Oh, great! Do you remember who the OP was? The forum? Or anything else that would help me search?
Thanks.
I put “+coaxial +hdmi site:straightdope.com” into Google and got 54 hits. It might be easy to glance through the titles to see if anything strikes at what you’re looking for. (I don’t remember the thread in question so I can’t help with more than that.)
With analog signals, the picture can vary from hideously fuzzy (noisy; signal loss) to nearly perfect. The quality of the picture is dependent upon every factor along the chain, including the quality of the coax cable carrying it to your setup.
With digital signals, you are either going to see a full picture or you are not going to see anything viewable (maybe some interittent stuttered pixelated garbage or the equivalent). If you hook up to your current cable and the picture is fine, you won’t get a better picture by swapping out to a better cable.
It is possible to have a coax cable that is too crummy, in which case you will have a completely unusable (maybe even blank) picture. But you don’t get the range of perfect-versus-noisy picture that you do with analog signals.
The comments below are from a discussion around digital v analog cables for audio, which is not exactly your question, but the take-away is the same: with digital either the signal arrives in a reconstitutable form which gives a perfect picture, or it doesn’t arrive in a reconstitutable form at all…
*"A digital signal, unlike an analog signal, bears no superficial resemblance to the information it seeks to convey. Instead, it consists of a series of “1” and “0” bits, encoded according to some particular standard, and delivered as a series of rapid transitions in voltage. Ideally, these transitions are instantaneous, creating what we call a “square wave.” This is so despite the fact that, when the signal is decoded, the result may be the very same 1000 Hertz tone, with its continuous slopes and lack of sharp transitions, represented by the analog signal described above.
One of the interesting distinctions between digital and analog signals is that they degrade in rather different ways. Both are electrical signals, carried by a stream of electrons in a wire, and so both are subject to alteration by the electrical characteristics of the cable and by the intrusion of outside electrical noise. But while the alteration of an analog waveform is progressive and continuous–the more noise is introduced, the more noise will come out of our speaker along with the tone–the digital signal suffers alteration quite differently.
First, a digital signal, because of its sharp transitions, is highly subject to degradation in its waveform; those sharp transitions are equivalent to a long–indeed, an infinite–series of harmonics of the base frequency, and the higher the frequency of the signal, the more transmission line effects, such as the characteristic impedance of the cable, and resulting signal reflections (“return loss”) come into play. This means that while the signal may originate as a square wave, it never quite arrives as one. Depending on the characteristic impedance of the cable, the capacitance of the cable, and the impedance match between the source and load devices, the corners of the square wave will round off to a greater or lesser degree, and the “flat” portions of the wave will become uneven as well. This makes it harder for the receiving circuit to accurately identify the transitions and clock the incoming signal. The more degradation in the signal, the harder it is for the receiving device to accurately measure the content of the bitstream.
But a digital signal, because of the way its information is stored, can be quite robust. While the signal will always degrade to some degree in the cable, if the receiving circuit can actually reconstitute the original bitstream, reception of the signal will be, in the end analysis, perfect. No matter how much jitter, how much rounding of the shoulders of the square wave, or how much noise, if the bitstream is accurately reconstituted at the receiving end, the result is as though there’d been no degradation of signal at all."*
Chief Pedant, that’s super informative. Thanks so much.
I don’t see the problem. With VCR’s you had the issue that the tapes must be compatible with the players. There’s no equivalent concern with televisions.
It’s not like broadcasters are going stop transmitting plasma TV compatible signals some day. Your plasma TV will continue to work years after you buy it, regardless of what happens with display technology.
I bought an LG 60PS80 about 6 months ago and I’m very happy with it.
Are you sure about that? Because without a coax input for an antenna or cable, those internal tuners would be pretty useless.
Out of curiosity I found a couple models on the bestbuy website that didn’t list a coax input in their list of inputs. When I checked their manuals they did indeed have a RF input for an antenna or cable.
A note about plasma TV’s. Their lack of contrast is noticeable with poorly lighted movies and will require the user to max out brightness and/or contrast to view properly. I don’t know if this gets worse over time but I’ve noticed this on movies that I’ve seen using a conventional TV and then on a plasma TV. Scenes were virtually wiped out by the normal settings of the plasma TV.
One thing worth mentioning is that LCD’s absolutely can suffer burn-in (they just call it “image retention”). I recently bought my first LCD TV - a pretty high end Samsung b750 series - and went extra large in order to watch standard format material at a good size without having to stretch it…only to find huge warnings on the first page of the manual warning to always use the whole screen and to limit standard format viewing to “less than 5% of viewing time” to avoid the black bars burning in.
I’ve never noticed that, but then I don’t watch TV with direct sunlight ever falling on my ( plasma ) set. Really no set should ever have maxed out brightness, that’s usually the “in store” setting to attract attention under the bad lighting conditions that are usually prevalent. By the way what’s a “conventional TV”? CRT?
My own personal bias is to prefer plasmas, as the colors seem a little richer to me, the blacks blacker ( less so as technology marches on ) and I dislike dejudder modes on most LCDs - makes theatrical films look like they were shot on video to me. But I do watch TV in slightly darkened rooms, even in daylight hours.
