Cheap LCD - what's the catch?

squibs

I've been looking at this TV as part of a budget home cinema package:

http://komplett.ie/k/ki.asp?sku=308949&view=detailed

I will be hooking it up to an AV amp/surround sound speakers, dvd HDD recorder, sky box and VCR. In what ways might this TV suck? In other words, what features do the more expensive ones have which I might want? I'm a bit of a newbie on this stuff - been happy with a normal telly/stereo Hi-Fi for years.

bennyc

Was talking to a mate in a sony centre and the prices are due a big drop in the comming months could be worth a wait

He was on about the 32" LCD for as low as 899 before XMas this year

Was looking at a Samsung Plasma for 1499 42" anyone have one I have no idea of the model number buying BOSE set first so holding off

squibs

Wow - hope your mate is right!

Loobz

bennyc wrote:

Was talking to a mate in a sony centre and the prices are due a big drop in the comming months could be worth a wait

He was on about the 32" LCD for as low as 899 before XMas this year

Was looking at a Samsung Plasma for 1499 42" anyone have one I have no idea of the model number buying BOSE set first so holding off

Hmmm, interesting...

/strokes chin with one eye closed.

Sparky

bennyc wrote:

Was talking to a mate in a sony centre and the prices are due a big drop in the comming months could be worth a wait

He was on about the 32" LCD for as low as 899 before XMas this year

wow i really hope this is true, i am thinking of buying a good lcd, but will these lcds have HDMI for HDTV

shabbyroad

I've been looking at this TV as part of a budget home cinema package:

http://komplett.ie/k/ki.asp?sku=308949&view=detailed

I will be hooking it up to an AV amp/surround sound speakers, dvd HDD recorder, sky box and VCR. In what ways might this TV suck?

I'd think twice about buying an LCD to hook up to an external amp.
The reason is that there will be sync issues between the video you see on the LCD and the audio you hear through your amp+speakers.

My understanding of the problem is that the time it takes to process the video signal through the hardware en route to the LCD screen causes a noticeable delay (I think it's something like 112ms but am open to correction there) between the video and the audio.
Audio going directly through the speakers on the LCD TV isn't affected because the manufacturer compensates for this delay internally.

I first heard about this when a post-production (audio) studio couldn't understand why their lip-sync was so poor. They had replaced CRT monitors with LCDs. Looked great but didn't do the job !

squibs

:eek: 112ms :eek:
That's appalling! Thanks for the heads-up. I had no idea. Do plasma screens have this latency issue?

pH

Though a decent AV amp will have an audio delay feature to allow the audio be matched to the video so it shouldn't be a problem.

shabbyroad

I'm open to correction on the 112ms. It is enough though that it will give you annoying out of sync and really irritating messed up lip sync.

A delay facility in the AV amp won't help - its meant to provide a quasi-reverb signal processing rather than correction. It definitely can't do 6 discrete channels of audio delay. That delay is usually preset and is usually not adjustable - and apart from that you'd have to know/calculate the delay and hope that the amp has a matching stereo delay.

I really don't know if plasma screens have this problem. I'd recommend checking out avforums.com there are some very well informed people there.

fatherdougalmag

Would the LCD manufacturer not delay the audio stream if it was an issue? Or at least provide the functionality from the LCD to delay the stream so that it's sync'ed with the display.

pH

shabbyroad wrote:

A delay facility in the AV amp won't help - its meant to provide a quasi-reverb signal processing rather than correction.

You are talking rubbish. Of course this is exactly what the delay facility in a decent amp is for. It delays the input signal before splitting for whatever processing mode you're using. My yamaha RX750 does this, but I believe it's common on cheaper amps also.

shabbyroad

So you've got an amp that delays 6 channels of discrete sound to an exact ms user setting from both analogue and digital inputs ? And also delays stereo sources to an exact ms setting ?

And you're sure that this is the function of this delay facility ?

xstatic

I heard LCD has something called motion-blur. Might not be the best for action flicks or games.

shabbyroad

pH I stand corrected. Great feature. I don't know how common it is on less expensive systems than the RXV750. Can't say I've seen it much.

Does it delay any input source ? in other words will it delay digital inputs and analogue inputs ?

I was confusing the 'delay' with the more common facility on amps to create a fake surround by choosing a front-rear delay (which is usually preset to about 3 or 4 settings in 15ms intervals).

I see the RXV750 does room analysis also - that's very cool indeed.