LCD/Plasma/CRT/DLP - questions

[Salsa Party Animal]

How do people find their Toshiba 37/32 WLT58 TV so far as it could be my choice, but I need to have a look in action

[EvilBoris]

After watching nothing but LCD screens for the last 3 months(Samsung TV and Viewsonic Monitor) I have returned to see the family for christmas.
Tring to watch Tv I feel saturated by the CRT buzz and my eyes want to melt from the 50hz.

[Rossco]

After good impressions from PeteJ, Rossco, Shakey Jake et al I recently ordered the LG 26LX2R after returning the faulty Samsung LE26 to play.

It came today and I'm very impressed with it. Good output through component, good output through VGA and stunning output through DVI VGA. No dead pixels either.

Games in 480p do look slightly blocky to an extent, but I'd imagine that's down to the fact the system's native resolution is far higher.

Nice work, tis a great screen. Everyone I've shown it too has been very impressed, even non technical gadget people too!

[mingo]

If you're not bothered about VGA, then I'd go for the Panny. I really wanted that telly, but the lack of VGA stopped me from buying it. There's some pics of it in action with a 360 (I assume your main reason for getting one?) and it looks abolutely superb. I'm also a big fan of the styling compared to the Sony, although having said that, either set will be superb.

The Panasonic it is then, cheers mate.

[Dazzla]

Add me to the LG owners list. my 32LX2R arrived from Empire Direct today. 360 over component is absolutely stunning, as I imagine it would on every LCD TV. Oppo via DVI is good, but not spectacular, I'll have to play with the settings. The iMac via VGA is extremely nice, HD movies over VGA from the iMac are fantastic. The only let down is Sky+ via RGB Scart, SD content doesn't flatter LCD TVs and it's still the case here, watchable but roll on SkyHD.

All of this doesn't help when I'm around 1-2 metres away from the TV, really shows up the sky.

[Crisp_Rapper]

SD content doesn't flatter LCD TVs and it's still the case here, watchable but roll on SkyHD.

All of this doesn't help when I'm around 1-2 metres away from the TV, really shows up the sky.

no ****! 6' from a 32" lcd running SD is nuts! viewing distance should be 8/9' at the very least.

[Dazzla]

Yeah, I know. My room's too small to be that far away. Watching TV will be about 7-8' away max. But I barely watch TV. It'll be about 70% 360, 15% iMac content, 10% DVD and 5% TV. I'll put up with it

[HaHaUK]

Add me to the LG owners list. my 32LX2R arrived from Empire Direct today. 360 over component is absolutely stunning, as I imagine it would on every LCD TV. Oppo via DVI is good, but not spectacular, I'll have to play with the settings. The iMac via VGA is extremely nice, HD movies over VGA from the iMac are fantastic. The only let down is Sky+ via RGB Scart, SD content doesn't flatter LCD TVs and it's still the case here, watchable but roll on SkyHD.

All of this doesn't help when I'm around 1-2 metres away from the TV, really shows up the sky.

You should have got a 26"! Mine is perfect and Im sitting 1-2metres away as well. Any bigger and it would have been waaay too big.

Make sure your using a good scart cable for Sky, as it really does make a difference what type of cable you use. I had my Freeview box linked to a scart splitter using a tired-out cable, and then from the splitter to the TV using a fully wired, brand new one, and it was viewable, but then when I linked it straight to the telly using the good cable, it was much better, and came very close to how it looked on my CRT.

Adjust the settings, as the default aint too good for SD content. I tinkered about with them when I first got it, and PS2 via composite actually looked good! I still havent got the hang of all the different options (Fleshtone, Bluetone, Greentone....et al ) but Im getting there!

[Baseley09]

Is that a problem with any source over RGB scart or just the Sky?

Every corner i turn i hear moans about stuff going through RGB scart of flat panels, it worries me.

[Concept]

From experience of both the Samsung and LG 26" sets, standard definition content is a problem over component and RGB, as predictably the closer you are to the native resolution of the television, the less pixelated things are due to less upscaling. I'm only a couple of feet away in terms of viewing distance and things can get very blocky when not running at 720p (or thereabouts).

RGB on the LG is definitely better than the Samsung though - not as good as a standard native set, but better than what I was expecting.

[gIzzE]

Going to piss a lot of people off here, but if you are going to be watching a lot of TV then you need to go plasma, and only really look at Panny and Pioneer (fujitsu if you can afford it).
LCD is not ready for lower bitrate stuff yet, and the Samsung really is poor with its processing, colours are off, there is noise in dark areas and with the smearing the whole thing looks very poor. I had one for a week to play with and it is not very impressive.

If you want a flat panel and care about image quality, get a plasma, I am sure LCD will be as good if not better in the future, but for now it doesn't come close.
Sky on mine can and often does look as good as a good dvd, HD looks stunning too of course, but I don't sit there gagging for it to arrive like alot of people on here seem too.
LCD screen are great for graphics, but for video they just don't cut it I am afraid.

[sj33]

My main problems with Plasma are the fact that they don't match the resolution of LCD, the constant risk of burn-in (which would induce paranoia in a person like me), and the fact that they are less suitable for PC use.

Plasma could well definately be a superior option for many people though, mainly those who watch a lot of TV as you say... but for me, it's LCD.

[gIzzE]

The Panasonic plasmas, commercial models I am talking about and the consumer should be the same, are more resilient to burn in than a CRT TV. I left the Singstar menu on from 1am through till 11am a few weeks ago on a new screen with under 100 hours on it and there was zero retention let alone burn. I admit other screens are prone to getting image retention but they also have a **** picture so not worth considering anyway.

Resolution is spec that everyone gets carried away with, the only thing it really, really improves is pc desktop.
Take two screens like the Panasonic 42" commercial range, one with a 768p panel and the other a 480p panel and feed it proper HD material. Stand next to the screen and you will see which is which, but get over 6ft away and it becomes very difficult to tell which is the HD panel, get to 9ft and I bet 90% of the people on here could not tell which is which. Same with HD games, run PGR on an SD screen and an HD screen at 720p and you will be hard pushed to tell the difference even when next to the screen.
I would take a Panasonic 480p display over any LCD on the market, I am more concerned with quality over quntity.

Look at it this way, would you expect a goodmans midi system with 300wpc to sound better than a Tag McClaren hifi with only 30wpc??

If all things are equal then yes, having a higher resolution is better, but resolution is only 10% of overall image quality, how good is the glass? How good is the Digital to Analogue converters? How well laid out is the board, and do you get noise on the analogue ins because they are next to the PSU? How good is the PSU? What deinterlacer is being used? What scaler is being used? What colour decoder is in there?

You can go on forever, at the end of the day the main thing is, does it look good, from reading this thread and the ones on avforums it is obvious most people are not blown away by their new HD TV unless they are feeding it a really good signal, well all I can say is you have not brought the right set, there are sets out there that are jaw dropping!

[Simmy]

Have to say my LCD is quite watchable just using an analogue TV ariel, and sitting from a reasonably good distance. It is comparable with my old CRT, which I always had a good picture on, and I'm therefore really not that concerned with it. Will be getting digital shortly and will give a final view on watching TV on it then, however I feel that once the old analogue TV ariel interference has been removed, the image will be spot on. Just an opinion from a new (new) gen LCD owner !

[Rossco]

Well I have my Sky going to my LG via RGB Scart and I dont have a problem with it at all, sure it could be a bit sharper etc but still, its a damn good picture I say. Nothing compared to a fully HD signal but its nearly as good as it is on the Sony CRT in the living room.