Buying a Flat Panel Display (LCD/Plasma/LED etc)

[Shan2nu]

Has anyone ever used / considered a Home theater projector?
Sony has one for 85k MRP, Just found this on Sony website...
Sony India : VPL-AW15 (VPLAW15) : Details

Please share Pros and Cons...

Actually we did. We wanted to go in for a Digital projector instead of an LCD TV. But from what i read/heard, DLPs were found to be more long lasting in terms of preserving picture quality over a period of time (and Sony doesn't have DLP projectors).

Moreover, there are very few Full HD projectors in the market. I hear Samsung has recently come out with their 1920x1080 range of projectors, need to check them out.

BenQ has their W9000 and W10000 series that have FHD but i doubt they're available in India. Most of the BenQs here are 1280x720 which just isn't gonna cut it.

Shan2nu

[Shan2nu]

Here's a review of the DLP vs LCD "degradation test" conducted by Texas Instruments - Texas Instruments' DLP vs. LCD Evaluation

And a video -

YouTube - DLP Projector Tests

Shan2nu

[tsk1979]

DLP will always be superior to LCD as far as image quality is concerned. Have watched countless videos on DLP projectors when I was in TI blr.

[jassi]

Originally Posted by ST7677

No Projection TV was ruled out years ago. It just does not cut in.
The picture quality even today is way bad.

I would live with CRT as long as I can, (probably till one day when I stop all this analysis and make an impulse purchase )

Hey ST - i hope you don't mean crt projection tvs - LCD projection or SXRD projection TVs have really good picture quality. I know people who have lcd/plasma panels in one room and the sxrd projection in another room and they have said that apart from the vertical viewing angle the PQ is equivalent if not better
Infact outside India, Sony sells quite a decent amount of rear projection LCD/SXRD TVs which in many Home theatre magazines' HDTV shootouts have scored more over LCDs which cost 3 times as much!!

Heres a link for the US where they sell all sizes of the SXRD
BRAVIA® HDTV Rear Projection

A simple search on the net will show how multiple people have been taken for a ride by store salesmen, indicating that sxrds suck over wall mountable lcds, when infact the reverse is true and then the person goes back and changes his 50" lcd for the 60" sxrd or gets his money back!!
LCD vs SXRD? - Yahoo! Answers

The only probs I see with SXRD/3LCDs is no wall mount capability and secondly the bulb needs to be replaced over time. However I have taken this as a positive as I am not comfortable with wall mounting and would have anyway placed an LCD on a stand.
The bulb/lamp needs to be replaced but only after 5000 to 8000hrs of use, which in a typical case (unless you run a 24hr showroom), would last multiples of years (2yrs atleast if you keep it on for 10hrs a day)

Hopefully your impulse decision will be the right one

CHeers,
j

[Shan2nu]

A simple search on the net will show how multiple people have been taken for a ride by store salesmen, indicating that sxrds suck over wall mountable lcds, when infact the reverse is true and then the person goes back and changes his 50" lcd for the 60" sxrd or gets his money back!!

Well, the SXRD is definately better than LCD but like you've mentioned, bulb life is an issue. I had a discussion about this with the Sony official. He told me that the bulb costs around 25,000 bucks and would need to be changed every 7000-8000hrs. This is what put us off, or else we'd have gone in for the 60" SXRD (Since the 70" was no longer available).

Even price wise, SXRD is awesome VFM. A 70" Full HD SXRD costs around 3.5L while a 46" Full HD LCD comes in at around 2.7-2.8L.

Shan2nu

[jassi]

Shantanu - just a pointer what is your per day usage - even if you use 10hrs a day which most of us dont, it will last you 700 days i.e. 2 years. By then the lamp value will be much reduced 300usd or so the bulb thing is a dealers way of telling you sxrd sucks, practically I know people who have gone from 1 sxrd set to another and never changed a lamp over the years they used it!! Only 1 friend had to replace his sxrd lamp in 2 years because he used to switch off the supply to the tv without letting the lamp cool (takes 30 seconds) after putting tv off.

Also when compared to lcd, the sony auth dealer on outer ring road pointed out that in a lcd if you damage the screen, the whole tv is gone, on an sxrd/3lcd, if you damage the screen, no probs, you can still restore the tv by replacing the glass display. He actually had some soft ***** and threw them on the screens (lcd and sxrd) and said if you have kids you stand to lose a lot more if you own an lcd vs sxrd, i found it funny but i am sure it makes sense to family ppl. I am not sure how much if this holds true, but given the fact that you get something which is much better at 1/3rd the price of lcd itself makes sense to me.

I researched for months before i bought my 42" and once dealers know you know the real deal, they don't try to upsell you a smaller lcd in favor of a larger 3lcd/sxrd.

