Best bang for Euro TV at the moment

dazzerb

My TV is dead so need to go out and buy a new one. Went to a few stores and looked and my head was spinning with all the options!

I have SkyHD so want Full HD and the only other things I want are more than 2 HDMI inputs, a screen 42" or higher and my budget is no more than a grand.

That said what is the best TV for the money (assuming a budget of EUR1000) in Ireland right now? Do not care if it is LCD, LED/LCD or Plasma - just want the best picture and size for the money. Internet ready/3D/thickness are not that important. It is all about the best picture for the money.

BTW: I am in Cork but I do not mind having it shipped.

Who wants to tell me what to buy.

Thanks!

Vim Fuego

From looking at Peats website, it looks like Panasonic are the only ones they stock that meet your requirements. I'd imagine you'd also be looking at LG & Philips in that price range.

For what it's worth, I bought a 42" Panasonic plasma back in 2006 that still hasn't given me a moments trouble so I would tend to lean towards them because of that.

http://www.avforums.com/ is a great place to do research on this subject as well

Block (8

dazzerb wrote: »

My TV is dead so need to go out and buy a new one. Went to a few stores and looked and my head was spinning with all the options!
!

Hi dazzerb I'm in the exact same boat as you but thankfully my tv is not dead

With all those different model no.'s I came back home hoping to google reviews on them only to realise I forgot the no.'s :rolleyes:

For me anyways it's between the LG 50PK350 50" 1080p Plasma TV and the other panasonic equivalent (I think it's around the same price and size can't remember the model)
Not too sure which is better in picture but before switching them on the panasonic casing doesn't look great.
The lg is going for €799 I read from currys forum so a saving of €100 if bought this weekend, luckily I didn't buy this Wed when I was down there!

Calibos

You don't 'need' Full HD for Sky. Sky broadcast at 720p/1080i. Only Bluray is 1080P Full HD res. TBH unless you are sitting 2ft from the screen you couldn't tell the difference between a HD Ready 720p screen or FullHD 1080P screen displaying Bluray never mind Sky HD. If it was me...and it was, 2 weeks ago I'd get a 50 inch Panasonic X20 HD Ready 720p. Great picture on SD and Bluray(haven't got SKyHD installed yet) To think I paid just over 700 euros for this screen when I paid 1300 apiece for 2 42inch HD Ready Panasonic PX70's about 2 years ago. Bargain! The clarity of Bluray on my 9ft projector screen is amazing (PJ is 720p) You really need to be talking projector screen sizes before FullHD 1080p becomes a must have and even at that 720p is still pretty stunning.

Zonda999

If you really need full hd op, then go for a panasonic 50S20, an excellent model and you should be able to find it for not much more than a grand, every proper review i've seen of it has said its an excellent set

Mountjoy Mugger

You can get the Panasonic 42" G20 delivered from N.I. for less than a grand.

dazzerb

Thanks everyone. I think I will be going for the panasonic G20 or S20 50". Not sure where I will buy yet or whether the G or S?

Need to buy soon as i have no tv!

Btw the broken tv is a samsung full HD.

Zonda999

The differences in picture quality would be tiny as long as you're not a total AV buff! The G20 does happen to have a freesat HD tuner built in however, the S20 does not. However, if you use sky and have no intention of getting rid of it, the freesat tuner in the G20 is useless to you apart from the possibility of getting BBC HD and ITV HD, which is also obsolete if you have a sky HD box!

Many boardsies have used seamus watters electrical in armagh to get G20's, as the model is'nt technically available in the republic, so they would be a good crown to get onto afaik. Richersounds are also good but they do not like to ship plasma's so that might be a problem if you're from Cork!

http://www.powercity.ie/?par=10-14-P50S20

I see the 50s20 is here with free delivery (apparently) and a 5 year warranty for 1200€. I would be surprised though, if it were not available for less North of the border

dazzerb

Just following up on this. I ended up buying the Panasonic X20 50" at the Soundstore in Wilton. I got it for EUR799 and was e400 cheaper than the S20 for which I think is pretty good deal, eg nice 50" plasma well under my grand budget. Not full HD but as pointed out in this thread I would only notice this when watching bluray (and even then I would probably not notice!).

It came with a 5 year Panasonic warranty and the sales guy sealed the deal when he demonstrated how tough and bullet proof the screen is compared to the other makes when he confidently punched the demo TV quite hard! I have small kids so this is a nice feature. The equivalent Samsung would never have survived!

Only problem was that it would not fit in my car so I need to wait a few days for it to be delivered (20 euro).

Really happy too with Sound Store and their sales guy. Very professional, knowledgeable and helpful. Highly recommend this place. I first went to Curry's but after 30 minutes waiting on a sales person to help me I walked out and headed to Wilton.

Again thanks all for your advise.

Zonda999

You got a very very good set for 800€ OP, no full hd but who cares really, a 50" panasonic plasma would have been twice the price only 2 years ago.

