LCD/Plasma/CRT/DLP - questions

[nips]

I'm looking to get myself a bit of a bargain atm, and I just searched for a 27" version of that Toshiba posted above and I think I know how.

I've got a place in Uni sorted for next year with a couple of buddies and we want to get a nice TV. Now, I want a HD TV for the 360, but everything else that's going to go through the TV will likely be SD. We're not going to be able to afford to get SkyHD, so I was thinking instead of getting a HD Ready TV, I should just get a HD Compatible one. I'll be able to get a set that does a pretty decent job of SD and supports a non-HDCP HD signal such as the 360.

Searching for the smaller Tosh I found this, which has many inputs and ticks all the other boxes. I figure why pay for a superflous HDMI port? My old man's got a HD-Toshiba LCD and it's pretty good. I imagine if I fiddled with the settings a little it could be excellent, but I'm not that picky anyway.

What do you guys think? You know any good, reasonably priced <?550 HD Compatible LCD TVs?

[mid]

Partly thanks to Lyris's raving about them, I finally crumbled and bought the 32" Sony S2010 from John Lewis last week. For ?950 with a 'free' Sony DVD Recorder (which sucessfully region-modded with an Omniremote hack I found online, and does prog scan) it was pretty great value.

Lovely deep colours on it, although I'm still not entirely sure I've struck the right balance between avoiding edge enhancement and blurring out detail.

[Kotatsu Neko]

You should be able to get the 26" S-series BRAVIA for around ?800 now. It looks like the Toshibas may only support HDCP on the first HDMI socket, which basically makes the second almost useless.

I emailed Toshiba to ask them this very question and they confirmed that *both* HDMI ports support HDCP.

[andrewfee]

I emailed Toshiba to ask them this very question and they confirmed that *both* HDMI ports support HDCP.

Excellent. It appears that it must have been a handshaking issue, rather than not supporting HDMI.

[RLench]

It was me who told Andrew about the Toshiba 'problem'. I saw someone post on AVForums claiming that HDMI2 on the Toshiba didn't support HDCP, and I was waiting to test it for myself. I tried it today and it works fine

[Rossco]

Whats the main differences between the Bravia S and V series? Spec wise they seem the same, I thought the V series was supposed to have 2 HDMI's though? I'll be looking to buy a new TV at the end of the year, 32", around the ?1000-1200 mark and would like 2 HDCP compliant HDMI sockets for Sky HD and PS3 and is it asking alot for a VGA and DVI socket too?

[andrewfee]

Whats the main differences between the Bravia S and V series? Spec wise they seem the same, I thought the V series was supposed to have 2 HDMI's though? I'll be looking to buy a new TV at the end of the year, 32", around the ?1000-1200 mark and would like 2 HDCP compliant HDMI sockets for Sky HD and PS3 and is it asking alot for a VGA and DVI socket too?

The only real difference between them is supposed to be the styling, build quality, and the wide colour gamut backlighting technology. Apparently all the processing etc is the same.

When doing some more reading into LCD technology a while back, it would appear that wide colour gamut technology is actually less accurate unless you have 10-bit data, which nothing will currently output.

It does appear that the V has a better calibrated greyscale out of the box, so unless you have the hardware to do that, it may end up looking better. (I've not seen the S in person)



Just had an email from Cheap Electricals cancelling my LC-37GE1E order btw. I ended up ordering one of those cheap MT200 DLP projectors which should be arriving today, (shipped yesterday and I paid for next-day delivery) so I'll post up my impressions later. (may have to wait until it's dark though, and it'll just be going onto a magnolia wall until I know if I'm keeping it or not)

[Mayhem]

Just had an email from Cheap Electricals cancelling my LC-37GE1E order btw.

No real surprise there. Not got one myself yet though. But in preparation I guess I will be back on the trail for looking. So what makes of LCD do people actually recommend in general?

[Lyris]

The Sony ones tend to get the most things right - it might be worth waiting until Autumn to see what their new models are like.

[charlesr]

Can anyone see any poor features about this: http://www.panasonic.co.uk/plasma-di...d8bk/index.htm

[andrewfee]

Screw LCD, Plasma etc, I have a new favourite:



?340 Toshiba MT200 DLP projector with 2500:1 contrast ratio.

That shot is taken in a room with high ambient light onto a magnolia wall (much brighter than it looks there) it's a 47" image from 77.5" away. (I'll be able to get another foot throw distance once it's set up properly)

Just a quick shot taken from Freeview via S-Video at the out-of-the-box settings, which looks amazing. I can't wait until it gets dark, and properly calibrated, to give this a good test. (and it should look even better on a proper screen)

[Rossco]

Nicely, I would love a projector but dont have the space or anything to set it up.

[Kotatsu Neko]

Does anyone have any online retailer recommendations? I was thinking of using Digital Direct but they've so far ignored 2 of my emails so they have been struck off my list!

[AllYourBase]

OK I have decided it is time to get out of the dark ages and get an LCD, can anyone tell me if there will be any problems with the Samsung LE32R74BDX for my future gaming (and other) needs? It looks reasonable to me. Should be able to get John Lewis to price match to about ?740 so not a bad deal considering I will get a 5 year warranty with them!

[Lyris]

The Samsung LCDs don't give you too much control over the backlight. Be wary of that if you're used to a CRT - Toshiba and Sony LCDs let you set it however you want and I don't think they cost much more.