[ST7677]

Even price wise, SXRD is awesome VFM. A 70" Full HD SXRD costs around 3.5L while a 46" Full HD LCD comes in at around 2.7-2.8L.

46" Full HD Samsung costs 1.6 lakhs MRP...

[jassi]

a sony 55" 3lcd costs 79k and 42" 59k (the one which I own). However these are not full hd, these are hd ready i.e. 1080i
I made the choice to go with 1080i, because there aren't many 1080p sources in india. TV feeds are still SD, and you still don't go out and buy blu ray dvds and/or hd-dvds. I did feel a pinch when I bought a PS3 and got 5 blu ray movies free. However I have come to notice theres not much noticeable difference yet in 1080i (hd ready) and 1080p (full hd), given the quality of content we have today.

All of my original movies dvds look awesome on the 3lcd and so do the PS3/xbox360 games. The blu ray movies are also awesome
The day will come when we have 1080p digital cable feeds in India, however till then I'd rather buy a 42" 1080i 3lcd tv for 60k and splurge the 40k to 1 lac in savings on building an awesome home theatre sound system, which I did

Yes the really huge sxrds cost a bomb right now (3lacs), but think how much a 70" LCD/plasma costs compared to a 70" sxrd (10 times more at 32lacs as per lg site LG Service )

Instead of spending 1.6 lacs on a 46" samsung, you could look at a much larger sony full HD sxrd set in the same amount, or a 46" full hd sxrd for much much lower Category Page Rear Projection (50" to 70")

[afg]

Hi

With regards to power consumption of plasmas versus lcds, I was reading somewhere that the power consumption by plasmas is much less on dark screens and it consumes its max power only on bright screens. So the consumption on an average is less than the max consumption stated in the manuals. LCDs on the other hand consume the same amount of power throughout irrespective of screen brightness. Don't know how far it is true though (probably propogated by the plasma lobby). But on an overall basis plasmas do not consume that much more power than an LCD.

I bought the Panasonic Viera 42 inch a few months back based on an evaluation of a number of tvs (LCD and Plasma). Here are some of my thoughts:

1) The Panny had the best picture for both broadcast and DVDs. The picture quaility is simply incredible.
2) Black levels, grey shadowing and colour rendition were better in plasmas than LCDs (but CRT is yet the best). The Panny was the best plasma amongst the lot (compared to Hitachi, Samsung plasmas. Believe the Pioneers are very good). LCDs had the worst performance in this regards with blacks not being rendered correctly (even the Sonys) compared to plasmas. I tried to adjust the back light and blacks improved but then the brigthness reduced considerably.
3) LCDs were much more bright than the plasmas, so if you are watching a plasma in a bright room, the picture will look washed out. Hence, Plasma's are good in a less bright environment than LCDs.
4) LCDs are good for games since they don't have picture retention problems of plasmas (thought current general plasmas have this issue to a far lesser extent).

In summary, I find plasma picture quality to be more natural and mellow. However, plasma sales are declining across the globe while LCD sales are going up.

[afg]

Hi

With regards to power consumption of plasmas versus lcds, I was reading somewhere that the power consumption by plasmas is much less on dark screens and it consumes its max power only on bright screens. So the consumption on an average is less than the max consumption stated in the manuals. LCDs on the other hand consume the same amount of power throughout irrespective of screen brightness. Don't know how far it is true though (probably propogated by the plasma lobby). But on an overall basis plasmas do not consume that much more power than an LCD.

I bought the Panasonic Viera 42 inch a few months back based on an evaluation of a number of tvs (LCD and Plasma). Here are some of my thoughts:

1) The Panny had the best picture for both broadcast and DVDs. The picture quaility is simply incredible.
2) Black levels, grey shadowing and colour rendition were better in plasmas than LCDs (but CRT is yet the best). The Panny was the best plasma amongst the lot (compared to Hitachi, Samsung plasmas. Believe the Pioneers are very good). LCDs had the worst performance in this regards with blacks not being rendered correctly (even the Sonys) compared to plasmas. I tried to adjust the back light and blacks improved but then the brigthness reduced considerably.
3) LCDs were much more bright than the plasmas, so if you are watching a plasma in a bright room, the picture will look washed out. Hence, Plasma's are good in a less bright environment than LCDs.
4) LCDs are good for games since they don't have picture retention problems of plasmas (thought current general plasmas have this issue to a far lesser extent).
5) Full HD (1920x1080p) resolution will only be perceptible on large TVs (above 42 inches) or shorter viewing distances (less than 10 feet). 1280x 720 resolution is sufficient for smaller tvs and longer viewing distances.
6) The quality of the TV i.e video processing, contrast quality etc is as important (if not more) as resolution.

In summary, I find plasma picture quality to be more natural, pleasing and mellow. However, plasma sales are declining across the globe while LCD sales are going up.

