non hd tv on a hd lcd or plasma

dohda

Hi All,

Im sure this has come up before but I could not find the thread so here it goes...

Im hoping to buy either a 37" LCD or 42" plasma in the near future, the only problem is when I see either of these showing non HD broadcast channels the picture looks terrible.

As there are still quite a lot of programs not broadcast in HD I was hoping to buy one which is good for both. Any suggestions????

I was thinking possibly an LG with the XD engine II and digital comb filters, but as I know nothing really about this its only a stab in the dark....

Cooee

I am in much the same predicament. I have read loads on the www.avforums.com site. From what I can make out it would appear that the majority opinion (although not unamimous) is that plasma is better on non-HD broadcast TV (SD television).

But there are some in the LCD forums that disagree with that opinion.....

Idleater

Cooee wrote:

But there are some in the LCD forums that disagree with that opinion.....

Yeah, I disagree.

I think that the SD signal shown in the shops does not do the screens justice.

I have NTL digital (and ordinary) on my 26" LCD and I think it is perfectly adequate. Better than my 4:3 CRT before.

Of course it absolutley flies on the XBox360 but that is a given.

Basically, I have no problems with SD signal source on my LCD.

L.

dohda

thanks for the replies,

Im curious though, if the LCD screen is below 30" would that make a difference as it would most probably not be 1368x766?

Would be great if it turned out that some of the LCDs were indeed good for both as they tend to be a good bit cheaper.

Ivan E

Issue with most of these is that the picture depends on the signal being sent into the tv. In a lot of shops, the signals are either too poor to generate a good picture or much better than what you have at home (i.e some HD demo or upscaler).

Another important factor is settings. In a lot of cases, default settings aren't great. Things like dynamic contrast settings which are constantly altering your picture. So it's important to do your research on particular models and find out how good they are and what you have to do to get the best picture. Otherwise you can buy one or go and look at one and be very unimpressed at what you see.

If you have digital tv and a dvd player, you should be happy enough. Anything less than that and you may not be too satisfied with the quality.

As for LCD vs Plasma, well I found that the picture was a bit better on the plasma. That was from viewing them side by side. However whichever one you get, you'll be more than happy with. I opted for an LCD in the end as I was getting a better deal on a particular one and it was highly recommended everywhere. My advice is if you can get a 42" and you're happy with that model, then it's probably better than a 37". It will look huge at first but then you get used to it and think what if you went bigger still.....

Idleater

dohda wrote:

Im curious though, if the LCD screen is below 30" would that make a difference as it would most probably not be 1368x766?

erm, pretty much all HD screens are 1366x768. If they are not that they are 1280x720. AFAIK, only 1080p screens are 1950x1080.

The problem is that on larger screens (eg 32" or 42") the screen is still that size so all you get is bigger pixels not more pixels.

dohda wrote:

Would be great if it turned out that some of the LCDs were indeed good for both as they tend to be a good bit cheaper.

erm, isn't that what I said in my post, that my LCD is good for normal tv and HD material???

L.