Need a new TV as mine is definitely on its last legs. Looking to go LCD or Plasma, but the budget won’t allow too much. This will be my main screen, so I want decent size ( I don’t need a 60in screen or anything close to that) for a decent price. Is $1K even possible in this situation for something of decent quality?
Basically I want a cheap tv that has perfect picture and good screen size, that’s all…
Any and all advice is welcome and appreciated.
Costco has a 42" plasma monitor for $899, and two 42" plasma HD TVs for $999 so it’s definitely possible to get one for under a thou.
Watch out for the “monitor” - it has no tuner, so you need to feed it from an HD cable box or satellite receiver.
First of all, because the aspect ratio is different, you need a bigger screen than you think you do. Get a large piece of cardboard and cut it to the dimensions of the screen you are thinking of and look at it for a while.
My brother recently got a 50 inch DLP (rear projection) for $1200.00 because Sony discontinued it (the newer ones apparently have a higher resolution). Looks fine to me. It’s not a flat panel like the LCDs, but its only about a foot thick and it is fairly light.
As an addendum to this, MAKE SURE YOU GET HD, because many stations are going HD and it’s really makes an awesome difference.
My wife and I bought a Sony Bravia 46" and we love it. It was an investment, thinking that we will own it for 5+/- years or more, it will pay for itself.
I don’t understand. A new water heater or air conditioner may pay for itself in lower energy costs. A garden may pay for itself in grocery money saved, but how will a TV pay for itself? Does it cost less to operate than a CRT television?
Not any more or less than a CRT tv, but it will save us from buying a new one every couple years… I shouldn’t have said…‘pay for itself…’
We assume our TVs will be used until they breathe their last. Our current TV is just a plain ol’ $800 TV (5-7 years ago). It has a great picture and is the envy of all our friends. I guess you just need to determine if you really need the latest and greatest electronics. We watch a lot of TV but we have other priorities that take precedence over that. My only suggestion is to really look at picture quality when you’re shopping. And take into account how big the room is that you’re viewing in. Sometimes bigger ain’t necessarily better. If you can’t sit far enough from the screen, you won’t get a better picture on a bigger TV.
Signed,
Small Room Kalhoun
As others have said, a lot depends on your personal preferance and the size of the space. If your room is too small, a larger TV will look bad…even if it is HD.
I’ve read semi-good reviews about the Vizio models of TV’s. They have some HD options that are very nicely priced.
Do you want the highest HD? At 1080p, there are fewer options available in the lower price ranges. But you can get some 720p or 1080i sets for that most likely.
I just picked up this set about a month ago and I love the picture quality.
Post a few more details about what you’re looking for, and what the location for the TV is like and I may be able to give you some other advice. Things like light level and viewing angle can also play a huge part in what you choose.
If you’re going the LCD or plasma route (or even LCD projection or DLP) you’re more than likely buying a HD widescreen 16x9 set.
The problem is if your going the cheap route and are expecting a “perfect picture” without getting a set with a built in HD tuner, cable tv with the HD package, or a satellite dish with the HD package, you will probably not be seing the “perfect picture” you are dreaming about.
These new generation sets when viewed with a standard def broadcast picture look lousy. Your either watching the picture with black bars on the sides or distorting the picture by stretching it lengthwise. Not to mention it looks poor becasue of the low resolution on a bigger screen.
Unless you’re set up to start receiving HD signals with your new set, don’t expect any miracles.
More specifics:
This TV will be going into a room with no natural light, so glare isn’t an issue whatsoever.
As I stated in the OP, I’m not looking for a big screen at this time. I would be completely fine with something in the 42" range.
I do want to go with plasma or LCD if I can get what I’m looking for. How much more of an investment will this be if I want to be HD ready?
Wall mounted would be perfect, but it isn’t a requirement for me.
Depending on where you live you might be able to get away getting an antenna to pick up Hd signals. I don’t even use my cable any more except to record. If you go here you can see if you can get an HD signal.
The prices of TVs are really dropping, I paid $1800 for mine last year, I think it’s around $1300-1400 now. You can get them for under $1000 and they should be good. We went with a 37" and from 12 feet it looks good. I wouldn’t mind a bigger set, but I’m happy with what we got.
Ok…the Vizio link I posted above has this set which seems to fit your budget and size. It’s only 37inch but again without knowing the dimensions of the room, or what size you currently have it’s hard to give a size recommendation. Note that that is an LCD. From what I can tell, usually LCD screens are a bit darker but have a much nicer “black” level than plasma. LCD screens are also subject to screen burn in. They also have a 42inch Plasma and LCD that comes in just under $1K
What will be the source for your HD signal? Cable? Over the Air? Satellite? All the sets I looked at from Vizio have built in tuners…so that is a plus. You also need to think about if input options will be a big deal. Do you want to hook it up to a computer? Need a DVI input? HDMI? How much other AV equipment do you have?
Wall mounting isn’t that hard, although the mount itself is about $120 or so. Get some track for the cords though, unless you’re going to fish them through the wall and up to the TV.
We have both a 42 in plasma and a 37 in LCD. Our plasma is only a monitor, but we have a dish, so it need to be hooked up to a receiver anyway, so that part doesn’t matter, and it was much cheaper then if it had an integrated receiver.
Some pros and cons.
*Plasma is much heavier. I don’t think I would mount our plasma, it weighs a ton.
*Plasma is much glare(ier). So we have to pull the blinds at certain times of day to watch it, or it’s like a freakin’ mirror.
*Plasma gives off much more heat (not that it matters, but there it is)
*Plasma is much more susceptible to burn-in. So either watch in stretchy-vision, or change bar colors frequently
*Plasma has a much better quality picture. That is why all of the cons still make plasma a better TV if you just want a good picture.
We got both of our TVs (Magnavox LCD, and Hitachi Plasma) at Sears, they were both on sale, and they were both great buys. Just keep your eye on them.
I was all set to say that you can get a 20" for well under 1k…and here I find people talking about 42" HDs…
I’ve never been able to tell any difference between HD and not, and, even if I could, I’m not sure it’d be enough to make me think I want HD.
Seems like you can get a 42-50" HDTV for around 1k, though.
Cite? I can’t find anything much under about $1,200 and none of them are true 1920x1080 HD.
I consider 1.2k to be around 1k.
However, here is the search I ran:
search
The first page has some ebays and refurbished, which might not be acceptable to the OP, but there are a few new products there as well.
What is the lifespan of a set anyway? I’m reading here that people are planning to keep or have had theirs for 5 years or so. We’ve got a 20" Sony we picked up here 13 years ago that’s still working great. We had to have it repaired one time about 10 years ago – the red and green colors started “bleeding” – and that’s about it. Are we just lucky or what?