Can anyone give TV buying advice?

[tecumseh]

BluRay HDTV (and some game consoles) do enter into the mix as it is the only format in which a 1080 will shine over a 720 at this point, when watching regular DVD and Direct TV or cable there will be no difference. So again if you have a home theater and are going to get a BluRay player than a 1080 set makes sense.

[bfree]

1. I love my Olevia 1080i LCD. If you don't mind refurbished check out www.newegg.com for some amazing deals.

2. HD requires HDMI cables which are unbelievable overpriced at big box retailers. Best Buy (and the like) sell televisions at a low profit margin so they can sell you a $5 cable for $55. Think I'm kidding? Check out www.monoprice.com and don't ever overpay for cables again.

Go Devils (in HD)!

[blazindw]

I tried to get a 46" Sharp Aquos LCD 720p tv from Sears on Friday morning...within minutes, their entire supply nationwide had been sold out. I left at 5:15am emptyhanded. If you can get 1080p, you are in the money, but they tend to be more expensive. My parents have 3 Samsung 1080p LCDs of various sizes (52", 46", 32")...they are the coolest things since sliced bread. I spend my entire time at home watching sports and movies in HD.

P.S. The sport I think looks the best in HD...hockey, surprisingly, followed by soccer. Check it out.

[Jim3k]

Speaking of HD DVD's, I'm hoping this Tuesday's Wisconsin game marks the first time of the season Duke is finally broadcast in HD. I bought my Sony KDS-2010 back in April in time to see the Final Four, but have been patiently waiting for a chance to see Duke in HD. So far, none of their games have been broadcast in HD.

I'm not entirely clear about that. The Temple game was on my ESPN HD channel and my HD Tivo kicked over to record it rather than regular ESPN2. It was not in wide screen format and the two margins both said ESPN HD. It was a very good picture, but I wasn't certain that it was actually HD.

Not too long ago I was watching a 49er game in HD widescreen and could actually read the coach's play card. Never saw that before. The Temple game didn't approach that level of clarity.

[ArnieMc]

I'm not entirely clear about that. The Temple game was on my ESPN HD channel and my HD Tivo kicked over to record it rather than regular ESPN2. It was not in wide screen format and the two margins both said ESPN HD. It was a very good picture, but I wasn't certain that it was actually HD.

It was not recorded in HD, so you don't get the detail. ESPN takes the SD (480i) signal, adds the sidebars, and converts to 720p to broadcast it on ESPN HD. The regular ESPN broadcasts the 480i signal and then your set converts it to whatever it displays.

Interlaced (480i, 1080i) sets are generally CRT (old tube-type) technology. The newer fixed pixel technologies (plasma, LCD, DLP, LCOS, SXRD) are all Progressive (480p, 720p, 768p, 1080p). They convert whatever signal they get to whatever they display except that some 1080p displays cannot accept a 1080p signal.

If you spent $150 on a Monster HDMI cable, you wasted $140. HD signals are digital. They either work or they don't. If they work, you don't need a more expensive cable. I second monoprice.com

[Jim3k]

Insert Marquette for Temple (women's game on the brain )

[HaveFunExpectToWin]

Speaking of HD DVD's, I'm hoping this Tuesday's Wisconsin game marks the first time of the season Duke is finally broadcast in HD. I bought my Sony KDS-2010 back in April in time to see the Final Four, but have been patiently waiting for a chance to see Duke in HD. So far, none of their games have been broadcast in HD.

One note. The best HDTV is the world won't do a thing without good HD content. Make sure you setup a time to get an HD box from your cable or satellite provider. (I just got my DirecTV HD DVR installed and am quite happy with the picture quality and quanity of HD programming)

Also, be prepared to be underwhelmed with SD (Standard Definition) images from now on.

Good luck.

[billybreen]

One note. The best HDTV is the world won't do a thing without good HD content. Make sure you setup a time to get an HD box from your cable or satellite provider. (I just got my DirecTV HD DVR installed and am quite happy with the picture quality and quanity of HD programming)

Not sure if it has been mentioned in this thread yet, but I want to give a plug for TiVo HD (or TiVo Series 3 if you want to be super cool) rather than a solution from the cable or sat provider. The TiVo experience with dual HD tuners is fantastic.