[ST7677]

Pardon my ignorance, What exactly is SXRD, is it same thing as 3LCD projector.


Also people have been talking about 3LCD degradation issue. How severe is that and in what time frame. Did you consider that?

regarding bulb replacement, is the availability going to be an issue? Also considering that it is so expensive, is there any guaranty on the bulb at time of purchase?


Thanks Jassi, At least I would now once again go to the showroom and have a detailed look at the RPTV again...

[jassi]

Both SXRD and 3LCD are self contained rear projection lcd tvs. SXRD is the more advanced version and offers full HD 1080p whereas 3lcd is limited to a max of 1080i (hd ready) Inputs on how this stuff works (color wheel, 3chips etc) is here Liquid crystal on silicon - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I have had my tv for 9 months now - on an average I have been using it 9 hrs a day (mostly fall asleep watching tv n forget to put the timer )
More on weekends when I game all day with my friends (12hrs easy)

I have not experienced so far any degradation, given that I have clocked 9monthsX30daysX9hrs = approx 2430 hours already

The lamp will be available with sony service station when it goes off (typically it starts degrading after 8000 hours). Today it costs 100-300usd in the US Sony Sxrd Lamps - Audio & Video Accessories - Compare Prices, Reviews and Buy at NexTag - Price - Review and mostly by the time we clock 8000hrs it will be 4-8k INR which I dont see as a large amount 3yrs down the line. Also mostly 3 yrs down the line I will move from my 42" 3lcd to a much larger sxrd or whatever the equivalent technology at that time (maybe 60" depending on size of my tv room), so no need to go through a lamp replacement.

If you are in bangy goto the sony exclusive showrooms (not the multi brand sales shops who wanna make a quick buck) on outer ring road near marathhalli and ask him specifically for 3lcd and nothing else. I think they may still have it positioned at eye viewing level unlike others who keep on the floors to make it look bad. Mostly the sales guys in India are useless when it comes to explaining virtues of this technology and mostly they are not interested in selling it unless a researched customer specifically asks for it

[HotChillyPepper]

Originally Posted by ST7677

Pardon my ignorance, What exactly is SXRD, is it same thing as 3LCD projector.


Also people have been talking about 3LCD degradation issue. How severe is that and in what time frame. Did you consider that?

regarding bulb replacement, is the availability going to be an issue? Also considering that it is so expensive, is there any guaranty on the bulb at time of purchase?


Thanks Jassi, At least I would now once again go to the showroom and have a detailed look at the RPTV again...

As a person working in developing Firmware for DTVs I have few points here. The main difference between a DLP and LCD setup is the moving parts inside DLP. It is not 100% solid stae circuit as an LCD.

Each pixel in a DLP TV / Projector is actually a light beam reflected from the light source from a nano mirror. the nano mirrors are suspended in a typical arrangement (Patented by TI) and the angle decides the brightness of every pixel beamed. Ahead of this reflected millions of beams there is a color wheel which wil rotate more than 30K RPM which wil mix the color accurately.

So the main issue with using this setup is the dusty climate here in India and we will be having trouble using it for an year or so. But LCD contains 100% solid state circuit, no moving parts and hence chances of failure is very very less. Dust and moist will not affect an LCD performace.

Apart from this opening the DLP will disturb the lense , color wheel assembly and you will never get the same factory setted geometry back. But LCD is 100% Digital processing using Image scalars and there is no geometry issues accorss services.

The LCD panel manufacturing technologies are improved a lot over time and now viewing angle of LCD TVs are much better. Most of the Samsung Panels give you 10000:1 contrast ratio which is way beyond any DLP.
-HCP

[ST7677]

Originally Posted by afg

In summary, I find plasma picture quality to be more natural, pleasing and mellow. However, plasma sales are declining across the globe while LCD sales are going up.

Couldn't agree more on this, however any comments on why is this so...

[ST7677]

My Analysis... (why LCD sells more than Plasma, when people prefer Plasma Picture)

1. Plasma is more expensive to produce, while LCD is cheaper to produce - hence LCD companies offer higher margins to retailer, who push LCD

2. Aggressive marketing by LCD brands, who make masses believe that LCD is better than Plasma

3. Aggressive price discounts by LCD mfgs

4. and then there are obviously Pros & Cons of Plasma

LCD TV prices will continue to fall, whereas Plasma TV prices have almost bottomed out (compared to production cost of about $900 for 42") and will not be able to compete with LCDs in future.

My Verdict - Plasma as domestic TV is pretty much going to die in 3-4 years.



Sony has already pulled out of Plasma TV and now, Phillips has also decided to stop Plasma production. LG also closes it's plasma plant.
Source: HDTV UK: Philips to phase out manufacture of plasma TVs


All that is fine, but I am still confused which one to go for...?