The two are slightly different I believe - “burn-in” usually implies permanence. All TVs can get image retention, but it is generally a temporary thing that be ameliorated.
Oh yeah, I’m referring to permanent image retention. It’s a very real phenomenon on LCD sets that I was alarmed to discover. Many/most LCD’s that are used for a lot of 4:3 material develop permanent light grey bars on the screen as a result.
Unfortunately, without some specs, there’s no way to know ahead of time if that cable will work for you or not. It works now, which is good. But if the HD channels are on a higher frequency, you may run into problems, since in general the higher the frequency of the signal the more that cable quality comes into play. You could try calling Comcast. If it’s a big deal, as in you’ll totally rearrange where everything goes if that cable doesn’t work, I’d try finding a friend with the HD channels you plan on getting, bring over the thin cable, and try it on his setup.
One has to suppose though that the cables used in the walls and from the building to the neighborhood box are probably shitty. I doubt they are spending bucks on top notch wiring in those places.
So, does spending a lot on super high end cables for the last few feet from the wall to the cable box really matter all that much? In my experience expensive cables are usually a waste of money.
It’s all that compression that causes cable and satellite signals to be inferior to broadcast signals. Most folks won’t believe that. They’ll insist that cable and satellite are superior to broadcast, and in the sense that they offer more stations (for maybe $100 a month) they are right.
But because broadcast signals are compressed less than cable/satellite signals, they contain more picture information (and maybe sound info too–I don’t know) and hence give you a nicer picture. And it’s free!
Yes, I should have specified CRT. The last movie I notice this was a Harry Potter movie. There was a scene which was lighted by “wand” light. It was meant to be a dark scene but the plasma TV I watched it on wiped it out. We had to stop the movie and change the settings. It may be a function of age or just the brand but it was really bad. I like plasma’s in general and they provide a good value point but there are differences that should be pointed out.
Also, don’t know if they make a 120 hz plasma which would be necessary for any 3D movies/sporting events.
Well no, the cables that the cable company runs from the pole to the building and inside the building aren’t shitty. They’re probably all installing RG-6/U now. Not super high end either, but tested and certified to be adequate over the frequency range required for current services. All i’m saying is that without some specs, there’s no way to know if the thin coax cable the OP has will work for his needs or not.
I’d wait for the new 3-D sets before buying. 2-D sets will soon be viewed as antiques, but if you still want one, they’ll be cheap.
magellon01: regardless of your purchase, don’t pay a lot of money for hdmi cables… Popular mechanics even did a study on how overpriced cables make no difference (cite)
either get them from your cable provider when you upgrade your cable box, or buy them online… I got 2 off Amazon for about $7…
Something I’ve noticed with Amazon…if you are not in a rush, pick the product, put it in your wishlist or shopping cart (make sure you are signed in with your account), then do nothing for a few weeks. Chances are they will e-mail you a targeted promotional price for it after a while…other buyers occassionally will post the promo codes they get (which are therefore known, and no big secret), but they don’t always work for everyone.
I have the 52 XBR9. Can’t compare it to anything else but my 4 year old 46" Sharp LCD, and it blows it away (technology progression, not necessarily the brand). I think they are starting to phase these out as they are '09 models so chances are you may get a good deal. They have been offering them with packaged deals (Blu-Ray players, PS3s, etc)…IMHO the packages are great deals if you want/need those other components. My second choice was the Samsung B630 (matte screen model), which is also getting phased out soon…I’ve seen great prices on it recently ($1300)
Amazon is generally my first choice, but my local Sears prices their open box items very aggressively, and you can usually negotiate some from there as well.
One thing the XBR has is a lot of connectivity options (internet widgets, netflix access, etc). If your wiring options are limited perhaps you can get the lower priced but very similar W series. Although, with an ethernet port on the TV you can purchase a wireless bridge to plug into the back of the TV and stream Netflix and just about any content on your PC over a wireless connection, so this might offer you some options.
I’d also like to plug American Express - they extend product warranties on electronics bought on the card to cover the second year. This has saved me quite a bit of $$$ on various items that failed outside the typical 1 year warranty.
I have the Panasonic Viera 50" plasma and couldn’t be happier. Burn in is not an issue, and we have a 360 and a Wii connected to it. Both look spectacular. We use DirecTV’s HR20 DVR and it is wonderful as well.
We bought the Panny to replace a Toshiba DLP. If you go with DLP, remember the “DLP tax”: you have to buy bulbs. The can run $100 to $300 or more per year. My Toshiba lasted only a year. You also have the components that go with the lamp. We replaced the DLP when the ballast went out. Maybe we got a bad brand or a bad set, but we got seriously annoyed.
The Panny blows us away, though. Sometimes I’ll walk past and I just stop and stare. It looks good no matter where you sit or stand in the room. Glare is a bit of an issue, but we deal with it.
Good sources of info: www.dbstalk.com, www.hdtvoice.com, www.avsforum.com
AVS especially will have lots of information and reviews for you.