Flat screenTV info

Hillbilly1

Hello all,

We have not bought a new TV in about 14 years!

We now need a new tv, and want something flat screen that can go on the wall, ideal size 32".

Now, it may seem silly, but what are the differences between LED/LCD and Plasma? In this time of changing technology is it worth going with a big brand, Sony etc?

I saw a Technika in Tesco 32" with integral DVD player for £199

http://direct.tesco.com/q/R.210-5905.aspx

It says discontinued online but is still in branch. Is it too cheap to be true?

What is better - LCD/LED/Plasma.

We us the TV for normal viewing, have Virgin TV and Wifit and watch DVD's, currenty on PS2. Is it worth getting something with internet capabilites?

Amy help greatly appreciated!

fwor

Hillbilly1 wrote: »

What is better - LCD/LED/Plasma.

I'm sorry if this sounds like stating the obvious, but if one of those technologies were "better" than the rest, everyone would buy that one and the others would die. Each has different characteristics.

The best thing to do is to go to a big multi-brand consumer electronics retailer and look to see which you like.

You can pretty much forget Plasma, as almost nobody makes them as small as 32", so you are really only choosing between LCD, and "LCD with an LED backlight", and the difference between the two is not that big.

No-brand names such as Technika: you might get lucky and have good reliability, but they are built down to that cheap price. Reliability is ~generally~ inferior, and picture quality may well be only "average".

grizzly1911

Hillbilly1 wrote: »

Hello all,

We have not bought a new TV in about 14 years!

We now need a new tv, and want something flat screen that can go on the wall, ideal size 32".

Now, it may seem silly, but what are the differences between LED/LCD and Plasma? In this time of changing technology is it worth going with a big brand, Sony etc?

I saw a Technika in Tesco 32" with integral DVD player for £199

http://direct.tesco.com/q/R.210-5905.aspx

It says discontinued online but is still in branch. Is it too cheap to be true?

What is better - LCD/LED/Plasma.

We us the TV for normal viewing, have Virgin TV and Wifit and watch DVD's, currenty on PS2. Is it worth getting something with internet capabilites?

Amy help greatly appreciated!

There are lots of techies that will no doubt give more depth.

This is my practical view, having brought and tried a few models.

Basically you have LCD and Plasma. The main LED offerings are just a different version of LCD.

LCD depend on a light source at the back of the TV and then an LCD "film" (with little windows in it, a bit like an advent calendar with mini doors, the pixels) is energised in different ways to let the light through. The way it is energised gives you the different colours and whites. If the doors are closed then it is black. In an LCD the light is from an CFL light source with a mainstream LED type the light is from an LED instead. There are pure LED TVs but they are a lot more expensive. LEd tVs are cheaper to run as the light source consumes less electricity, probably 50% or less.

With plasma you have lots of little bulbs filled with gas. The way these little bulbs get energised gives you the colours and white. Black is achieved by switching the bulb off simplistically. Plasma TVs therefore tend to give a stronger blacks as you don't have the light "creeping" through a closed door like the LCD.

In practice for general viewing the blacks won't be much different.

Plasma tend to give better, sharper pictures IMO, LCDs appear a little softer. Plasmas tend to be over the 42" mark and LCD 40" and below.

I think plasma give a better picture but I have also seen some very nice LCDs too. I have a Panasonic plasma, but have installed both a 37" Sony, with wifi and a 26" Samsung LCDs.

Many of the LCD screens and insides are made by just a few suppliers. Where you will notice a difference is in aesthetic appeal the way the menus and programme guides work. Sound will generally be better on the more expensive products too.

TVs tend to be HD ready at 720p (pixels) or 1080i/ and full HD at 1080p) 1080p is the the optimum. Some 32 " TVs do have an upscaled cobbled together version of 720p that can cause issues when connecting external devices such as game machines.

The normal aspect ratio is 16:9 (width:heigt) some cheaper units are 16:10 which means you wil have a black margin, top and bottom -I believe.

Take care with the cheaper DVD combi units as the readers aren't always that robust.If they fail they will be very expensive, relatively, to get fixed.In addition a separate DVD player (or Blu Ray for HD quality from Blu Ray discs) gives you more flexibility, easier to swap.

New TVs generally have Freeview a or Freeview HD tuners built in, the latter at premium. Freeview HD may not be needed if you get this via virgin.

If it is going to be your main TV and you can afford it I would go for a more mainstream brand personally. My belief is that it will be more user friendly and will have remote codes available.

Wifi will require a dongle or suitable interface cost from £15. Good for watching catchup TV and downloading films and connecting to your PC media.

Hope that helps from a laymans point of view.

Hillbilly1

Thank you both! That clears up plasma/lcd.

With regard to using the tv for internet, we have wifi broadband is the tv just used as a screen with computer stuff elsewhere, or is everything in the tv so to speak?

grizzly1911

Hillbilly1 wrote: »

Thank you both! That clears up plasma/lcd.

With regard to using the tv for internet, we have wifi broadband is the tv just used as a screen with computer stuff elsewhere, or is everything in the tv so to speak?

Most flat screen TVs will act as a monitor for a PC/Laptop if hard wired via VGA.

True internet tellies have the ability to have a wifi "dongle" usually supplied by manufacturer at high price or something like this:-

http://www.amazon.co.uk/TP-Link-TL-WA500G-Wireless-Extended-RangeTM/dp/B002XKJ17I/ref=sr_1_28?ie=UTF8&qid=1322598488&sr=8-28

With the decoding bit in the telly.

If you know anyone with a PS3, they do the same job and the menu is similar to the Bravia TV menu.

almillar

grizzly1911 is a bit out of date with VGA - some tellys come with out it, and loads that do have resolution difficulties - ie the won't let you display 1080p over VGA, which kinda defeats the purpose.
You're looking for any old TV if you want to connect a computer - any modern computer should have DVI or HDMI out, which you can plug into the TV's HDMI socket (and sound to an amp).
Sounds like you're after a 'smart TV', which has all the internet browsing stuff built in. As above, the often have a network socket at the back, so you'd want it to be beside your router, or will require a proprietary (and expensive) wifi dongle to go wireless.

Gratis

almillar wrote: »

Sounds like you're after a 'smart TV', which has all the internet browsing stuff built in. As above, the often have a network socket at the back, so you'd want it to be beside your router, or will require a proprietary (and expensive) wifi dongle to go wireless.

The router doesn't actually need to be sited beside the television. If it isn't convenient to run an Ethernet lead between the router and the television, the gap can be bridged by means of a pair of Powerline adaptors, using the mains electricity wiring, instead of an Ethernet lead, to supply the television with a LAN and Internet connection. After all, both the router and the television are going to be sited within range of an electricity socket anyway!

My experience, after experimentation, has been that – at least with our Sony televisions – a 200 mb/s Powerline connection performs faster and more reliably than either a Sony inbuilt wi-fi connection or a Sony USB wi-fi adaptor. (Even on 802.11n at 5 Mhz.)

almillar

Gratis - that's extra equipment, like the expensive dongle. My point was without extra equipment, assuming consumer has a spare LAN cable or the TV comes with one.
There's a danger that people confuse 'internet ready' things with 'has WiFi'.

soay_2

Just to say we bought the Technica 32 inch tv (no dvd player) for £199 a couple of months ago & were so pleased with it we went back for a second one.

It is easy to operate & the picture & sound quality are totally satisfactory as far as we are concerned.