Teach me how to buy the right TV

poopshovel wrote: Solid plan. Geet'er dunn.

That plan went down the crapper.

I went to Best Buy. I wanted to take a look at the 40" Visio, but it was the only TV out of the hundred or so on the display walls that didn't have cable hooked up to it. I told the sales guy that I wasn't going to buy it without seeing the picture first. Two guys went off to find a cable to hook it up, which took a surprisingly long time when you consider that they were standing in the store that you go to buy that kind of thing. After about 15 minutes, the TV was hooked up and then they said that they couldn't find the remote for it. While I was standing there, I couldn't help but notice how nice the picture was on the Samsung next to it. I decided to go up the road to BJ's Wholesale Club to see if they had the Visio on display, but first I bought the wall bracket that I wanted from Best Buy.

At BJ's, they had both the Visio and the Samsung, and I discovered that the Samsung had a better picture and was even a few bucks cheaper. So I bought the Samsung at BJ's.

When I got home, I discovered that the bracket won't work due to the location of the power and cable outlets on my wall, so that has to go back.

Wait, the mount or the TV?

Be aware that (from what I've heard) the picture you see on the display models has very little to do with the picture quality you'll get at home. Something to do with a 500 way splitter on their feed.

Just FWIW, about two years ago I bought a 50" Panasonic plasma and had nothing but troubles out of it. Returned it three times for replacements (yay Best Buy) and finally got a LG 55" LCD that was cheaper and better in every way. Knock on wood, it's had zero problems since day one.

KyAllroad wrote: Be aware that (from what I've heard) the picture you see on the display models has very little to do with the picture quality you'll get at home. Something to do with a 500 way splitter on their feed.

The splitter, and the fact that they turn the brightness up to "blowtorch" to try and make them stand out next to the other 499 sets in a brightly-lit store. In other words, you can't tell much. Besides, if you aren't even going to feed it an HD signal, what do you care what it looks like?

Just FWIW, about two years ago I bought a 50" Panasonic plasma and had nothing but troubles out of it. Returned it three times for replacements (yay Best Buy) and finally got a LG 55" LCD that was cheaper and better in every way. Knock on wood, it's had zero problems since day one.

And that is the very essence of YMMV. I love our Panny plasma. Our LG plasma is just OK and will soon be replaced by a projector. Granted, it's a couple of years older, but it has a LOT of image retention issues, whereas the Panny has none. I'm a plasma TV fan, and I'm very sorry to see them going away. Hopefully I'll get many years out of ours before I have replace it.

In reply to Woody:

Sorry dude. Everything's a motherberkeleying project.

EX: SWMBO insists having the kid's new "princess bed" (xmas present) delivered and "set up" would be preferable to me picking it up and setting it up on xmas eve.

Bed was supposed to be here between 10:45 and 12:45 today. At 2:30, there's a truck at the top of my driveway with two "civil rights activists" literally throwing boxes out the back.

30 minutes later the words "If I wanted it done all berkeleyed up, I would've done it myself" come out of my mouth, followed by my politely asking them to GTFO of my house.

So yeah. I feel ya.

PS: I said ours was a "VIZIO." It's not. It's a Sharp "AQUOS" and we like it a lot. No issues in 3 years.

Appleseed wrote: Wait, the mount or the TV?

The mount.

Back when I built my house and TVs had tubes in them, I decided to put a power outlet and cable feed up high on the wall, directly behind the TV so that I could hide the wires. That brilliant move is now biting me in the ass. The electrical boxes are stacked one on top of the other, and the two are about 9 inches from top to bottom, which is more than the space between the crossbars of the mount. Looks like I'll need one of the full motion ones that I can mount to a single 2x4 stud.