about two different 32" LCD TVs.  One was a lesser known brand for $1000, the other was a tier one brand for $1400.  Our first reaction was to tell him that $400 can buy a lot of XBox games, or even a new surround sound system (on a budget, of course).  After all, once you get the TV home, will you really be able to see $400 worth of better picture out of the brand name set?  After a little more investigation, it turns out a few reviewers at Amazon found the less expensive TV had random power failures after two or three months of usage.  For one reviewer, the set eventually stopped working altogether.  sounds like the $400 is money well spent.  That, or it's time to look for a different low cost alternative.

Braden is in the market for a new TV.  He's looking for a screen size greater than 60 inches.  Not wanting to take out a second mortgage, he has eliminated plasma and LCD, leaving only rear projection as an option.  Front projection would be an option also, but it isn't ideal for the family room that will host the TV, so it's out.  Here is the elimination process he went through.  Based on reliability information and his own bias from past experience, DLP and LCD are out.  The LED DLP looks really attractive, but it's only available in 56", so it doesn't meet the requirements.  That leaves Sony SXRD, JVC HD-ILA and Brillian LCoS.  He's decided to wait for the next generation SXRD and HD-ILA sets to hit the shelves before deciding.  Once TV Authority has all three in house, it will be time for an HT Guys field trip.  What will the deciding factor be?  Most likely cost.  Keep in mind that all these sets use a bulb, so annual maintenance (cost of a bulb and bulb lifespan) are also a big factor.  If one TV is $1000 cheaper, but you have to spend $500 more a year on bulbs, is it really worth it?