The great flatscreen rip-off

[potential]

i bought a CRT mainly because of the quality and also because i have a victorian house and it sits an alcove...
looked at loads of tellys and bought what sound and vision mag
the back of it is fucking massive thou need two people to lift the leviatan

 

[alsoknownas]

Which model did you go for?

 

[potential]

its bout two years old now panasonic tx-32dtx10
picture is superb but sound aint so gr8

 

[Sunray]

CRT's were just about perfected but their size prevented manufacturers offering larger than about 36" due to the average width of front door. Getting people to have their windows taken out to install them isn't a selling point. Unfortunately size has become a massive selling feature and now people don't sell CRT.

I've long said that LCD is a terrible display technology. According to the inquirer LCD manufactures have started to approach decent picture quality so in the next year or so might actually be able to buy a set that renders a picture as intended.

 

[alsoknownas]

Yes, good point. I realise that CRT's do have an upper size limit. Actually, as usual, size is important, especially for High Def (whose benefit relies on a minumum picture size / viewing distance ratio). I can also understand people wanting to save space in their homes.

But at the cost of a decent image quality? Not for me, thanks.

 

[mhwfc]

I wish there were more HD CRT's on the british market, there were loads when I last went to USA.

My friend bought the Samsung WS32Z419 and although it has a great picture, it doesn't have much else in the way of features, and has already developed minor faults twice.

IMO the picture on the Samsung Slimfit is very good on standard definition widescreen, the Freeview and Sky SD picture is far better than any LCD I've seen, the geometry's off though, if you watch a 4:3 programme or DVD the black bars down the side of the screen are curved so you get a goldfish bowl effect.

 

[alsoknownas]

I have to go and see one of those Slimfit sets up and running. I keep dithering between - yes, perfect solution, and - no, too unreliable/duff geometry etc.

They have them at the Curry's Superstores apparently. Anyone know which ones are the 'Superstores' (with a North / East London bias)?

 

[Radar]

They have them at the Curry's Superstores apparently. Anyone know which ones are the 'Superstores' (with a North / East London bias)?

Why bother ?? It seems currys themselves don't know, according to their own store locator.

If they can't be arsed making it easy for you to find their own stores, use someone else who isn't as secretive

(unless you just want to check it out, then go buy it off the web, in which case more power to your elbow !!)

 

[Negativland]

Do cheaper LCDs generally have a really shite ability to display a dark black? Kind of like you had tuned the contrast down and the brightness up in an old CRT. My mam and dads flatscreen is a 26" Philips, and at night this makes it rubbish for watching films. The screen in my laptop is miles better.

 

[alsoknownas]

Why bother ?? It seems currys themselves don't know, according to their own store locator.

If they can't be arsed making it easy for you to find their own stores, use someone else who isn't as secretive

I know. Weird isn't it? However it's about my only chance of trying before I buy.

 

[alsoknownas]

Do cheaper LCDs generally have a really shite ability to display a dark black? Kind of like you had tuned the contrast down and the brightness up in an old CRT. My mam and dads flatscreen is a 26" Philips, and at night this makes it rubbish for watching films. The screen in my laptop is miles better.

Yes. That's exactly the main problem.

 

[pogofish]

looking for a new TV recently, I was astounded to find that many (if not most) high street stores had NO CRT TELLYS AT ALL!
That can't be right?

Most if not all of the main manufacturers stopped selling/supporting CRT by the end of last year.

 

[pogofish]

Plasma is way better to my eyes.

Plasma has other disadvantages tho - A very poor screen life for one.

 

[pogofish]

IIRC digital radio is inferior quality to FM radio - the advantage is that you can fit a lot more channels into the available bandwidth.

Only if you are in an area with excellent reception. Otherwise digital knocks spots of FM for sound quality.

 

[alsoknownas]

Most if not all of the main manufacturers stopped selling/supporting CRT by the end of last year.

I'm sure that flat screen technologies (next gen LCD, Plasma, and emerging tech like SED, etc.) WILL BE the future of TV. But it seems as though the transition has been made prematurely - led by companies comercial interest, rather than customers viewing interests.

 

[Xanadu]

But to be honest, a lot of people did choose flat screens not due to the picture quality, but because they wanted a thin stylish TV with okay picture quality to mount on their wall.

 

[Xanadu]

Digital radio also has the capability of having better sound quality than FM, but they decided to put more channels on there instead

 

[Sunray]

Only if you are in an area with excellent reception. Otherwise digital knocks spots of FM for sound quality.

My arse. Yes if your listening to it on your clock radio, perhaps. Anything more and you can be certain that that is not even close.

This is down to the low bandwidth allocated to a lot of the radio stations. 96kbs is not uncommon these days as is mono. BBC7 for instance. Thats broadcast in mono on DAB. MONO, as the TV world goes High Def, the radio world end back at muffly mono. Fantastic.

I was interested in it for a while, but its not really worth it and have been less than impressed with the way its been handled even by the BBC.

There are many many people complaining about it, here is a succinct example

http://www.transdiffusion.org/rmc/features/digital/worse.asp

 

[pogofish]

My arse. Yes if your listening to it on your clock radio, perhaps. Anything more and you can be certain that that is not even close.

Try stepping into this part of the world then

Except when I lived on a hilltop, in line of sight to both the transmitters serving this area, FM reception has never been anything but shite - Even on a variety of above average hi-fi equipment. Mono is about all I ever listen to FM in anyway as there is just too much noise on a stereo signal. Building a large & obtrusive external antenna or putting one along the roofline is about the only way round that.

Simply plugging the line-out from a pretty cheap DAB radio into the Hi-fi was quite a revelation in sound quality & I'm listening to a lot more radio again because of it. Even though at times, even DAB reception can be a bit flakey.

Judging from the reception in the car & carting radios all over much of this country, I'm still in a reasonable reception area as it is. I don't have to go vey far to find places where rception is even worse. So, I'd contend that for many folk, dab is a considerable & very practical improvement.