[DevilAlumna]

Not sure if it has been mentioned in this thread yet, but I want to give a plug for TiVo HD (or TiVo Series 3 if you want to be super cool) rather than a solution from the cable or sat provider. The TiVo experience with dual HD tuners is fantastic.

Really? I wish you hadn't said that... my husband's been itching to upgrade, but hasn't been able to justify the extra expense... yet. Right now, we have old TIVO (standard def), plus a Comcastic dual-tuner HD DVR. That, to me, seems like plenty TV viewing/recording capability.

Only problem is it's all hooked into one TV, and I'd like the ability to extend/stream recorded programs to another location in the house.

We're thinking our ideal solution will eventually involve the MS Media Center, but the availability of HD TV cards (and a decent machine to put them in) is not suitable yet (standards are still being defined.)

The other option is to just watch everything online; there's so much good content available now (news podcasts, tv shows, movies), about the only thing not available for digital download/stream is Duke BBall in HD!

[HaveFunExpectToWin]

Not sure if it has been mentioned in this thread yet, but I want to give a plug for TiVo HD (or TiVo Series 3 if you want to be super cool) rather than a solution from the cable or sat provider. The TiVo experience with dual HD tuners is fantastic.

I love the Tivo experience as well, but you're still chained to your cable co's channel lineup which isn't exactly chock full of HD programming yet. (billybreen, I think you've mentioned you have Verizon FiOS, so you're better off than most)

And if you choose a Tivo HD (or Series 3), you won't be getting the HD content available on Video On Demand (unless you also rent a separate cable box from the cable co). On Demand is where cable has been able to compete in the HD content arms race.

If you choose DirecTV or Dish, then there's no Tivo option.

I will say that as an avid Tivo lover for the past 5 years, I'm not hating the DirecTV DVR I got. I need a few more weeks with it before I can readily endorse it however.

[billybreen]

I love the Tivo experience as well, but you're still chained to your cable co's channel lineup which isn't exactly chock full of HD programming yet. (billybreen, I think you've mentioned you have Verizon FiOS, so you're better off than most)

And if you choose a Tivo HD (or Series 3), you won't be getting the HD content available on Video On Demand (unless you also rent a separate cable box from the cable co). On Demand is where cable has been able to compete in the HD content arms race.

If you choose DirecTV or Dish, then there's no Tivo option.

I will say that as an avid Tivo lover for the past 5 years, I'm not hating the DirecTV DVR I got. I need a few more weeks with it before I can readily endorse it however.

Good points. I've been really happy with the FIOS HD options, and I believe they are competitive to sat (and the internet bandwidth is fantastic).

I believe TiVo and DirecTV have repaired their relationship, so some form of TiVo service may be returning before long.

[Jim3k]

Really? I wish you hadn't said that... my husband's been itching to upgrade, but hasn't been able to justify the extra expense... yet. Right now, we have old Tivo (standard def), plus a Comcastic dual-tuner HD DVR. That, to me, seems like plenty TV viewing/recording capability.

Only problem is it's all hooked into one TV, and I'd like the ability to extend/stream recorded programs to another location in the house.

Yeah, there's a smaller HD dual hard-drive version at about $400. It's working great and I use a multistream video card. It allows both hard drives to operate at the same time. My wife is the big user and she loves it.

My son tried to add a free-standing hard drive to it, but discovered that the literature on doing that is wrong and you can't do it (yet).

Nevertheless, it's a lot cheaper than the $800 version. That version has a much larger hard drive.

The Tivo programming capabilities are far superior to any cable company DVR. I agree that you can't do interactive stuff (like PPV or boxing) but we've never done that anyway, so it was not a loss for us. (I have a second set with a box that could do that if I ever needed to, but it's not HD.)

