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[Amadeus]

For those of you who are debating between DLP and Plasma and LCD. There is another, and imo better choice: LCoS. The new 1080p LCoS's are out in a couple months and will blow your mind. All for the same cost as what you would pay for a current DLP/LCD at the same size.

I could not recommend enough that you wait for either the 1080p Sony SXRD or the new 1080p JVC D-ILA's (both use LCoS technology). They are less than 2 months away from retail.

But if you have to have right now... check out the current 720p JVC D-ILA's. You will be impressed. They look quite a bit better imo, than the current DLP's and LCD's. Go to a store and judge for yourself... I guarantee you your eyes will spot the JVC D-ILA's as being superior before you are even able to get close to the TV's. They are much brighter and crisper with near flawless colors out of the box (literally). I have a professionally ISF calibrated Sony Direct view CRT HDTV and the colors on the JVC's were dead on with it.

i just hope that these SXRDs will hit the european stores (soon). JVCs D-ILA aren't even available in euope but JVC TVs are very rare here.

 

[HokieJoe]

Just saw a 55" Sony A20 at Bestbuy next to a LG DLP. The A20 had a slighter sharper picture and less pixelation on fast movement scenes; but it had a lot more black crush than the LG. Believe me, it had nice deep blacks. Not CRT black, but nice nonetheless.

However, I was watching one scene of a beach at sunset. They were behind a sand dune with the sun going down in front of them in the distance. On the LG, I could actually see some nice detail in the dark upper part of the dune. When I looked at the A20, all I saw was black. That alone would kill this set for me because of dark scenes in games like Halo1/2 or GR2. I'm sure some of this could be calibrated out, but I fear not enough to satisfy my tastes.

I really wanted to see the 50" A10, but they didn't have any on the floor yet. They also had a 52" JVC DILA on the floor. The colors looked awful. In fact, the whole picture looked like ass. In fairness though, I've seen other DILA's set up nicer. I think they just had the settings all out of whack. They did have a schweet looking Mitsu 62" DLP though- WD62525. I'm still trying to confirm whether or not there's an audio delay issue, but if not, this baby is definitely in the running now.

 

[Shompola]

Is the A20 a Sony`? Sony tvs are known for artificially darkening grey colors to make it look "better"---- some people like it and some dont.. still it is a cheap way to enhance the black level.. fortunately you can turn that shit off in the service menu. atleast on my tv you can.

 

[HokieJoe]

Is the A20 a Sony`? Sony tvs are known for artificially darkening grey colors to make it look "better"---- some people like it and some dont.. still it is a cheap way to enhance the black level.. fortunately you can turn that shit off in the service menu. atleast on my tv you can.

Yep, I shoud've clarified that- sorry. I saw the Sony A20. I'll edit the post.

Anyway yeah, I'm one who likes nice deep blacks, but I don't want the blacks adjusted so black as to crush all of the shadow detail either. If I were going to seriously consider a Sony A20, I'd have to take my trusty copy of DVE or AVIA in the store to set it up properly before making the decision to purchase one.

 

[+Aliken+]

a newbie question... which is better and why?
LCD vs Plasma

or acctually pro's and con's of both

 

[Gunstar77]

Well I pulled the trigger today and bought a 42" Sony A10. :http://www.sonystyle.com/is-bin/INT...ProductInformation-Start?ProductSKU=KDFE42A10 I walked into CC and for the first time they had one on display. It was selling for $1800 but I had a coupon from CC to receive a gift card of 10% of your total purchases. So I bought the TV and then put the gift card on the protection plan. In the end I got a 4 years protection plan and the TV for just under $2000. The one catch is, they didn't have any in stock. I should have the TV with in a week, so I post impressions then. If anyone has any questions feel free to ask.

Well I got the 42 inch Sony A10 on Friday. I was saving my impressions until I had enough time to get the settings where I like them, I got alot help from www.avsforum.com to save me alot time. I will break my impression down into different catagories: Analog channels, Digital channels, HDTV channels, 480i & 480p gaming, & 720p & 1080i gaming.

Analog channels - The analog channels were pretty disappointing out of the box which is typical with most big screen HDTVs. But with some work I got a decent picture, nothing to write home about but decent. Compared to my 32" Sony CRT HDTV the A10 just can't match the PQ but like I said I knew the PQ would be low. C-

Digital channels - The Digital channels actually surprised me, I didn't think the A10 could pull off the scaling needed to display a 480p image so clearly. Comparing it to my 32" CRT, I would say it was a little better oddly enough. B+

HD channels - The HD channels were perfect. I know that some people aren't keen on RPTVs but this TV looked better then the DPLs that cost more then it IMO. Comparing it to the 32" CRT, I would say it was better PQ. A

480i & 480p gaming - This was very disappointing out of the box, everything was a jaggy mess on Xbox. With alot of work, I got the PQ up a bit but still no where near my 32" CRT. C-

720p & 1080i gaming - This is much better. This is what HD gaming is supposed to look like. Soul Calibur 2 on 720p was excellent, even when I stretched the image to fit whole screen it still looked great. I also hooked my PC to the VGA input on the TV and play Guild Wars and PQ was great, very nice feature. The A10 was definately better then 32" CRT. A


So all in all, I think the A10 is a great value. Some people might be wondering why buy a 720p set now when 1080p sets are coming. Well I have 2 reasons.

First, when I was looking at the 720p set at Tweeter, then also had one of the Samsung 1080p on display. So I went up a compared the 1080p set to the 1080i & 720p sets. Now all the TVs had the same video running on them from the same feed. I noticed that 1080p set really didn't look any better, in fact I think it looked worst. I assuming the feed was 1080i video, the Samsung had to upscale the image to 1080p which looked grainy compared to the 1080i & 720p sets. I kind of knew that the PQ would look like that but I wanted to see for myself and was right. That is not to say that down the road we might see better scalers but for now I was not impressed.

Second reason, right now the HDTV market is getting flooded with new technology: SED, FED, and LCOS sets just name a few. On top of that now we are see the 1080p sets now. So I figure this way, the A10 is pretty damn cheap for HDTV and Sony has made 5 series of GW, A10 being the latest . With new technology comes problems, for example: the GWI & GWII were very problematic, from Lamps burning in out in weeks, bad glares, no HDMI, poor scaling, just to name a few. But now after the GWV they have pretty much made a pretty solid TV after learning from their mistakes on earlier models. So with SED, FED, & LCOS being all new technology except for LCOS, which is new but has been around for a little while now, we can count on alot of flaws on the 1st and maybe the 2nd runs. I personally have alot problem spending $3000 to $4000 on a technology that is going to be problematic and will improve alot in the next 5 years. So I would rather buy the A10 and wait for the newer technology to iron out all the problems and become cheaper too. Why pay $3000 to $4000 for a flawed TV when you can wait a few years a get the same TV with most of the issues ironed out for a $1000 to $2000 cheaper. Plus we don't even know if 1080p will take off with developers or Television Networks, you might of paid an extra $1000 or $2000 and only be able to play a fews that actually use 1080p.

In closing, take this advice. Don't buy a HDTV is you aren't going to go Next Gen or you don't plan on getting a HD receiver anytime soon, you are just waisting your money. But if you are getting Next Gen then the A10 is a great buy.

If anyone has any question on the A10, feel free to ask.

 

[Deg]

a newbie question... which is better and why?
LCD vs Plasma

or acctually pro's and con's of both

Look it up. Both have improved alot over the years so not all issues hold anymore. As for what one you would prefer depends on what you want.