Need a new television

saltysam · Post by **saltysam** » 29 Jan 2008, 21:56

Early days but tv seems great so far,watched Apocalypto on blu-ray earlier and it looked super.

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 04 Feb 2008, 21:32

Salty are you now able to give a rating out of 10 for improvement from HD Ready to Full HD? And the same for SD quality difference? Is it worse, better or the same?

saltysam · Post by **saltysam** » 04 Feb 2008, 21:39

the quality is much better but that's probably down to it being a 2 year old newer lcd than the samsung. i haven't watched much sd stuff on it so far, just Halloween 2007 region 1 which looked very good, played it on my toshiba hd-dvd. hd discs look fabulous but i'm still playing around with the numerous settings at the moment.

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 04 Feb 2008, 22:06

What about broadcast SD? Thanks btw.

saltysam · Post by **saltysam** » 04 Feb 2008, 22:07

SD channels are much improved compared to the samsung.

Markgway · Post by **Markgway** » 04 Feb 2008, 22:32

The SD channels concern me because the majority of what we watch would still be SD. My Dad is convinced that any LCD will look worse than the CRT we have now (Philips 28" WS).

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 04 Feb 2008, 22:45

saltysam wrote:SD channels are much improved compared to the samsung.

Thanks.

Markgway wrote:The SD channels concern me because the majority of what we would would still be SD.

Me too. It's why I was considering sticking with HD Ready over FULL HD. I've not fully decided. I won't until I need to think about it. FULL HD TVs are so expensive I'd seriously have to think about buying one no matter how I looked at it.

I can handle £600 and maybe even £800 at a push (I paid that for my current TV but back then I had to) but £1000 is a hell of a lot to pay.

Markgway wrote:My Dad is convinced that any LCD will look worse than the CRT we have now (Philips 28" WS).

Has he seen one?

It's a hard one to call. Some say SD definitely looks better on CRTs. Personally I say LCD easily look better to CRT BUT a low bitrate SD channel definitley looks worse, sadly many are low bitrate so it can be a problem. Overall it's a marked improvement though. That said you don't just buy LCD TVs for watching SD channels. SD DVDs almost always look much better (again if it's a really low quality DVD you can see it, whereas before it maybe masked).

I do know whenever I have to endure my Dad's 28" WS CRT it always looks way worse, a mess in fact. That and you also buy LCD TVs for their size. CRTs are so big and ugly. I couldn't go back now, and yes overall they are a step backwards.

The connections on the rear of a CRT tend to also suck. I'm using many of mine on my LCD and would struggle with just the two scart sockets.

Samsung LCDs are now very reasonable. If I were to buy a new one I'd likely stick with Samsung. They don't make very good Combo HD Players or even very good HDD/DVD Recorders but they do now how to make TVs and Computer Monitors!

Yi-Long · Post by **Yi-Long** » 05 Feb 2008, 00:07

If I would buy a FullHD LCD, I would go for a nice LG or Toshiba, which are getting VERY good reviews AND are very affordable, like 1100-1300 euros.
Ofcourse that's still alot of money, and I'm sure they'll drop to just below 1000euro within 6 months orso, but if I'd buy one NOW, I'd go for one of those.

saltysam · Post by **saltysam** » 05 Feb 2008, 10:19

i find on my new television switching on dnr on the low bitrate channels improves performance.

saltysam · Post by **saltysam** » 05 Feb 2008, 10:46

Toshiba 1080p 37' lcd £641 on dixons, can be had for less than £600 using various vouchers

http://www.dixons.co.uk/martprd/product ... HotUKDeals

Markgway · Post by **Markgway** » 05 Feb 2008, 23:50

bradavon wrote:Has he seen one?

Only in stores and they always look shit.

Markgway · Post by **Markgway** » 06 Feb 2008, 00:02

saltysam wrote:Toshiba 1080p 37' lcd £641 on dixons, can be had for less than £600 using various vouchers

Great price for a 1080p but apparently the SD picture isn't good.

Damn.

saltysam · Post by **saltysam** » 06 Feb 2008, 00:33

LCD is not great for sd imo,plasma is better.for HD viewing it's the opposite.

Markgway · Post by **Markgway** » 06 Feb 2008, 01:03

The problem is I can't ONLY watch Blu-Ray movies, lol.

Most of the time it'll be SD TV -- even if it's only the news or football.

Yi-Long · Post by **Yi-Long** » 06 Feb 2008, 02:00

Dixons in Holland doesnt carry TVs. Didnt know the UK dixons does...

Saw the LG today in the store, and they were running a demo on ALL the LCD's and the demo was Uncharted (PS3), and I noticed the in-game characters sometimes had a little white line around them on the LG.

