Deals on 1080p Displays

Sadly...no I don't have a PS3 yet. Not until I finish remodling my basement.(then comes the PS3 AND a BIG TV) I'm not sure if stores are running the displays at 720 or 1080, so I don't know if I've even seen an 1080 output! The highest resolution I think I could find is the movie "CARS" which looks fantastic. Maybe next week I can get the cable guys out for the HD channels.
 
And now that I got HD service hooked up, it even makes it a better deal. One really nice feature that the TV has is when I change the channel it tells me what the signal coming in is...1080i or 480i. Does anyone know if a signal will be broadcast in 1080p in the coming future?
 
Circuit City. It was the only brand that made a 1080p in 32" that the store carried. You could say I bought it by default. :)
 
Costco is having a sale on the Westinghouse LVM-37W3 (37" 1080p LCD - no tuner). Normally priced at $1,000 it is now priced at $800. The sale ends June 10. Click HERE for more details.

Keep in mind, this TV isn't going to win any performance awards, but it looks good, and offers an amazing value for the cost.... 37" 1080p for only $800 and not made by some unkown Chinese manufacturer! 👍

This is the kind of TV I recommend for those willing and interested in upgrading it after just a couple years to better TVs, as the performance standards are still increasing while at the same time the prices are continually decreasing, thus buying an expensive state-of-the-art TV today will cost a lot more in depreciation loss then a value minded TV like this Westinghouse.

On the other hand, if you are more inclined to hold on to your TV for five or more years, then I would definitely not recommend this TV.
 
Since there are some TV experts in this thread I'll ask you all for your opinion on this TV that I'm thinking of buying.

Link
 
Can you tell that by the resolution that it displays, it's just that I couldn't see any written anywhere else. What sort of resolution should I go for then if I want 1080p.
 
Mark T
Can you tell that by the resolution that it displays, it's just that I couldn't see any written anywhere else. What sort of resolution should I go for then if I want 1080p.
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The one you linked in the previous post is able to handle 720p. 1080p is 1920 × 1080 in progressive scan.
 
Mark T
Can you tell that by the resolution that it displays, it's just that I couldn't see any written anywhere else. What sort of resolution should I go for then if I want 1080p.
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1080p is a resolution, as mentioned above = 1920x1080 p = progressive. All digital displays are progressive, so in gerneral it isn;t important to include the "p", but over time its become the norm to refer to TV's as 1080p, 720p, 480p, etc.

From the link you listed it says:
Visible Diagonal: 23"
  • HD Ready
  • Colour Gamut: EBU 100%
  • Resolution: 1366 x 768
  • Brightness: 500 cd/m²
  • Response Time: 8ms
  • Dynamic Contrast Ratio 2000:01:00
  • Viewing angle: (H/V) 170°/170°
  • Backlight: CCFL
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Although its resolution is 1366x768, it is still referred to as a "720p" display.

1366x768 is a very common resolution for monitors as that is a common resolution for computer graphic cards. Most "720p" TV's on the other hand have a 1280x720 native resolution.

The downside to having a 1366x768 display is that if it doesn't do a good job of scaling, then you'll likely see more jaggies as it will struggle to properly scale a 1280x720 image to 1366x768. It is also for this reason many 1366x768 displays will include a "pass-through" option which bypasses the scaler and displays the 720p signal unaltered leaving a black border of unused pixels (24 pixels wide on the top & bottom, and 43 pixels wide along the left & right sides... minus any overscan) surrounding the image.
 
What I'm looking for is a TV that is between the size of 22-26 inches and is 1080p. Do you have any recommendations? I want to play XB360 games in the best possible quality. I do have a 42-inch LG plasma TV but that's always taken by the Missus.
 
Mark T
What I'm looking for is a TV that is between the size of 22-26 inches and is 1080p. Do you have any recommendations? I want to play XB360 games in the best possible quality. I do have a 42-inch LG plasma TV but that's always taken by the Missus.
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If it's for the X360, and for games, then I would definitely not recommend a 1080p display. There are almost no games that are native 1080p... possibly none as the X360 is limited to playing games that are only recorded on DVD, and that means they have very little disc space to include data for rendering native 1080p graphics. Now the X360 can certainly render scaled 1080p graphics, but that's not going to offer anything new in terms of additional detail for which a 1080p display would be capable of showing.

If I were you I'd spend the same amount of money on a 720p display in order to get a high performance display with high contrast, accurate and wide color gamut, low response time, and decently bright... although for such a small screen, brightness is not going to be an issue to be concerned about.

