TV's.... LED LCD Plasma, which one

[Led_Z]

Which one is better? benefits? drawbacks?

We need to replace a TV and looking for one, heard plasma's really run up the electricity, but not sure about the others?

Anyone got any suggestions...

 

[Bubba]

W
Anyone got any suggestions...

No..

Sorry I am bored.

 

[tboy]

My plasma does produce a LOT of heat.

The newer LED/LCDs have come way down in price since 3D came out. They are brighter and IMO sharper than regular LCD.

With LED there are two types: edge lit and back lit. Back lit is better but not many are out there, most are edge lit (and back lit costs more).

More important over the type of screen, is the specs.

You're going to want a minimum of 120 hz refresh rate (how many times per second the image is refreshed or changed). 240 hz is becoming the norm and I saw one at 600 hz. A higher refresh rate will prevent pixellation during scenes with very fast changing images. Especially when there are lots of blacks and whites in the image. I find with my 60 hz plasma the blacks go all blotchy. Plus I think it's supposed to get rid of the ghosting when a very dark image shoots across a very light background. You used to see a "shadow" of pixels following the image due to the pixels not being able to go black fast enough.....

You'll also want the highest contrast ratio possible. 5000:1 or something along those lines. The higher the contrast ratio the blacker your blacks will be and your whites will be whiter.

Be VERY aware of what you're buying. Leons etc sell a LOT of 40" and up TVs are what looks like great prices...until you see they are only 60 hz and often 720P

Do NOT buy anything 720P....1080P all the way. IMO it's like watching TV through a screen door (I can actually see the space between the pixels on a 720 tv). That's fine if you're going to sit in the next room to watch tv but if you're sitting at the proper viewing distance it sucks.

Proper viewing distance:
People are constantly putting TVs over fireplaces etc. This is wrong on so many levesl (Literally). Your eyes should be centered on the screen vertically and horizontally and square to the screen. When you look at the centre of the screen you should just see the edges of the bezel with your peripheral vision. This is the correct seating height and position. Any degree you sit away from that, you're losing the effect.

Think of when you go to a movie theatre: do you sit in the front row? No. Do you sit in the back row? no. You try to sit smack dab in the middle and about halfway back.....

 

[JustRiley]

I enjoy very much my LCD samsung tv it was on sale at besy buy when I got it for $327

 

[McGuinty]

My plasma does produce a LOT of heat.

The newer LED/LCDs have come way down in price since 3D came out. They are brighter and IMO sharper than regular LCD.

With LED there are two types: edge lit and back lit. Back lit is better but not many are out there, most are edge lit (and back lit costs more).

More important over the type of screen, is the specs.

You're going to want a minimum of 120 hz refresh rate (how many times per second the image is refreshed or changed). 240 hz is becoming the norm and I saw one at 600 hz. A higher refresh rate will prevent pixellation during scenes with very fast changing images. Especially when there are lots of blacks and whites in the image. I find with my 60 hz plasma the blacks go all blotchy. Plus I think it's supposed to get rid of the ghosting when a very dark image shoots across a very light background. You used to see a "shadow" of pixels following the image due to the pixels not being able to go black fast enough.....

You'll also want the highest contrast ratio possible. 5000:1 or something along those lines. The higher the contrast ratio the blacker your blacks will be and your whites will be whiter.

Be VERY aware of what you're buying. Leons etc sell a LOT of 40" and up TVs are what looks like great prices...until you see they are only 60 hz and often 720P

Do NOT buy anything 720P....1080P all the way. IMO it's like watching TV through a screen door (I can actually see the space between the pixels on a 720 tv). That's fine if you're going to sit in the next room to watch tv but if you're sitting at the proper viewing distance it sucks.

Proper viewing distance:
People are constantly putting TVs over fireplaces etc. This is wrong on so many levesl (Literally). Your eyes should be centered on the screen vertically and horizontally and square to the screen. When you look at the centre of the screen you should just see the edges of the bezel with your peripheral vision. This is the correct seating height and position. Any degree you sit away from that, you're losing the effect.

Think of when you go to a movie theatre: do you sit in the front row? No. Do you sit in the back row? no. You try to sit smack dab in the middle and about halfway back.....

I will be PM you on my next TV purchase.

Thanks for the info.

 

[tboy]

^^^^^ no problem!!!

I enjoy very much my LCD samsung tv it was on sale at besy buy when I got it for $327

Not to say Riley is one of them, but there was a report when HDTV first came out and it stated that 90% of all people who "thought" they were watching HDTV actually weren't......the reason? Because they didn't know any better.

For the record 720P is NOT HD.....it's better than analog 320 or 480 but certainly not HD which is (a minimum) of 1080P.

Also: the P stands for progressive scan (how the various lines of image are refreshed during each pass of the scan) and the i stands for interlaced. As I understand it, progressive scan refreshes every line, every time the image is refreshed, and interlaced means every second line. This is key when looking at the refresh rate in Hz. A 60 hz tv indicates that the image is refreshed 60 times a second. So if you have an interlaced TV, the complete image is only refreshed 30 times a second. A 60 hz tv that is P or progressive, the image is completely refreshed 60 times a second. Same as 120 hz (120 times a second) 240 Hz (240 times a second) etc.

Now one may think, oh well, BFD...but imagine trying to watch an action movie with lots of moving images. Something like transformers. It is 100% smoother if your refresh rate is 120 hz over 60 hz, 400% smoother if the refresh rate is 240 hz.

That's why you can get 40" TVs for under $500.00 and larger 55" for under $900.00.

 

[tboy]

Oh yeah, one BIG thing when buying a TV:

Ignore brand names and all the specs. Buy the tv that looks best to YOUR eyes. Before doing that however, make sure Mr or Mrs Salesman resets ALL the menus to factory default.

Places (even really good places like Bay Bloor Radio) are notorious for fiddling with the settings to make a dull picture brighter. The problem with that is if you boost up the brightness setting to max, that means you're pushing the TV to the max, ALL the time. Hence it won't last as long as one that is set to it's native or middle brightness setting.

One of the biggest issues with flat panel screens is getting blacks to be black (the colour not the people). So places will boost up the contrast level in order to show white whites and black blacks. Again, a tv running this way just won't last as long.

Think of a car that produces 300 HP at 10,000 rpm vs a car that produces 300 hp at 5,000 rpm. The engine is running twice as many times to produce the same hp....

 

[Clint Ewood]

LCD

https://www.ehow.com/about_5202744_life-lcd-tv-screens.html