New TV time....

[Milo]

As a joint birthday present to each other, Mrs Milo and I want to buy a new TV as our main TV (which just so happens to be the last CRT TV in the house), refuses to break.

I'm open to all suggestions with the following criteria:

1. Budget about £600 max, may go a bit higher if the deal was right

2. Min size 42" (would be happy with 42" but wouldn't rule out bigger as the room can take it)

3. Doesn't have to be latest model with the fanciest of gizmos

4. Would prefer full HD if possible

Ref point 3, I don't want to pay £1000 for the very latest model only to see it half in price within 6 months. Been there and done that plus I don't really watch enough TV to want a one with every bell and whistle.

Having said that, I'd rather spend the full £600 and get the best model available than try and get away with £450 and be disappointed.

Any suggestions please?

[m4ttm4son]

Standard auto-response: Biggest Panasonic Plasma you can budget for

More detailed responses to follow

[Dave]

Every telly in our house is a panasonic (and we have a few!), tells you everything you need to know really... agree with matey above. Look for panasonic deals and buy the biggest you can afford.

[Milo]

Plasma over LCD? I must confess to knowing very little about modern TVs but thought the trend was for LCD these days even at 42"?

[rottenbend]

Panasonic make ace plasmas but they look boring (when switched off ). Samsung make good looking LCD models with decent picture. There's a lot going on in the market at the moment with 3D, LED backlighting and all that jazz. I like Philips - but they are very pricey.

[m4ttm4son]

From what I heard whilst researching for my Telly purchase 7 months ago, LED is good in a conservatory ie in a highly lit room, otherwise Plasma all the way.

Having a quick look on Richer Sounds the 42G10 is on it's way out being replaced by G20 so you can get some good deals on those if they've got stock near you.

[cruiser647]

We bought the 37G20 Plasma for our front room. Have a look back through and you'll see pics of my 37" job.

Perfect picture - only issue is the amount of time the guider takes to appear.

But I refuse to buy anyother big TV make other than Panny.

bought from Amazon and got Nectar points - not many, but they were the cheapest anyway.

[eldavo69]

Been a Panasonic plasma customer and very impressed but just (2 days ago) taken delivery of an LG 50PK590 50" plasma. Had much better reviews than the current Panasonic lineup and am very happy with it. Even before calibrated the picture is excellent and the styling of the tv is excellent, paid £650 with free delivery from Comet. Full 1080p HD and built in Freeview HD too.

If you want a look Milo give us a shout, it's not like you're at work or owt!

[Milo]

Thanks for the info so far folks.

Have been looking at the 42" & 46" Panasonic plasmas, TX-P42S20B & TX-P46S20B @ £600 & £680 respectively. In the real world, is there that much difference between 42" and 46" (other than 4"......) i.e. would you feel the benefit of going for 46"? I can appreciate 19" to 23" (if there is such a thing) would be a big improvement but 42" to 46"?

Interesting to hear about the LG eldavo; knowing you're not someone to rush into these things I presume it must be a good one. "If it's good enough for you, it's adequate for me".

Out of curiousity, do Panasonic make TVs/screens for other manufacturers? I seem to remember Samsung making the LCD screens for several others for example.

[Muppetboy]

I have a 4 year old LG LCD, can't say I'm that impressed, although after hooking it up to my Onkyo receiver last year it is better... If I were changing now I'd probably get a Samsung.

[Dave]

You will notice a difference in size between a 42 and a 46.. 42 is a nice size i think for the average sitting room.

However if you love films and TV in general then a 46 is quite an experience.

The easiest way to compare is to pop down to your local comet/currys tomorrow and check out the sizing.

[Tipex]

Definately go and compare Plasma's to LCD (Don't think LED will be in budget yet?), I've got a Panny 42" Plasma, in a decent sized room, and I don't think I'd ever want to go any bigger to be honest, otherwise it starts to look a bit silly.

I had a 37" LG LCD before the plasma, and to be honest, I preferred the picture on the LG LCD, I find the plasma picture too soft, it is a fantastic picture without doubt, but I was expecting more from the Panny, and was a little disappointed it didn't blow my socks off, I personally prefer the sharper, brighter image from an LCD, some of the Samsungs look great to me for that reason.

Also, My LG LCD, got moved to the bedroom, where soon after it started playing up, turn it on, and sometimes you'd get sound but no picture, I used to have to turn it off and on about ten times until it worked, but now it's died completely, I suspect the backlight has gone, it's not even 3 years old yet, very disappointed, no idea how much it would be to repair it, but I suspect more than it's worth to be honest.

[eldavo69]

I've never considered LG before and have been less than impressed with their previous offerings. However, their current Plasma range is pretty much best in class. My previous Panny plasma was bought as it won loads of awards at the time, but the picture quality on this LG Plasma is something else! Plus a contrast ratio of 3 million to 1 means blacks look deeper than our other LCD even! The thing that's really suprised me is not the HD content but how good SD looks too.

Only negative would be that the anti reflective coating is better on the Panny but this is only noticeable in bright direct sunlight.

[Tipex]

I've had a few LG products over the years, and this is the first thats gone wrong, I was very happy with it before it broke.

My brother has an LG CRT TV, that when it was new, was top of the range, split screen, picture in picture and all that type of stuff, we worked out it was 12 years old the other day, as I got it for him when I was the area manager of an electrical wholesaler, and I left that company 10 years ago! it;s still going strong, and has an excellent picture.

The only thing I could criticise about my LG LCD (other than breaking), would be that the blacks aren't very black, but then it did only cost £450 and wasn't the latest spec when I bought it from Tesco.

