crazymjb

Hey, today my grandparents picked up a Sharp 37D40U.

Anyway, they told my parents they are going to buy them one for their room for around the same price. I am pretty into AV, I chose our DLP downstairs(nicest one at the time about a year and half ago, sammy 720P 50 inch with the built in pedastil).

Anyway, we are looking for something around 1500 bucks with at least 720P resolution. While id love the 37D90U, thats gonna be a bit pricy and I don't know if its worth it for the 1080P on such a small TV. If we were going into that price range wed probably just double it and get a 70 plus incher DLP for downstairs and give them the 50 DLP.

So anyway. I thought I'd ask you guys for your opinions since I am sure a handful of you have them. We may just get what my grandparents have, but a 42 incher also sounds nice.

Mike

crazymjb

Thanks for the move.

Mike

gdfthr

personally i would go plasma with panasonic. at first lcd was the way to go, but since plasmas have dropped in price considerably and quality has gone way up it kind of pushed lcd aside. as far as the samsung lcd goes it is a very nice tv. it has the best black definition in the market but lacks slightly in other color def. also the other downside i think is that sharp has discontinued the cablecard slot which i personally feel is going to replace cable boxes completly once they figure out how to get it to work with video on demand.
and trust me, watch a red sox game on a 720p and then a 1080p and you will hate the 720, and keep in mind the smaller the screen the better the picture

crazymjb

Well this 32-37 will be going in my parents bedroom, about 10-12 feet away from their heads. While 1080P is preferable, for this application I am not sure how realistic it is. We have the 720P set downstairs and that is a 50:


I am trying to convice my parents to put that in their room and get a 70+ 1080p for downstairs, but that doesn't seem as likely.

Mike

2001AudiS4

Please stay far away from the Panasonic plasmas. I see several a week, and they really have VERY poor picture quality. If you go plasma, go with a Pioneer or Mitsubishi, or perhaps a Fujitsu which will cost a little more. Cable cards lack the best feature with digital cable, the info/guide features. I don't see a real need for cable cards either, as most sets that have the slot are a main tv and typically have either a home theater system or at the very least a dvd player. So whats the point of having a card vs a box?

crazymjb

My parents have a box in their room, so they may as well just swap it for an HD box.

We are releativly budgeted on this. They were planning to get something like this eventually but my grandparents said they'd get them one just for the hell of it, around 1500 though. Sure my parents would put in another 500 if they felt it was really worth it, but thats about it. Sure I'd love a pioneer elite but thats not what we are in the market for.

Mike

gdfthr

From what I have seen the Panasonics are very good, but to each their own. And I would absolutly love to see their new 103 inch plasma in action. I myself have a Sony Grand Wega 50 inch 1080p LCD and my parents have a 70 inch grand wega 720p. (And before anyone says it, yes I understand the irony of me praising Panasonic plasma and I have a Sony LCD but thats the sacrifices you make when you can get things for cost)

And the reason why I mentioned the cable cards is because they are being re-worked to enable video on demand and info/guide features. So now you have the same functionality of a box but without the clutter of a few extra wires.

2001AudiS4

Have you compared the Panasonics to other brands?

gdfthr

I have. When I was looking I compared Panasonics, Mitsubishi, Pioneer, LG, and Sony. As far as plasma goes I was hooked on Panasonic and Pioneer. There was def. a little higher picture quality in the Pioneer Elite, but it didn't seem to be worth the extra money in my mind. The quality didn't appear to be that much better. Sony had great LCD's but lacked in plasma. Mitsubishi had a beautiful DLP I think it was a Diamond series. And LG just sucked all around.
By crunch time I had decided that I was either going with the Panasonic or the Sony. Again the Elite didn't seem to justify the extra cost to me, and I couldn't find a 65 inch Mitsubishi Diamond to save my life unless I was willing to pay ungodly amounts of cash to Tweeter. Even my friend who sells all sorts of TV's and components couldn't get me one. So because he had close ties with a Sony distributor and Panasonic pulled 90% of their distributors (which he was one of) I chose the Sony.

