What do you think of this HDTV?

[wvjules]

Its on sale at Best Buy for $399 on Black Friday. Is it a good deal for an inexpensive HDTV?

Our Wal-Mart currently has this one on clearance for $577. I know the other one is cheaper, but which one is a better deal?

BTW, I currently only have a 27" TV so the two sizes are bigger than what I currently have so that doesn't make much of a difference.

 

[always quiet]

I was looking at them at Circuit City today. I thought the picture quality was outstanding but it will be a cold day in Hades before I spend THAT much for a tv!!

 

[cardaway]

Pretty good. Some people will only buy tube TV's because all the other technologies don't handle black levels as well.

The only thing I would warn against is making sure there isn't an equally good deal for a slightly bigger TV. Should be lots of deals for TV's under 40 inches.

 

[wvjules]

I'm definately getting one of those, I'm leaning towards the Best Buy one. Now I wonder what happens to all of my DVD that aren't in widescreen. They're going to have the black strips down the side, aren't they? OH well, I'll just start buying WS DVDs from now on.

 

[cardaway]

I'm definately getting one of those, I'm leaning towards the Best Buy one. Now I wonder what happens to all of my DVD that aren't in widescreen. They're going to have the black strips down the side, aren't they? OH well, I'll just start buying WS DVDs from now on.

Some of the Full Screen DVD's will not lose much if you were to use the magnify or stretch options on your DVD player or new TV. Many "Full Screen" DVD's are actually opened up widescreen movies. The official term is "open matte". The extra at the top and bottom is cut off to make the movie widescreen.

By default though there will be bars on the side.

As for the rest... yes, buy the original aspect ratio for now on. Usually widescreen unless it's an old movie like The Wizard of Oz or Snow White.

 

[bicker]

I cannot imagine an HDTV that cheap being of any decent quality.

 

[cardaway]

I cannot imagine an HDTV that cheap being of any decent quality.

Maybe, but it also could be because it's so small by HDTV standards. One can only imagine how low standard format TV's will go for a year from now. Same with smaller HDTV sets.

 

[True North]

Just a quick note, it is not an HDTV, it is HD ready. I think you need to buy a seperate tuner to have proper HDTV through it.