For your needs, I think you'll be quite pleased with that Samsung display.
 
Digital-Nitrate
If it's for the X360, and for games, then I would definitely not recommend a 1080p display. There are almost no games that are native 1080p... possibly none as the X360 is limited to playing games that are only recorded on DVD, and that means they have very little disc space to include data for rendering native 1080p graphics. Now the X360 can certainly render scaled 1080p graphics, but that's not going to offer anything new in terms of additional detail for which a 1080p display would be capable of showing.

If I were you I'd spend the same amount of money on a 720p display in order to get a high performance display with high contrast, accurate and wide color gamut, low response time, and decently bright... although for such a small screen, brightness is not going to be an issue to be concerned about.

For your needs, I think you'll be quite pleased with that Samsung display.
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Sounds good to me. I'm going to order it now. I think £299 is a superb price as I was looking round some electrical retailers today and nothing came close to this. At least I know that with Samsung I'm getting a reasonable contrast and a good selection of inputs.
 
I happen to have the year-older version of that exact screen for the 360, but 26 inch. You won't be disappointed. 👍

I was going to say you'd rather look for a screen of a similar resolution anyway, and not 1080p. With a screen that size, the detail increase will be very minimum, so paying double, or even more, the price for a 1080p display that size would be a waste a near waste of money.

Not that you can get a 1080p display that small anyway. :P
 
Costco's are about to get the next-gen Vizio 1080p HD displays, and to kick start the release, they have a $200 off coupon you can use with the purchase of the 42" model. When I was at the store they still had not got it in yet, nor did they know what the price will be, which I found odd, but I'd expect it to cost only about $1,000 with the coupon. 👍

While not 1080p, Costco also has the 32" Sharp Aquos on sale for only $550!

BTW: In case anyone has the wrong idea, I definitely do not work for or have any affiliation with Costco, only that I am regularly impressed with the deals and service they provide. That said, I'm sure there are even better deals from online retailers, and hope others will share deals they find as well.




Finally, for those looking to get a good deal on Blu-ray, HD-DVD, and DVD movies, www.DeepDiscount.com is having their annual Mega Sale. If you aren' already familiar with DeepDiscount, they are without doubt the best source for heavily discounted Blu-ray, HD-DVD, and DVDs, and now they are branching into other markets.

Anyway, the way the sale works is that it acts basically as a 20% off coupon. In other words, you can only use it once between June 1st and June 16th. So when placing an order make sure you have everything you want in it, as you won’t be able to get the 20% off once you've used it in a previous order. Also keep in mind that the prices on the site, and when you add them t your cart do NOT reflect the sale price... as an added bonus there is no tax and shipping is FREE!

Once you are done adding items to your cart, then put in the following, SUPERSALE into the Promotional Code box.

To give you an idea on the savings, with the 20% off, expect most Blu-ray, HD-DVD, and DVDs to be close to 50% off list price. 👍

I found close to 50 Blu-ray titles priced at about $15 and over 150 that were about $20 or less (after 20% discount of course)... so I got a little carried away with my order. :D

One more thing, I wanted to get some Blu-ray movies for my Parents and my Sister's family so I called DeepDiscount to see if I can ship different items within the same order to multiple addresses in order to get the 20% discount on all items, and they let me know that it was not only possible, but because many of their customers do that they have that option available in the check-out procedures. 👍
 
Digital-Nitrate
Costco's are about to get the next-gen Vizio 1080p HD displays, and to kick start the release, they have a $200 off coupon you can use with the purchase of the 42" model. When I was at the store they still had not got it in yet, nor did they know what the price will be, which I found odd, but I'd expect it to cost only about $1,000 with the coupon. 👍:
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I decided to purchase one of these for the bedroom, as I was looking to replace our old TV with a new 37" 720p flat-panel model, but considering for just a couple hundred more I could get this 42" 1080p it seemed like a no-brainer.

I have to say, while I wasn't overly impressed with what I saw from the display at Costco. Once I got it home and did some minor calibration using nothing more than the basic video controls and my eye, I have to admit this is a great looking TV!

The biggest improvement was when I turned the Backlight control down to about 50%, as it was set way up to about 90% and was really washing out the picture. The other controls really didn't need much adjustment, but once I have the time to really run it through its paces with some test discs and colometer readings I'm sure I'll see that it needs some additional adjustments if I want to get it dialed in just right.... on the other hand it's not like we are using this as our primary movie watching display, so I may just not bother with it.