2001AudiS4

I have access to Panasonic, Sony, Mitsubishi, Pioneer, LG. I refuse to sell a Panasonic to any of my potential customers. If they wish to be cheap and buy solely on price and not quality, I tell them to just go to best buy or circuit city. I will say there is no need to go with a Pioneer Elite. The normal Pioneer, either consumer or pro line will do. The pro line lacks inputs, but for a home theater it is fine. Mitsubishi is actually made by Pioneer and their sets are practically identical, so sometimes you can get the same tv for a little less, since the Mitsubishi typically comes witha slightly smaller price tag. I am not sure if you only compared the picture in the stores, sometimes it is difficult to get a good comparison there. To me, all that matters is that people are happy with their tv, and if you are happy with the Panasonic (if you were to buy that tv, not saying you actually have) then that is all that matters. I personally would take a Sony Bravia over a Panasonic Plasma. The Bravia's are very nice tv's and light years ahead of the competition in regards to LCD's IMO.

gdfthr

Why wont you sell a Panasonic? Do you think that they are really that bad compared to others?
And I tried not to compare any of the tv's in Best Buy or Circuit City. They have a tendency to hook up the tv to some of the best picture sources to give optimul picture, which is a good thing but I want to know what the picture is going to look like with an everyday common household feed.
I did however have to constantly look at the 70" Sony at Circuit City. For some strange reason they were the only ones (maybe just in my area) to have that LCD.
I was unaware though that Pioneer produces Mitsubishi tv's, and I absolutly agree with the lack of inputs.

gdfthr

I do have one other question for you 2001AudiS4. When we got our 70" LCD we noticed that it had either 2 or 3 dead pixels. When we contacted Sony customer care we were told that they would replace the block under warrenty but there would be no guaranty that the new block would be any better or worse and that the new block wouldn't have any warrenty at all. If after the swap we want to try another block it would cost around $3500. Now my question to you is was I just getting a brush off from this guy? and if not, with your expierence, would you have changed blocks?

2001AudiS4

I haven't dealt with Sony's service personally, so it's difficult for me to say. I will say that it is common for manufacturers to say that it is common to have one or two dead pixels. Whether it is just a cop out or not, again I am not sure. I would argue the point with them though if it does not solve the problem to your satisfaction. If the person you speak with doesn't help, just go above them and raise a stink. Sometimes you have to think of it as a first line of defense, and you have to break through to try to win the battle. As far as the lack of inputs, I was referring to the pro series of the pioneers. It is basically just a monitor, and not a true TV. It doesn't even come with any inputs, you have to purchase a video card that has the inputs. Typically you can get 1 set of components, 1 of composite, and there may be some other choices I haven't even seen. The consumer model however has a ton of inputs. 3 or 4 components, and the same with composite, 3 HDMI, 2 VGA, coax. Like I said though, for a home theater, the Pro series in not a bad choice. It has excellent picture quality, without all the unnecessary inputs that you don't use.

If you can, update us on how it goes with repairing your tv.

yunginTL

how does Hitachi, Phillips and Samsung compare in the plasma war?

2001AudiS4

I do not know much about the Hitachi's, I think I have seen one plasma from them. The Phillips I was pleasantly surprised. They are a bit heavy, but have a very nice picture. They are a bit quirky with some of their menu options, but what counts is picture quality and they are very good. Samsung is emerging as one of the best tv manufacturers out there, so I have nothing but praise for them. All their tv's are pretty nice.

crazymjb

^I do love our sammy.

What about SED TVs? When are they due out and with what kind of pricing?

mike

Dan

2008 & ???.

http://news.com.com/Canon+to+build+u...3-6122022.html

crazymjb

Hmm... I wonder if they will come out with another High Def 20-30 years from now... I'm sure they will.

Mike

2001AudiS4

I have to retract my statement as far as the picture quality on the Samsung plasma. I installed a 42" Samsung tonight, that was purchased from Best Buy. The picture quality was not great, so much so that the customer mentioned that he was not excited about the tv, as he was before he saw it. It look OK on hi-def stations, but not great. There were certain scenes where there was a very grainy picture, even on hd. I told him that I could sell him a Pioneer for only $100 more he was going to purchase that Samsung for, be he decided to get the Samsung instead. Oh well. I had high hopes for it, but seeing is believing.

yunginTL

yea to me the samsung plasma can't compete wit the pana or philips

2001AudiS4

It was better then panasonic, but worse then the phillips.