Flat screen TV - help

[Burdock]

Below 40" LCD above 40" Plasma, it seems that the technology suits the size as LCD's are hard to manufacture above 40" and Plasma is the opposite.

I think Sony, Samsung and Toshiba have ditched their plasma range and are now concentrating on LCD only.

I have this after spending 6 months reading reviews and posts on http://www.avforums.com/ and couldn't be happier with my purchase.

cheers Jedi...I will show him your purchase! Did you buy online -did you get any kind of warranty?

http://www.lcdtvbuyingguide.com/lcdtv-plasmavslcd.shtml

And cheers for link Ollie!

[gingerjedi]

cheers Jedi...I will show him your purchase! Did you buy online -did you get any kind of warranty?



And cheers for link Ollie!

I got John Lewis to price match an online retailer which was a surprise! The beauty of that is you get their 5 year store warranty thrown in at no extra cost. I JL!

[Burdock]

I got John Lewis to price match an online retailer which was a surprise! The beauty of that is you get their 5 year store warranty thrown in at no extra cost. I JL!

hmmm! nice! do they guarantee to match cheaper prices, or did you smooth-talk the salesman?!

[edit] "which was a surprise" oh well, i'll try, but I have all the charm of an earthworm when it comes to haggling over prices.

[gingerjedi]

hmmm! nice! do they guarantee to match cheaper prices, or did you smooth-talk the salesman?!

[edit] "which was a surprise" oh well, i'll try, but I have all the charm of an earthworm when it comes to haggling over prices.

They have a 'never knowingly undersold' policy and there’s an online form somewhere on their website, just fill in the price details and wait for the reply.

They have come down quite a lot in 6 months so you may find that JL are quite competitive anyway, its all about being happy with your purchase when spending that sort of money and I was far happier having JL staff deliver my set than some courier who didn't give a 5hit, plus I know where JL lives if I have a problem!!

[BoredBloke]

"I got John Lewis to price match an online retailer which was a surprise"

John Lewis will price match, but they will not discount. I went in about a month ago to buy 2 TV's. I had a budget of about £1500. The 42inch one (sharp) was originally £1299 but they had dropped this price to £949 to match empire direct. I wanted a half decent 32 inch one for the bedroom and plumped for a LG one. They wouldn't offer any discount so I walked out and got 10% off the lot at empire direct. I paid £20 to get a 3 year warranty on both of them and anything I buy in the next year.

The attitude of John Lewis annoyed me. I wanted to spend £1500 on something they probably bought off their suppliers for say £750. So there was plenty of wiggle room for them to discount. They wouldn't budge and while they probably sold the goods to somebody else, they did miss out on whatever profit i would have given them. So even if they only made £300 out of the deal, it's still better than the nothing they eventually got out of me. They were also throwing in a free stand on the big TV which was bloody horrible.

As for the LCD/plasma thing I went for LCD on both. LCD can't really do true black as it uses a lamp to make the images. But on the good ones it's very close. The refresh rates are now OK. They use tons less power than a plasma which can often replace the fire in a small room! They are also significanly lighter which is important when nhanging them on the wall.

I'm going to get SKY HD soon, as I want it for the football. I've been toying with buying a HD box from ebay rather than paying the £300 sky want for them.

I have to agree that the pictures look a bit cr@p close up, but that is because of the poor feed heading their way. The 42" one I have is a 1080p full HD one. So it's taking the 500+ lines on its feed and applying them to the 1080 lines it has on the screen.

Big Telly

Small Telly

[Burdock]

Tony - plenty of goodies in there, much obliged!

[gingerjedi]

I have to agree that the pictures look a bit cr@p close up, but that is because of the poor feed heading their way. The 42" one I have is a 1080p full HD one. So it's taking the 500+ lines on its feed and applying them to the 1080 lines it has on the screen.

That’s why I went for a quality 720P over a similar priced 1080P, I still watch loads of SD material and it handles it really well, sky HD only broadcasts in 1080i which is no better than 720P ...I won’t go into the details here it gets very confusing!

I've read that at a typical viewing distance of 8 feet the human eye can't distinguish between the 2 anyway, of course this changes when you get a really big one as the pixels get bigger.

[oraclesmith]

The attitude of John Lewis annoyed me.

We bought a telly in 2002 from John Lewis which had their 5 year guarantee on it. After 4 and a half years it developed a fault on the SCART socket so we took it back and they repaired it, no questions asked. I was impressed.

[Buffoon]

I had a look at that Sharp one in Richer Sounds in the City the other week - cracking piece of kit. Nearly bought one, but then I remembered the fact that I am leaving the country and couldn't take it with me.

[THEPUMA]

John Lewis won't price match online retailers but I tend to find that most online retailers also have a small retail outlet so they then have to price match.

I can then get John Lewis vouchers at an 8.5% discount. This is through a work-related organisation but I'm sure there are sites where you can buy vouchers at a discount so that may be worth investigating.