Go for the 42" Panasonic PS42C450 Plasma @ $1097, it's in the latest catalogue for DSE. It's only HD ready but if you're not going to be watching full HD content, it'll be better than the DSE and Konka branded TV's. It has built-in Freeview HD and it's meant to be a great TV according to online reviews.
JMatt94: Go for the 42" Panasonic PS42C450 Plasma @ $1097, it's in the latest catalogue for DSE. It's only HD ready but if you're not going to be watching full HD content, it'll be better than the DSE and Konka branded TV's. It has built-in Freeview HD and it's meant to be a great TV according to online reviews.
Did you mean to say the panasonic x20 or the samsung c450 lol? Either is a very good tv for the money, panasonic has better blacks, samsung more saturated colours.
Yeah I wouldn't trust any of the reviews on the dick smiths website, most of them won't have seen another high definition tv in their home (in the store doesn't count) so thus have nothing to compare it to except their 15 year old 21" crt.
As for the difference between 1024x768 and 1920x1080 tvs, if you're far enough back you can't tell the difference. A variety of other factors can contribute to one tv looking better than another like dunnersfella said and could even be that the 1080p tv just has a superior panel and has deeper blacks which can give the appearance of a crisper picture.
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JMatt94: Go for the 42" Panasonic PS42C450 Plasma @ $1097, it's in the latest catalogue for DSE. It's only HD ready but if you're not going to be watching full HD content, it'll be better than the DSE and Konka branded TV's. It has built-in Freeview HD and it's meant to be a great TV according to online reviews.
Did you mean to say the panasonic x20 or the samsung c450 lol? Either is a very good tv for the money, panasonic has better blacks, samsung more saturated colours.
We've a smaller 26" Sommet in the bedroom. Seems to work fine, picture is fairly decent for the older hd standard(it's not full hd).
I can't vouch for it's freeview receiver as I live in Masterton with no terrestrial reception to test with, only satellite.
I don't think you could really go past these tvs for value.
I also bought a while back a really awfull Phillips 47"Full HD LCD from Harvey Norman. It's a right pig of a tv to which the Sommet compares most favourably.
wow, I ended up getting an LG 42LD560 for a good price from THE GOOD GUYS. Once I was in the store it was clear to me how crappy the ones without 100hz true motion looked and I couldn't settle for anything less than this beast of a tv.
Thanks for steering me off the cheap konka, I saw it playing Avatar at dSE and it looked just as good as the other brands (panasonic looked terrible and sony is very conservative on colours) but yeah it was a little bit choppy, especially with all that avatar eye candy goodness.
I realise the original poster already bought a TV, but just a few comment. I would not buy a plasma, they are heaters and have other issues.
I've got a Konka 42", bought it December. Actually the first TV we ever bought new, was always given/repairing TVs since I started with electronics 23 years ago. The Konka is good with the right signal. I've run it off our PC and no problem with the picture. The issues are that it is not good with upscaling and the colour depth is also insufficient when you use analogue sources (except animated programmes which have limited colour depth).
In shops you trust whatever source the shop connected and whatever settings they use (or don't).
I've got a 32" Sony W4000 (full HD LCD), 40" X4500 (full HD LCD) and Panny S10 42" (full HD Plasma).
Plasma is better - not bright enough for a sunny room, but action is way smoother. However I can see it flicker on bright scenes. Yes it gets warm, so it serves a double purpose as heating our living room (as well as the heater and fireplace, equals a nice and warm living room!)
Sony's X series is really nice. I'm bummed I didn't get the 46" with true RGB backlighting but its still nice. Still suffers with the usual LCD weaknesses (blacks not black, motion etc, though the 100hz motionflow helps)
Sony's W was my first LCD. Started off great until I got the X. Then really noticed how poor (comparitively) the picutre quality is (even though its freeview HD/playing Blu Ray) and a smaller screen. No motionflow very noticeable on sports/motion etc.
Well i've got no complaints with the LG, except that most .MKV's complain about unsupported audio, and district 9 1080p mkv defaulted to director commentary and couldn't be changed. should be fixed with a firmware update i hope.
I just bought a blu-ray player and it has 5.1 analogue output on the back (yay!) so i can finally hook up my pc speakers (all except for the subwoofer). firmware update takes forever and i've heard it can screw ur player up but avatar won't play properly so i'm giving the udpate a go.
Niel: I realise the original poster already bought a TV, but just a few comment. I would not buy a plasma, they are heaters and have other issues.
What are these other issues? We've had CRT, Rear Projection, LCD and now Plasma. The Panasonic 50"Full HD plasmas have been by far the best TV's we have ever owned - never had any "issues" Heaters? well that's handy. Power consumption? who cares when you spend 4 or 5 grand on a TV and it costs you another $40 a year in power. Heavier? well we don't carry ours around the house often. Image retention? well rare now. Well we watch a lot of HD movies and sport, and you can't beat a big a** Plasma for that ( projecters, well that's another story )
As regards heavy the latest generation plasmas are much lighter and slimmer. The current 65" with stand is 66Kg. My older model with stand nearer 100Kg. Like Clevedon I have owned several Panasonic Plasmas as well as a couple of LCDs (Sony and Panasonic). There is no contest between them, plasmas win hands down.
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