The Arbitrary ChuckJerry

Since I watched last year's Patriots/Eagles Super Bowl on an HDTV I had determined that I needed to get one. I didn't go out right away and get one because I thought the feeling would just blow over, or I would realize that it just wasn't worth it, or something to that effect. That never happened and so I decided that I just needed to turn around and get one. I put a lot of thought into it, over a year, actually, and decided that it was just something I needed to have. I mean, I guess I didn't *need* it, but really really wanted. Kathy was basically neutral to the idea, so I figured that was good enough for the both of us.

About a month ago I decided it was just time to get one, so I started to do a lot of research on them. I read descriptions of the differences between LCDs, tubes, plasmas, projections, and their pros and cons. I learned all about the different screen resolutions and bulb lives and so forth. Obviously I looked into the prices of all of them as well. I looked online at the options, I went in person to Best Buy and Circuit City, and finally I decided that I should actually buy one.

I decided on the Sony 50" Grand Wega. The main reason I decided to buy that one was because of the screen resolution. What I learned about HDTVs is that they come in basically 3 different resolutions, namely 720p, 1080i, and 1080p. They make ones with lesser resolutions, but if you're going to spend money on an HDTV, you really should get one of these or it's kindof a waste. The P in 720p and 1080p stands for progressive, while the I in 1080i means integrated. Progressive scans essentially smooth out the movement and get rid of any jumpiness from frame to frame and offers a better picture quality in terms of movement. Integrated picture has jumpiness issues according to most of what I read. The difference between 720 and 1080 is just the number of pixels in the screen resolution, the same way you can change the resolution on Windows from 640x480 to 1024x768, or whatever the actual numbers are if I'm saying them wrong.

Until recently you have to make a choice between basically 720p, with a smoother image, and 1080i, with better resolution. Most HDTV is broadcast today in 1080i and the TV just reinterprets the signal as necessary to the lower resolution if you don't have it. The TV I got has 1080p resolution, which is where the industry is basically heading. It's in essence the best of both worlds, with the higher resolution and the progressive scan. It will be capable of displaying images in 1080p when it becomes widely available, and, in theory anyway, will not become obsolete any time soon. That's the main reason I got this TV versus any of the other HDs that were available. There are only two 1080p TVs on the market at the moment, this Sony one, available in 50" and 60", and a JVC that's available in similar sizes. Within the next year there will be a ton of new 1080p TVs available along with a bunch of options for showing stuff in 1080p resolution.

I was watching this thing on an HD channel about the electronics corporation convention in Las Vegas and all the different companies were talking about was how 1080p is the future and all the new technology is being developed specifically for that and then I felt pretty good about spending all this money on something that will be at least up to date with the technology. The coolest thing that is becoming available to take advantage of the resolution is the Blu-ray disc. As I understand it the Blu-ray is the next generation of DVD. It has higher resolution since it was specifically developed for HDTV and the discs are capable of holding more information, 25GB per disc versus about 5GB on a DVD. A Blu-ray player would be backwards compatible with DVDs and would therefore be akin to the what the Playstation2 was to the original Playstation. It's not exactly the same as Blu-ray seems to be a whole new technology, but from a consumer standpoint it's the same because you wouldn't need to repopulate your DVD collection as you may have done between VHS and DVD. The Blu-Ray shit is going to be available in players and computer drives in May. I'll probably hold off for a while on getting one of those to replace my DVD player until the price goes down and the technology is more established, but it seems like that will be something to invest in soon enough.

In the end, I bought a TV that was a little bigger than I wanted to, I got the 50" Sony versus the 46" Samsung I had intended to get, and a bit more expensive than I originally thought, the premium was for the 1080p resolution, though I must say I did get a very good price for that particular model on a sale at Circuit City. I did buy if for significantly less than the MSRP price that's listed on the Sony site. The reason I got the bigger set is because that is the smallest available 1080p TV. It's designed for larger screens to maximize the big screen resolution. The industry seems to think it would be a waste of the technology on smaller sets since 720p resolution handles that pretty well. At the end of the day I'm really happy with it, and even Kathy has said that she likes the HDTV channels and the resolution is noticeably different and better. Combine that with the DVR cable box, and we never have to leave the house again. The only thing I don't like about it is the way the speakers stick out on the side rather than being better integrated into the main chassis. It makes the TV wider than necessary and doesn't take space considerations into mind, which was essential in my case as the TV is probably the absolute biggest that would have fit comfortably into my living room.