04-01-2009, 04:27 AM
The rumor about Plasma running out and having to be recharged is not true. There is actually no gas in a plasma TV that can be recharge/refilled. Salesmen usually spread this misinformation about plasma to get people to buy an LCD TV. LCD's have a much higher mark up on the price than plasma. Both LCD and Plasma TV's actually have around the same life span, about 60,000 - 100,000 hours.Which TV to buy...Well that is up to you. I would strongly recommend going to an electronics store and looking at TV's before you buy online. If you buy online I would buy from Crutchfield,<a href=\"http://www.crutchfield.com/S-RrXw6dt7IP2/index.html\" target=\"_blank\">http://www.crutchfield.com/S-RrXw6dt7IP2/index.html</a>Crutchfield offers free shipping on TV's, and you don't have to pay sales tax. Unless you can get a good deal elsewhere, I really wouldn't recommend buying anywhere else. Crutchfield is outstanding with their customer service, you will have no worries if you buy from them.Back to what TV to buy. Plasma has the advantage of having a much brighter image, with deeper black levels. When you buy a TV you want to get one with the highest contrast ratio possible, and plasma has the highest. There's also no motion blur with Plasma, which is why you don't see 120hz/240hz plasmas. The feature is unnecessary with Plasma TV's. LCD has advantages in the power consumption department, on avarage an LCD will use about half the power a plasma would use. A 40" plasma will usually draw about 600watts, an LCD of the same size will draw about 250watts. With the 120hz/240hz LCD's, gaming looks amazing. The higher refresh rate makes hi def games look sweet. With LED Tv's, LED enhances things like contrast, sharpness ect. This is one of those things where you really have to see it and decided if you like it. LED seems to fall in line with 120hz/240hz TV's, the features enhance the picture, but some people actually don't like the enhancements.Price wise, plasma is cheaper the larger you get. You can get a good 50" plasma for what a good 40" LCD costs.With brands, Samsung makes excellent TV's. You really can't go wrong with Samsung. My HT clients love them, and I love them as well. Sharp makes excellent TV's as well. Panasonic is my top choice if you buy plasma. If you can go for broke and want to buy plasma, go with Pioneer, the best Plasma TV's imo. Avoid Sony altogether, not that Sony is bad, but they are overpriced for the quality you get. Avoid brands like Westinghouse, Vizio ect. There's only a couple of manufactures that make screens for these TV's, so if you buy a Vizio you are technically getting a Samsung per say, but the video processors and other internal components are usually the cheapest and most poorly made things. I've replaced I don't know how many Westinghouse and Vizio's for my clients.I hope this info helps you out.Jeff-Oh one more thing. If you need HDMI cables, don't fall into the trap of buying a $100+ cable. Digital is digital, the signal only needs to go from point A to point B. You can get quality HDMI cables at Monoprice.com, I've been using them for years, good stuff.