Now, I know you cant trust the display in-store. First of all they are ALL running the same demo, so the signal is being send to too many tvs, and usually the TV's are poorly installed as well... and the source-demo is probably also not the very best possible, but I AM wondering what that white line is around these characters.

gasteropod · Post by **gasteropod** » 06 Feb 2008, 02:06

Yi-Long wrote:but I AM wondering what that white line is around these characters.

It's probably got the Sharpness set too high.

Yi-Long · Post by **Yi-Long** » 06 Feb 2008, 02:22

gasteropod wrote:
Yi-Long wrote:but I AM wondering what that white line is around these characters.
It's probably got the Sharpness set too high.

Aw thanks. So when set up right, it should be no problem, right!?

gasteropod · Post by **gasteropod** » 06 Feb 2008, 02:55

Yi-Long wrote:Aw thanks. So when set up right, it should be no problem, right!?

Is there any chance you could ask in the store if you can just have a quick play with the settings to see? I'd imagine they would let you if it means a sale for them.

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 06 Feb 2008, 03:10

Yi-Long wrote:If I would buy a FullHD LCD, I would go for a nice LG or Toshiba, which are getting VERY good reviews AND are very affordable, like 1100-1300 euros.
Ofcourse that's still alot of money, and I'm sure they'll drop to just below 1000euro within 6 months orso, but if I'd buy one NOW, I'd go for one of those.

1300 Euros, affordable??? WOW way too high for me.

saltysam wrote:i find on my new television switching on dnr on the low bitrate channels improves performance.

Can you enable it per source or is it just across the board? It may make DVD/HD look worse. I tend to leave most of that stuff off.

saltysam wrote:Toshiba 1080p 37' lcd £641 on dixons, can be had for less than £600 using various vouchers

http://www.dixons.co.uk/martprd/product ... HotUKDeals

That's an amazing price, not that I've looked to compare.

bradavon · Post by **bradavon** » 06 Feb 2008, 03:14

gasteropod wrote:Is there any chance you could ask in the store if you can just have a quick play with the settings to see? I'd imagine they would let you if it means a sale for them.

Whenever I've asked they've got funny, maybe though.

Markgway wrote:Only in stores and they always look shit.

What your average high street stores or professional places?

If it's a high street you need to tell him that's very inaccurate. They always share the same connection to ALL TVs (or there abouts) and make the TV look like shit. They always use shit cables too.

I've seen many staggeringly bad pictures in stores that I just know cannot be accurate of the TVs quality.

Markgway wrote:Great price for a 1080p but apparently the SD picture isn't good.

Is that sourced from Forums?

Like HK films fans they're never happy. Take it with a pinch of salt.

Yi-Long wrote:Dixons in Holland doesnt carry TVs. Didnt know the UK dixons does...

Are you sure it's the same company? Dixons in the UK have always sold TVs.

saltysam · Post by **saltysam** » 06 Feb 2008, 09:59

bradavon wrote: Can you enable it per source or is it just across the board? It may make DVD/HD look worse. I tend to leave most of that stuff off.

each input's individual settings can be saved. i certainly wouldn't use DNR on dvd/HD, there is no need.

IronMonkey · Post by **IronMonkey** » 06 Feb 2008, 11:43

saltysam wrote:LCD is not great for sd imo,plasma is better.for HD viewing it's the opposite.

Rubbish. Plasma far out-performs LCD with HD material, even with the same manufacturer.

Panasonic make a 37" plasma AND a 37" LCD & the plasma performs far better in just about every area - colour, contrast, greyscale, clarity, motion. The only way the LCD set outperforms it is with brightness - it can go a little higher.

Since most users watch films in a dark room, brightness becomes a moot point anyway since its better to turn the brightness down when in darker viewing conditions.

IronMonkey · Post by **IronMonkey** » 06 Feb 2008, 11:47

gasteropod wrote:
Yi-Long wrote:but I AM wondering what that white line is around these characters.
It's probably got the Sharpness set too high.

Yep, thats right. As a general rule, in most cases when using the DVE setup disc I've noted that sharpness should be set to just under 50%.

saltysam · Post by **saltysam** » 06 Feb 2008, 12:17

IronMonkey wrote:
saltysam wrote:
Rubbish. Plasma far out-performs LCD with HD material, even with the same manufacturer.

Panasonic make a 37" plasma AND a 37" LCD & the plasma performs far better in just about every area - colour, contrast, greyscale, clarity, motion. The only way the LCD set outperforms it is with brightness - it can go a little higher.

it's all subjective imo. neither plasma or lcd are perfect but clearly the consumer has chosen LCD. Panasonic are the plasma specialist aren't they?

Yi-Long · Post by **Yi-Long** » 06 Feb 2008, 17:27

...but isnt LCD better at handling videogames? That's what I read, not too long ago. It's supposedly better for the fast movement on screen etc, reaction time and all that jazz.