Hi guys,

Newbie to Geekzone, but have been messing with radios and amps since I was a kid -- built a battery powered triode amp for my crystal set, the set inherited from my grandad who used it to pick up first radio transmissions from the BBC in London in the 20's !!

Now interested in digital TV and Freeview, am considering building a HTPC, but will go with satellite and terrestrial set top boxes to feed my excellent 36" Philips CRT (36pw9527). The Philips produces a superb 576i picture from both analogue and digital inputs, the latter of course being sharper and free of minor imperfections and ghosting. Pixel plus signal processing option is excellent -- it does line doubling and increases resolution horizontally, with a refresh rate of about 75hz. Set also has digital natural motion which was first intoduced by Philips in the late 90's, makes for a much smoother picture involving movement -- I see similar features only now starting to appear 10 years later on LCD sets from Sony and others.

The set can also accept 576p 50hz and 1080i 60hz input signals over component YPbPr cables and I am keen to see if I can get a terrestrial set top box to provide feeds for these two input options. Might need to buy a "HDMI to component" conversion box to get 1080i 60hz, I see such boxes are now available on Ebay.

Longer term will upgrade to a large full HD LCD or plasma, currently waiting for display technology to fully mature and for prices for 50" plus sets to drop below $4000, or maybe wait for OLED TVs ?

Currently have a Topfield TF 5000 satellite box which has given excellent service along with dish and LNB all supplied by Freeviewshop.

For terrestrial I'm looking at an Extra Terrestrial set top box ...... specs look good and initial user comments also look good.

Cheers,

Triode66