Considering it sells for less than half the price of the Sony Bravia and Sharp Aquos, this is a fantastic value! Compared to both the Sony and the Sharp, it's only obvious weakness is that it doesn't do as good a job processing poor quality video, but even marginally good video, like from your average DVD it looks great, and 1080p movies off Blu-ray look amazing - better in fact than Sony's $25,000 QUALIA 004 projector (OK, that came out three years ago, but still...)!
 
DWA
No PC input (d-sub)? :grumpy:
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Yes, it has a D-Sub VGA input and supports PCs. 👍

Surprisingly for the price, it also has an HDTV tuner w/3D Comb Filter, 3:2 or 2:2 Reverse Pull-down, Deinterlacing, 5.1 SPDIF Digital Optical Audio output, POP & PIP & Zoom & Freeze, and more. 👍
 
Hmm... o rly. My only problem is it's Vizio and I'm sorry to say I'm too picky at this point to go against one of my rules of getting a name brand.

With that said how do you guys feel about this TV? I don't know if it's a deal but it was the best looking when I went to BB. Also, what's more important or makes more of an impact contrast ratio or Brightness? Usually if there is a contrast ratio as high as this one has it gets really really expensive. Or did I miss something... ? Thanks
 
DWA
With that said how do you guys feel about this TV? I don't know if it's a deal but it was the best looking when I went to BB.
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The specs look good, and if you already saw it in person and thought it was the best there, and you're OK with the price I'd say go for it. 👍


Also, what's more important or makes more of an impact contrast ratio or Brightness? Usually if there is a contrast ratio as high as this one has it gets really really expensive. Or did I miss something... ? Thanks
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Contrast is definitely more important than brightness, at least for these smaller displays. Once you get into the 60+" range having poor luminance will certainly negatively impact the images.

That said, in some ways contrast is related to brightness, as it determines how much subtle detail can be displayed in a bright scene (illuminated detail), just as it also determines how much detail can be seen in a dark scene (shadow detail). Black Level, which is often mistaken for Shadow Detail, is something almost entirely different, so having a great contrast level wont necessarily mean you'll have a great black level.

A word of caution though when looking at the published contrast levels in a spec sheet, and that is, there is no standard for how a display must be calibrated before measuring it's supposed contrast levels. By calibrating the TV for both maximum brightness and then maximum darkness it is possible to get very high contrast levels, but watching video with a display set like that would be intolerable!

This is why you may often see in a technical review, a display that advertises that it has 10,000:1 contrast ratio will only show a true contrast ratio calibrated for optimum video quality as having less than 1000:1 contrast level.

Another method of enhancing contrast levels is using a form of dynamic iris technology, and in many cases this is an excellent compromise for achieving higher contrast levels, like that LG model, but even then, I have little doubt that contrast level in its spec is still well above what it actually is achieving when it is calibrated correctly for video.
 
Well, the only thing that bothers me about going by "eye" at a store is I've heard or have been told these "displays" are set up to showcase and sell their tv. Yet, I've seen some that are expensive and seem really really ****ty. Like a reviewer I came across said, the most irritating thing to me is the pixelation during fast movements and I agree. Partly why I really hate this "digital revolution" we are in. This TV seems to make up for it because of the 5ms response time though. Either way, for that part... out of all the tvs I stared at this one had the LEAST or no amount of pixelation during movement.

Digital-Nitrate
This is why you may often see in a technical review, a display that advertises that it has 10,000:1 contrast ratio will only show a true contrast ratio calibrated for optimum video quality as having less than 1000:1 contrast level.
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Oh that sucks... and is irritating because it borders false advert to me. :grumpy:

edit: Yep... this will be the tv I WILL HAVE one way or another. :drool:
 
DWA
Just out of curiosity what do you guys think of this? It's not exactly a TV but it would be a good one for a 360 and pc.
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As a PC monitor I'm sure it woud look just fine. Just keep in mind that it has a 6 bit TN panel which has fairly poor color reproduction. A better panel to have for watching video on a LCD monitior would be one with either a S-IPS or P-MVA panel.
 
Ok thanks.

Digital-Nitrate
Just keep in mind that it has a 6 bit TN panel which has fairly poor color reproduction. A better panel to have for watching video on a LCD monitior would be one with either a S-IPS or P-MVA panel.
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So... is this an older model? or did they just skimp out on that part? :odd:
 

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