LCD/Plasma/LED

rockcity

rockcity

everyday is a chance to get better
Joined
Apr 10, 2005
Location
Greenville, NC
WTF? All this flat screen TV talk has me interested...


What is the difference (pro/con) of LCD/Plasma/LED?

What is best?
What is a PITA?
What is here to stay?
What is fixable?

I know resolution matters too...

asuming all other things remaining the same, which is better ? LCD/Plasma/LED???


I'm looking at upgrading the old ass CRT TV in the living room, so I'll be looking soon :)


Rob
 
Right now the best is a LED. Feel of the screen with the back of your hand and you can feel the difference. Plasma is old school and lCD(liquid crystal display) is on it's way out. LED (light emitting diode) is your choice.
 
Just bought one last week and went through the education process. 1080P (for example) is the resolution. You want the highest you can get. Plasma is not readily repairable. LED's can burn out and leave a dead spot on the screen. My LCD computer moniter is 8 years old and never gets turned off. It is still humming right along.

We selected a 46" Samsung LCD 1080P at Best Buy. We walked back and forth and this one just jumped out at us a being the clearest picture of all of them. We made them an offer on the floor model and got 150 bucks off and it still has the full 1 yr waranty. Be fore we went, I measured how far away we sit from the tv and paced that off in the store. When we stood that far away from them, anything bigger than a 46 was like sitting on the front row of a movie theater. It was too much for the room. Hope that helps!
 
i got a 1080 plasma last year with one of the rooms to go special and i love it i can tell though the more common channels i watch for example news channel 14 some of the standard images you can see are getting burnt into the screen which sucks but you can only see them when you first turn on the tv as soon as you change the channel it goes away
 
LED is still a LCD display. The difference is the back lighting. Your standard LCD is backlit on the sides by fluorescent tubes. The thinner LED TV's are backlit by LEDs on the sides and the thicker ones are backlit by a board of LED's behind the screen and these by far offer a crisper picture and more brilliant colors. Someone (I'm thinking Samsung) had added yellow to the color pallet instead of the standard red, green, blue giving it an even clearer picture and more vibrant colors. (But this was over a year ago so everyone might be doing this by now.)

Like was said before, Plasma's are bad for burn in and LED's use less power. Good luck. 3D may or may not be around to stay as I'm sure they are working on 3D's that do not require glasses.
 
Anyone want to explain Hz? For instance cheaper lcds are 60 and 1080p but then you have some 720p that may be 600hz... What's more important?
 
Hz is basically your refresh rate...if its 60Hz, the screen is refreshed 60x/second. So the higher the number, the clearer and fresher the picture should look.
 
rockcity said:
hmmm... wonder what a 720p with 600Hz would look like beside a 1080p 60Hz???
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After some light reading. I think the 1080p is more important than the higher refresh rate. From what I understand they don't have the 240Hz perfected. Not really sure. I don't keep up with it. I still have a CRT thats almost 20yrs old and still going strong. Don't plan on replacing it till it goes out.
 
The only magic to the refresh rate is that you want it to be at least 120Hz. Broadcast TV is recorded at 60Hz, film is 24Hz, and some older film was 30Hz. So a 120Hz TV can show any of those at native refresh rates without having to do a 3:2 conversion. It shows the 24Hz image 5x in a row, shows the 60Hz frame 2x, etc.

There's no difference between a 120Hz or 600Hz or 240Hz otherwise. It's just marketing bullshit.

You just want 1080P. That's Blu-Ray quality. Nothing else is recorded at a higher resolution than that. Broadcast is either 1080i (half the lines as 1080p) or 720p. Fox and ABC are 720p, everybody else is 1080i.
 
Btw, pretty sure there's no 600Hz. I think it was a 60
 
Shawn said:
The only magic to the refresh rate is that you want it to be at least 120Hz. Broadcast TV is recorded at 60Hz, film is 24Hz, and some older film was 30Hz. So a 120Hz TV can show any of those at native refresh rates without having to do a 3:2 conversion. It shows the 24Hz image 5x in a row, shows the 60Hz frame 2x, etc.

There's no difference between a 120Hz or 600Hz or 240Hz otherwise. It's just marketing bullshit.

You just want 1080P. That's Blu-Ray quality. Nothing else is recorded at a higher resolution than that. Broadcast is either 1080i (half the lines as 1080p) or 720p. Fox and ABC are 720p, everybody else is 1080i.
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Your the man
 
Ooops. Sorry. I only looked at the LED's
 
JUICED COUPE said:
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/Insigni...HDTV/9748831.p?id=1218166511573&skuId=9748831
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That's the one I just ordered. It's for a master bedroom, so I didn't care if it had the absolute best resolution out there. I am mating it to an LG Blu-Ray that I got at Wal-Mart for $50. From what I understand, its supposed to be pretty good with the HDMI cable connecting them.

