Re: TV purchasing advice.
By: BoraxMan to All on Fri Jan 06 2012 03:24 am
Hello all.
I've never actually bought a TV in my life. The one I have now my folks game me when I moved to my own place ages ago. The TV was a spare one they had they didn't need, and even back then it was old. Its got a wooden
case, probably nearly 20 years old! Worked great, but the picture is
losing colour, and the sound varies intensity.
Just seeing what TV's and brands people recommend. I think people here would have similar expectations. What I'm looking for is this, in rough order of priority.
* Longevity. Has to be robust and last a long time. Reliable and will go the distance.
* SCreen sice of about 80cm, thereabouts. Preferably a resolution of 1920x1080.
Any "full HD" TV should have a resolution of at least 1920x1080.
* Connectors for VGA and for my DVD player and VCR player. The coax ones I think they are.
No, coax is for cable TV or an NTSC/ATSC antenna. You should be using component
(3 cables, just for video) or HDMI for your DVD player and S-VIDEO for your VCR
player (if it supports it), if it doesn't, then composite (the yellow video cable) is better than coax. Basically, you only use coax if you must use the tuner (cable card, NTSC or ATSC, or PAL if you're in Europe) in your TV.
* simply to use, not overloaded with unecessary features of expensive firmware. I just want a TV, thats it.
Well the "brand" won't determine the feature set as most manufacturers/importers provide a wide variety of feature sets in their TVs for
different price points and markets.
* It would be good to be able to play movies from USB thumb drives or external hard drives. good format support is a plus.
Um... that's an "expensive firmware" feature, not "just a TV". Anyway, a lot of
TVs have USB ports these days (just for that purpose), but so do Blu-ray Disc players and cable/sat set-top boxes, so you don't have to have it in the TV to get that functionality.
* Recording programs is a plus.
Wha? I thought you said you "want a TV, thats it"? What you're now describing is a personal video recorder (PVR) function and will only be found in the highest end TVs.
* Is friendly to someone who doesn't want to have to upgrade firmware, and kind of likes old tech.
Also quite important, low power consumptions.
I'm asking here because I know I'll get good advice and I assume we share a similar view of technology and similar expectations.
Also, I prefer one which doesn't have a stupid logo and start up sound!
And changes channels quickly. The closer it behaves to my current TV, the old CRTs, the better.
Most of us these days have a set-up box which is our tuner and we don't the TV's tuner (if it even has one), so how quickly your setup changes channels is up to your tuner, not your TV. Anyway, good luck in your search.
I have had good experiences with TVs from Mitsubishi, Toshiba, and yes, even Visio with most of the features you descibed above.
digital man
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