[HaveFunExpectToWin]

Jim3K,

There's now an eSATA external drive that's approved by Tivo, made by Western Digital. The specific model is called My DVR Expander and is available through Tivo.com or BestBuy.com. Other external SATA drives may possibly work, but they aren't supported by the Tivo tech support.

[billybreen]

Yeah, there's a smaller HD dual hard-drive version at about $400. It's working great and I use a multistream video card. It allows both hard drives to operate at the same time. My wife is the big user and she loves it.

My son tried to add a free-standing hard drive to it, but discovered that the literature on doing that is wrong and you can't do it (yet).

Actually, I've had a free-standing external eSata drive attached to mine for several months using an undocumented approach found online. Works just fine, and it's nice to have 1TB of space for all my HD content

[billybreen]

Really? I wish you hadn't said that... my husband's been itching to upgrade, but hasn't been able to justify the extra expense... yet. Right now, we have old TIVO (standard def), plus a Comcastic dual-tuner HD DVR. That, to me, seems like plenty TV viewing/recording capability.

Only problem is it's all hooked into one TV, and I'd like the ability to extend/stream recorded programs to another location in the house.

As of about a month ago, TiVo restored multi-room and to-computer sharing from the HD series boxes. It would be fairly simple to pull content off of the TiVo HD and onto a standalone system (yes, Windows based if you must). You just need to use one of the apps that unlocks the TiVo format into standard MPEG. I'd be surprised if someone in the nerd community hasn't already automated that process.

[Clipsfan]

Does anyone have any experience with DirecTV's HD DVR? I picked up a second HD TV over the holiday and it's now time to step up to HD, but I haven't decided whether to stay with DirecTV (using one of the old Tivo DirecTV boxes with it) or switch over to Time Warner (our only cable choice).

[bird]

We just went HD. As one of my partners told me beforehand, going HD was the best technology money you can spend. The biggest problem is that "SD" is so inadequate by contrast that it is actively annoying. Big surprise is how good regular DVDs look on the set. We went with a full FIOS package - internet, phone, HD. Said goodbye to Comcast. (Wife has funny story standing in line at Comcast office with others turning in their boxes, listening to other joyful former Comcast customers sharing their various hate-Comcast stories.) Duke / Wisc. first Duke game seen in HD - paid for the package right there.

[billybreen]

We just went HD. As one of my partners told me beforehand, going HD was the best technology money you can spend. The biggest problem is that "SD" is so inadequate by contrast that it is actively annoying. Big surprise is how good regular DVDs look on the set. We went with a full FIOS package - internet, phone, HD. Said goodbye to Comcast. (Wife has funny story standing in line at Comcast office with others turning in their boxes, listening to other joyful former Comcast customers sharing their various hate-Comcast stories.) Duke / Wisc. first Duke game seen in HD - paid for the package right there.

Amen, brother, amen. The 'exit interview' with Comcast as I turned in my hardware was pure joy.

Comcast Schlub: So, you're giving the FIOS thing a try. Would you mind telling me why?
Me: Well, I get 2x your internet speed, 10 more HD channels, 50 more movie channels, and it costs me $40 less per month.

[captmojo]

Amen, brother, amen. The 'exit interview' with Comcast as I turned in my hardware was pure joy.

Comcast Schlub: So, you're giving the FIOS thing a try. Would you mind telling me why?
Me: Well, I get 2x your internet speed, 10 more HD channels, 50 more movie channels, and it costs me $40 less per month.

You could have reminded him of Maryland's bb arena.

[DevilAlumna]

Amen, brother, amen. The 'exit interview' with Comcast as I turned in my hardware was pure joy.

Comcast Schlub: So, you're giving the FIOS thing a try. Would you mind telling me why?
Me: Well, I get 2x your internet speed, 10 more HD channels, 50 more movie channels, and it costs me $40 less per month.

Yeah, yeah, rub it in. You'd think living in this tech-centric part of the world, we'd have FIOS by now, but alas... we'll be making the jump the moment we get a sniff of it near our house. (Though I hear Verizon's customer service is enough to almost make you want to switch back.)