I'll let you know how it does. It should be here around the first week of December. They were running a free shipping deal. I hate crowds. Me and Black Friday aren't the best of friends.
 
Shawn said:
The only magic to the refresh rate is that you want it to be at least 120Hz. Broadcast TV is recorded at 60Hz, film is 24Hz, and some older film was 30Hz. So a 120Hz TV can show any of those at native refresh rates without having to do a 3:2 conversion. It shows the 24Hz image 5x in a row, shows the 60Hz frame 2x, etc.

There's no difference between a 120Hz or 600Hz or 240Hz otherwise. It's just marketing bullshit.

You just want 1080P. That's Blu-Ray quality. Nothing else is recorded at a higher resolution than that. Broadcast is either 1080i (half the lines as 1080p) or 720p. Fox and ABC are 720p, everybody else is 1080i.
Click to expand...

This - in summary, the "refresh" thing is 90% misleading garbage.

"flicker fusion" of the human eye starts around 30Hz and maxes out about 60. IOW, you can't actually see changes that happen any faster than that. The 120-240 business is just "smoothing" the signal over time supposedly giving a sharper image.

On a side note, in case anybody has though maybe you could take a PC vid card and hook it up to one of these boxes and run the resolution at 120 or 240 Hz - you can't. They typically lock at only 60Hz w/ DVI and max around 85 or so on VGA.

It's really frustrating for guys like me b/c there are alot of obscure scientific needs for really high refresh rate monitors, especially in large format, and it's becoming impossible... unless they just change the firmware...
 
Shawn said:
The only magic to the refresh rate is that you want it to be at least 120Hz. Broadcast TV is recorded at 60Hz, film is 24Hz, and some older film was 30Hz. So a 120Hz TV can show any of those at native refresh rates without having to do a 3:2 conversion. It shows the 24Hz image 5x in a row, shows the 60Hz frame 2x, etc.

There's no difference between a 120Hz or 600Hz or 240Hz otherwise. It's just marketing bullshit.

You just want 1080P. That's Blu-Ray quality. Nothing else is recorded at a higher resolution than that. Broadcast is either 1080i (half the lines as 1080p) or 720p. Fox and ABC are 720p, everybody else is 1080i.
Click to expand...
As someone who sells Tv's for a living this is exactly what I try to tell everyone that comes in and asks this question. The newer plasma Tvs are better but they still have flaws which have already been covered. Plasma=Biggest screen for the $ Lcd good all around tv Led is the best you can buy generally the most expensive but has the best picture and the cheapest to use. A lot of the new plasma Tvs are now energy star rated
 
There are a few misconceptions in here. The real question is /needs to be what is the main type of programming your gonna be watching/playing?

Then maybe you can be pointed in the right direction.
 
plasmas are awesome but reflect alot of light so if the room isnt pitch black.
LCDs will burn out pixles and will leave you with little blue or black spots on the tv.
LEDs are expensive but are 3d and probably one of the thinnest tvs they sell
 
X2 on the heat thing. My 47 LCD actually heats up the living room a little. It usually stays about a degree or so warmer than the rest of the house and you can feel the heat about 12-16 inches away pretty good.

My dad has a 55 LED and puts out no heat at all. Can't speak to the picture quality because he doesn't have HD or blue ray.

If I have to replace mine in the future, I will get LED even if it's more expensive just because of the energy savings.
 
GREENCHEROKEE said:
X2 on the heat thing. My 47 LCD actually heats up the living room a little. It usually stays about a degree or so warmer than the rest of the house and you can feel the heat about 12-16 inches away pretty good.

My dad has a 55 LED and puts out no heat at all. Can't speak to the picture quality because he doesn't have HD or blue ray.

If I have to replace mine in the future, I will get LED even if it's more expensive just because of the energy savings.
Click to expand...

The 54" Panasonic plasma we bought last year really isn't that bad, yes you can feel the heat if a few inches away from it but it's really not that noticeable. Mien is actually energy star cetified; I believe the newer ones are much better about this.

X2 on the glare though, most have a smooth glass screen, so if you have lights behind your head it can be an issue.
i just carefully chose where to mount it and moved the living room light and it's no issue at all.

All that said the best "picture for your buck" is still plasma, much more affordable especially in the "big" sizes.
 
I trusted my senses. After walking back and forth looking them over, the Samsung 1080P LCD was noticeably clearer, smoother picture. The fact we have had good luck with other Samsung products and customer service, just sealed the deal.
My moto is... Only a fool argues with his own success.:lol:

Good luck with your search!
 
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