Oh, and Currys in Mahon are an appalling shambles alright, not a nice atmosphere in that shop at all..

irishh_bob

dazzerb wrote: »

Just following up on this. I ended up buying the Panasonic X20 50" at the Soundstore in Wilton. I got it for EUR799 and was e400 cheaper than the S20 for which I think is pretty good deal, eg nice 50" plasma well under my grand budget. Not full HD but as pointed out in this thread I would only notice this when watching bluray (and even then I would probably not notice!).

It came with a 5 year Panasonic warranty and the sales guy sealed the deal when he demonstrated how tough and bullet proof the screen is compared to the other makes when he confidently punched the demo TV quite hard! I have small kids so this is a nice feature. The equivalent Samsung would never have survived!

Only problem was that it would not fit in my car so I need to wait a few days for it to be delivered (20 euro).

Really happy too with Sound Store and their sales guy. Very professional, knowledgeable and helpful. Highly recommend this place. I first went to Curry's but after 30 minutes waiting on a sales person to help me I walked out and headed to Wilton.

Again thanks all for your advise.

i bought a 37X20 yesterday , i had no choice but to go for the X as the S or G isnt available in a 37 inch , thier is a very noticable reflection and glare of the X unless your room is completley free of natural light , i have blinds in my living room so im definatley going to have to buy some curtains if im to watch sport during the day at weekends without catching myself playing in croke park or old trafford :eek:

its a good tv overall but the sound is very mediocre and SD is noticabley worse on a 37 than on a 32 which i had before ( HD is excellent though ) , i cant imagine what it would be like on a 50 inch , sounds like your happy with your purchase but if it was me , id go for the S20 as it has a double sheet which prevents glaring , on the plus side , motion blur is a thing of the past , the LCD i had for a brief period suffered a lot in this regard

dazzerb

irishh_bob wrote: »

i bought a 37X20 yesterday , i had no choice but to go for the X as the S or G isnt available in a 37 inch , thier is a very noticable reflection and glare of the X unless your room is completley free of natural light , i have blinds in my living room so im definatley going to have to buy some curtains if im to watch sport during the day at weekends without catching myself playing in croke park or old trafford :eek:

its a good tv overall but the sound is very mediocre and SD is noticabley worse on a 37 than on a 32 which i had before ( HD is excellent though ) , i cant imagine what it would be like on a 50 inch , sounds like your happy with your purchase but if it was me , id go for the S20 as it has a double sheet which prevents glaring , on the plus side , motion blur is a thing of the past , the LCD i had for a brief period suffered a lot in this regard

Not too concerned about the glare with the room it will be in and I alway mute the audio, connect everything to the tv via hdmi and then optical audio out from tv to a proper receiver. You do have me a bit concerned about SD though!!

irishh_bob

dazzerb wrote: »

Not too concerned about the glare with the room it will be in and I alway mute the audio, connect everything to the tv via hdmi and then optical audio out from tv to a proper receiver. You do have me a bit concerned about SD though!!

dont know what price the S20 is in a 50 inch but you can get the S20 in a 42 inch for 799 in power city in case you might be interested

Calibos

I think SD looks better on my new 50X20 then it does on my 2x 42 and 37in PX70's. We haven't gotten Sky in yet but have eased TV withdrawl symptoms for the last few weeks in the new house with all the tv shows we have archived on our server streamed to the tv's via XBMC on xboxes. The SD Xvids arguably look even better on the bigger new screen than on the smaller screens. I'm also pretty amazed by the quailty of the DTT transmissions.

Funny story... Some of the family had to watch the World Cup final on an ancient 21in TV on our business premises next door via a rabbits ears arial. I wasn;t too interested and was busy wiring up the new TV in the house. It was only after the match when they told me how bad the analogue reception was that a lightbulb went on in my head. While the signal is crap on the business premises because of the house in the way we have line of sight to three rock from the house and I said to them I should have thought of bringing the crappy business tv into the house for the match. Then the light really went on in my head. I am just after wiring up our new 50 in plasma.....with DTT tuner!!! Brought the crappy one for all rabbit ears arial in to the house, plugged it into the X20, did a channel scan......fantastic 700x500 odd res RTE picture. They could have watched the match in luxury!! DOH!!!

dazzerb

so I have had the new X20 for over a week now and wanted to add some closure to this thread.

SKY HD looks great. Tickers on news channels also flow perfectly.
Standard channels also looks great and really exceeding my expectation. Some non HD are quite close to HD (e.g TV3) which surprised me.
Audio is not great but is the audio on any flat screen any good? I keep volume down anyway and listen through my receiver and if I could by a TV with no internal speakers I would.
A little glare on the TV. Kids have been commenting that it is like a mirror but not bothering me.
Viewing angles are amazing. (I guess this is a plasma thing)
I just have an upscalling standard DVD player (not Bluray) and movies from it look great.
Wii looks great on it!

So I am very happy with my purchase. EUR799 for a quality 50" Plasma with an 5 year warranty it pretty good IMO. Soundstore in Wilton also highly recommended.

Again - thanks everyone on the thread for your help. You saved me at least EUR200!