Well, I decided to hold for now. The Westinghouse was awfully tempting, and if there's another $1500 sale I'd probably bite it.. but common sense kicked in and I figured I'd wait until I have more reason to actually use an HDTV. I'm just going to keep a keen eye on upcoming HD-DVD releases for now, something like a Godfather set or a Kubrick set (rumored) may get me to take the plunge.. and maybe after a few visually stimulating movies that don't suck come out.

A bigger reason would be live sports or the upcoming fall season of TV shows. If you are simply waiting for HD discs and don't watch TV, I'd say at least another year before it starts becoming economically wise for most people. Maybe 3 years. No doubt the early adopter types on this forum will jump all over that statement, but I don't think there is any doubt that HD discs will have to be classified a niche market until there are hundreds or even thousands of titles available.

I notice that as of today the price on these has dropped. Best Buy and Circuit City now both are offering the Panasonic TH42PX60U for $1999.99. I've been debating between one of these, the 42" Westinghouse, a 40" JVC LCD, and the 42" LG plasma. I think the Panasonic just moved closer to becoming my choice.

Wow! That's a very good price!

nice...

That was quick. They've now gone back up from $1549 to $1749 and they're also out of stock. I bet they sold a bunch of them over the last few hours.

anybody have this tv?
 

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/Samsu...oductDetail.do

i recently moved out of my house and had to leave behind my parents 60 inch HD. now i just have the tv that was in my room old 19 inch samsung, it's a good tv but i need a HD badly for my 360 and don't wanna spend too much.

Was in Walmart his morning and they had a tv I hadn't seen there before. A 52" Panasonic LCD Projection for about $1850. Came with the stand too. It also had 2 hdmi ports.

Let's say that both of these TVs were available at the same price. Would you rather get:
(1) A 50" flat-panel HDTV with 1366x768p. Delivered tomorrow (September 30, 2006).
(2) A 50" flat-panel HDTV with 1920x1080p. Delivered January 31, 2007.

Your Current TV: Sony XBR 27".
Your HD plans: Directv HD will be ordered as soon as HDTV is purchased. An HD DVD player will be purchased by November 30, 2006 (midpoint between the two dates above).

All other things equal (same technology, same general quality, etc.), I'd wait for the 1080p.

Make sure you can get #1 from Costco, then order both. ;)

But I'd want #1 right now for football season. But I like football, someone who doesn't wouldn't have reason not to wait a couple months for #2.

(1) Well, I don't want to abuse Costco. And it would be an abuse to do #1 now from Costco.

(2) I want it for football too. We have Directv's NFL package, with the $99 add-on superfan package. But ... *sigh* ...


I get employee discount. The TV people at work tell me that the model I was planning on buying will have 1080p native resolution by the beginning of the year. Also, it'll have 2 HDMI inputs instead of 1 (forgot to mention earlier). I don't know what other improvements, but these two are for certain. And that it'll be for about the same price.

Then you could probably sell #1 without much loss, no?

You want it for football. I'm making a statement, not a question. :) Keep in mind 2/3 of the football games are only created in 720p. That's 6 per week on Fox, 1 on ESPN. There are 3 on CBS and 1 on NBC in 1080. CBS still hasn't bothered upgrading to increase the number available, they may not get every game up in HD til 2009!

Spiky: interesting, interesting. Very interesting. Thanks for the input.

I'd wait, too.

What are the other differences in the 1080p model? For example I was looking into a Samsung 720p vs 1080p and the contrast was way higher on 1080p. So it was not just the resolution that was higher but other things as well is what I am getting at.

Bottom line, I would wait.

True. There could be other improvements as well. But there could also be delays in production as well as shortage in inventory (and we get last priority). I may just get a 42" plasma HDTV for now, then upgrade in 3~6 months. Thanks all.

Hey ya'll...

Sorry if this has already been discussed but I'm thinking of getting a smaller LCD or something for my bedroom. Currently I have nothing in there. Can anyone recommend something under 1k? I'd prefer something widescreen.

Like 40" small or 26" small or even smaller yet?

I'd probably take a 26" or 30" preferably.

So I'm getting closer to my move to LA (it's looking like early November), and it got me thinking about an HDTV again. I'm still interested in the Mitsubishi DLP, but I also thought about projectors. Is it really possible to get 1080p projectors with good image quality for under $3,000?

Freak,

I was shopping for a 26", but stopped when I had to get a car this year. So I'm a little out of date. I was seriously looking at the Viewsonic line. They've always been an excellent monitor company, and are priced in the bottom of the LCD TV market. One thing to think about is location of the speakers. There is a large dimension difference between the models with speakers on the bottom vs those on the side.

Suprmallet,
Not yet. Under $5K just became possible, it seems the Sony Pearl is shipping. Or did you mean RPTV?

Is any company still making CRT RPTVs for HD anymore? I can't find any at stores anymore. I'd love another 55" CRT RPTV, but it would be nice if it had a few HDMI inputs (my current one only has one DVI).

I think you can still find the Hitachi RPTVs at CC.