Monday, March 05, 2007

I Can See Clearly Now

Well if nothing else, I can see in High Definition. I gave in, I folded, I let Jeff get a new TV. He asked if I gave in because I got sick of listening to him. And in reality, that's a big part of it. And then he goes on to say, that he may not buy one today, he doesn't want to jump into it. I almost choked on disbelief. He's been 'researching' tvs for at least a year. There is NO WAY he doesn't know everything he wants to know. We went through this a year or so ago also. At that point I put my foot down and said no HD, no LCD, no 720p or i or whatever it is. I don't see buying into technology that isn't readily available at a reasonable cost. Because I know that if we get a new tv, then we need a new receiver and then we need a new Dish DVR... not to mention all the cabling. So it's not just the expense of a tv. Now the new thing is 1080p. I just don't understand why they are putting out tvs with this function when they won't be broadcasting tv stations in 1080p for AT LEAST 6 years. I guess if we end up with a blu-ray DVD player and buy more expensive blu-ray DVDs then we will get the full benefit, but right now that is NOT happening.

So we went to one Big Box Electronics store and asked some info and got prices. The nice thing about the sales person was he explained why a LCD vs a plasma and vice versa. And also explained that 720p is really all anyone needs. So we decide to price compare and go to another Big Box Electronic store. 4 HOURS LATER, we finally had a tv and a new receiver. I am still not sure why it took 4 hours, but I do know that the twins were miserable by the end...and therefore I was miserable by the end. Oh, and we ended up woth the 1080p because it was only $100 more.

If that were all, fine, but then we had to go home and install the thing. By 8 the installation was done, but now our universal remote will not work and it won't let us re-program it. UGH!

What's done is done.

3 comments:

Joel said...

So what are some pros/cons with plasma and lcd and which did you go with?

JSmith5780 said...

The LCD has no glass 'screen' so in a room with a lot of glare it works well. This is placed in our sun room, so lots of glare. This is always annoyed me with our current tv, especially for daytime viewing.

The drawback of an LCD is the 'screen' is more delicate, meaning we placed it slightly higher out of reach from the kids.

The plasma has a glass screen, hence more glare, but is more durable.

As for the 720 vs 1080. The most any station will be broadcasting in the near future is 720. You will only get 1080 on blu ray disc and possibly some video games at this time. The tentative braodcast date for 1080 is 6 years away. So if you are a big moivie person or gamer, then 1080 would be the way to go. Otherewise the 720 is more sufficient. In our case we got the 1080 because it was only $100 more.

JSmith5780 said...

Forgot to add- LCDs are brighter, have no screen burn in and use less energy. Those weren't our selling points though.

And in case I didn't make it clear, we bought an LCD.