[Milo]

Hmmm, decisions decisions. The room it's going in is about 7m x 5m so a good size and it will be going up against the 5m wall so it can take a decent size set. The 32" CRT tucked away in the corner just doesn't hack it and the bloody thing won't die. We paid over £1000 for it about 5 or 6 years ago which why I was loathe to just bin it. This explains my reluctance to buy £1000 of LED/3D TV now.

I don't watch that much TV. I don't even have Sky. But when I do watch something I like it to look and sound good hence I'd rather get the best TV for my £600ish rather than the latest model.

[Tipex]

One thing to note, coming from a decent CRT TV, you will be disappointed with the picture quality in general, plasma & LCD still cant match a good CRT on SD signals, and the bigger the screen, the worse the picture looks, you need HD really for the bigger screens.

[NewNiceMrMe]

Pop into the office next week and have a look at the 40" Samsung LCD we've got.

I bought it for the World Cup and am very pleased with it. Paid about £550 and have a 40" Samsung at home too and no complaints at all. Might as well see for yourself what the quality is like if you want to. It is one with integrated Freeview etc and it works a treat. Not sure if it has impacted productivity mind...

[Cameo]

I've got a 42 " Panasonic plasma panel that is coming up to 5 years old and it's been been faultless (hope that's not the kiss of death). It's only SD but the picture still looks great whatever source you put through it and so if I had to replace it I'd definitely go with a Panasonic plasma again. Having said that I've just binned the CRT bedroom portable and replaced it with a 19" LG LED and I'm seriously impressed; great picture and reasonable sound. I've always been cynical of LCD but the new LED technology seems much better (even at the smaller and cheaper end of the market).

[Woppum]

i havent looked at tv's in a couple of years now. when i was choosing i went for pioneer and aviamo. Not sure if they are stilla round, panny seems to be all the talk. Parents just got their 65" and quality looks rreally good.

[DanG]

Have you had a look through What Hi Fi magazine?

I used them as a guide to buy my last 2 tvs and, when doing a visual comparison in the shop, i would say they were bang on with their advice.

Worth a few quid and a read - or a look at their on line site.

[Rachel]

Pop into the office next week and have a look at the 40" Samsung LCD we've got.

I bought it for the World Cup and am very pleased with it. Paid about £550 and have a 40" Samsung at home too and no complaints at all. Might as well see for yourself what the quality is like if you want to. It is one with integrated Freeview etc and it works a treat. Not sure if it has impacted productivity mind...

I agree with the Samsung vote. I bought a 23.6" 1920x1080 HD monitor and a 46" series 6 LCD @ Xmas last year and they are just superb screens (though it can take you a little while to tweak the settings for each of the inputs on the 46").

Play TV and BluRay on a PS3, a new Mac Mini media Centre, Pioneer DVD player are all plugged into the 46" and each displays beautifully. The TV also seamlessly scales component - which is what I use for the DVD.

IIRC I paid $300 for the 23.6" and $1950 for the 46" (Aus. $).

[Chav]

One thing to note, coming from a decent CRT TV, you will be disappointed with the picture quality in general, plasma & LCD still cant match a good CRT on SD signals, and the bigger the screen, the worse the picture looks, you need HD really for the bigger screens.

Bit of an over generalisation. SD can look fab on a 10ft screen. On 40" screens at 8ft+ most people cant see the pixels. The requirement for 1080p is psychological. For a more natural picture a lot of the time a good 720p tv will look better, especially a plasma with a 1024x768 res which will cause even more blurring due to pixel rescaling.

The fact a 1080p LCD is so accurate gives half the problems, but some setup can fix that.

Not sure why so many people fixated on 1080p when most content isnt 1080p itself.

LCD/Samsung panels just as good if not better than panasonic. Seems people stuck 3-5 years ago in their assumptions.

If you dont have sky not sure what the point is of a full hd tv anyway as freeviewhd/freesathd waste of time. Nowadays though plenty of full hd bargains and i wouldnt touch a panasonic. far better to spend 500 quid and upgrade a year or two later. Most of the midrange tvs now have 1000000:1+ contrast etc

watch a highbandwidth signal at 576p on a 40inch tv and it'll look hd. the problem is often crap freeview/sky signal.

[Milo]

Had a good poke around the TVs at Currys (or is it Dixons?) today. 42" is possibly too small for what we want. Must admit the 50" LG looked huge (too big?) so then looked at the 46"/47" ones but physically, they were almost the same size as the LG has a tiny 'frame'.

The 46" Panasonic was ruled out as the surround is patterned rather than piano black and cheapened the whole thing. My wife loved the 50" LG which is odd as I thought she would hate the size of it.

As things stand I'm leaning towards the 50" LG although I've been looking at other 46"/47" ones including Samsung. Every other LCD TV we have is Samsung, admittedly they're 2 x 26" and 1 x 19".

It's amazing what your money buys these days compared to a few years ago. I'm sitting in front of what was almost £1500 of CRT TV and home cinema in 2004/5 which was probably mid-range at the time (100hz though which was a big wow!). Not only is it crap now, that kind of money would buy you a wonderful setup in 2010.

[Tipex]

Despite the problem with my LG, I'd buy another, but I'd want a 5 year warranty, not sure if John Lewis sell LG but I'd definately be buying from them to get the warranty, plus the excellent service.

I might end up putting the Panny in the bedroom, 42" is probably overkill for that, but the opportunity to relegate it to the bedroom, and upgrade again in the lounge is too strong, I will definately be looking at the LG and Samsung LCD/LED's.

[Milo]

I liked the LEDs we looked at but at my budget, I'd have to compromise on size and features which kind of defeats the object.

Ultimately (assuming it's still working....) I expect this TV to go into another room in 3, maybe 4 years time and we'd buy a new 'main' set. By then £1000 will probably buy a 70" 3D LED virtual reality TV with 2000W of sound, capable of doing the housework.