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I have ordered a new toy: a 47″ Vizio 1080p LCD HDTV. I’m supposed to be picking up Friday or Saturday, and getting it all setup. It’s replacing a 32″ tube tv, and here is a comparison of the size difference: Visual TV Size Comparison : 47 inch 16×9 display vs 32 inch 4×3 display
To this I’ll be hooking up a TiVo HD DVR (with HD channel feeds from Cox Cable) an Xbox 360 (for games and watching DVDs) and a Kenwood surround-sound amplifier.
This is my first flat screen tv, first wide-screen (16:9 aspect ratio) and first high-def tv.
I don’t have either a Blue-Ray or HD-DVD player. Does anyone have one or the other and can make recommendations? It seems pretty obvious that Blue-Ray is the winner, and HD-DVD is on the way out. Is the quality of Blu-Ray substantially better than a “regular” DVD?
Also, any advice on cabling everything? I’ve heard that HDMI is the best signal, but I want to send the sound through the amplifier.
I’ll post some pics when I get it all setup. 😎
I don’t have any HD equipment or service, and for now I think I’m okay with keeping it that way. To me, the benefit isn’t worth the considerable cost — the TV you linked is US$1800 (which is on the low side of the cost slide), plus another $400+ for a Blu-ray player, HDTV service is another giant jump in cost from the cable provider, and then buying HD movies is more per disc than regular DVDs.
To me, that’s a lot of dough to shell out for the improvement. I imagine I’ll probably give in eventually, but only once prices start to come down considerably.
I know that wasn’t what you were asking for, but… I’m bored and felt like tossing in my two cents.
We went with the Sharp Aquos 50 something inch but you know us girls we are never sure on measurements!
Have a great time with your new tv Jeff! :0)
Tigerblade;225904 wrote:I don’t have any HD equipment or service, and for now I think I’m okay with keeping it that way. To me, the benefit isn’t worth the considerable cost — the TV you linked is US$1800 (which is on the low side of the cost slide), plus another $400+ for a Blu-ray player, HDTV service is another giant jump in cost from the cable provider, and then buying HD movies is more per disc than regular DVDs.To me, that’s a lot of dough to shell out for the improvement. I imagine I’ll probably give in eventually, but only once prices start to come down considerably.
I know that wasn’t what you were asking for, but… I’m bored and felt like tossing in my two cents.
Actually, the HDTV service doesn’t cost anything additional (at least not with Cox Cable). There WILL be an additional cost though. Right now, we only have one cable box. The second TV just gets the “analog” stations (no cable box). With the new HDTV, I’m going to move the cable box (and our “old” TiVo) to the secondary TV, and then getting two Cablecards for the new TiVo HD. The two Cablecards allow us to get all the digital cable programming on our new TiVo, but without requiring a cable box. The downside is that you still have to pay Cox $49 to have an installer come out and insert the damned cards, and pay $6/month for the privilege of using them.
But for now, my monthly cable bill goes up $6; not too bad. I could save that if I turned the old cable box in rather than hooking it up to our second TV, but it’s not so much.
As for the Blu-ray issue, I’m not planning to get Blu-Ray just yet. For now, I’ll be playing standard-def DVDs via my Xbox. I’ve done this before on an HDTV and they look great. I’ll probably hold off for a while before springing for the Blu-Ray. On the bright side, prices for that kind of stuff always goes down.
Oh, and I only paid $1399 for the TV (so I saved a few hundred of the retail price). Not too shabby, eh?
1. Your 47″ widescreen will display a 4×3 equivalent of a 36″ TV. So in essence, you’ve gone from a 32″ to a 36″ when you watch standard def TV shows.
2. If you plan to feed both video and audio from your cable box and DVD source through your receiver, your best quality picture will be using component video cables. The newer receivers have HDMI switching, which makes things very neat/tidy, but that’s for your next receiver, I’m guessing.
3. The HD format war is still not over. HD-DVD got a surge last fall but Blu-ray went back up in the last month or so. Since the movie companies are still not covering both formats and there were no developments at CES, I’d say your best move is to wait. On your picture quality question, yes, both formats will be noticeably better than standard DVD.
4. Once you have the TV, go here to get user comments, calibrated settings, etc. for your TV.
mfenech;225912 wrote:1. Your 47″ widescreen will display a 4×3 equivalent of a 36″ TV. So in essence, you’ve gone from a 32″ to a 36″ when you watch standard def TV shows.Not according to this website. Check the link.
mfenech;225912 wrote:2. If you plan to feed both video and audio from your cable box and DVD source through your receiver, your best quality picture will be using component video cables. The newer receivers have HDMI switching, which makes things very neat/tidy, but that’s for your next receiver, I’m guessing.Actually, I won’t have a cable box (read my post again). I will be plugging the cable directly into my TiVo HD, which provides either component or HDMI output to the TV. I didn’t plan to feed my video through the receiver (what’s the point of that?). According to the Vizio owners manual, I would do something like this:
Cable > TiVo > HDMI to > TV > Audio out from tv to receiver.
mfenech;225912 wrote:3. The HD format war is still not over. HD-DVD got a surge last fall but Blu-ray went back up in the last month or so. Since the movie companies are still not covering both formats and there were no developments at CES, I’d say your best move is to wait. On your picture quality question, yes, both formats will be noticeably better than standard DVD.Actually, there was a rather huge development at CES. Warner Brothers (which previously issued in both formats) announced the day before the show that they were pulling support for HD-DVD. Most of the stuff I’ve read seems to indicate that Blu-Ray is gaining support from the publishers and consumers alike. I’ve heard that in Europe, it’s pretty much all Blu-Ray and no HD-DVD at all. So it seems like things are going in that direction. In any case, I’ll be sitting on the sidelines for a while longer. I need to let my wallet stop smoking! 🙂
mfenech;225912 wrote:4. Once you have the TV, go here to get user comments, calibrated settings, etc. for your TV.Thanks for the link!!
Sorry…Tivo box
The development you mention was the one I was referring to, and was announced before CES, I believe.
Many of the newer receivers have built-in HDMI switching. People want a cleaner setup, even if it’s not the the most direct connection.
Go here and put in your numbers. Actually says you’ll have a 38″ viewing area for standard def TV..sorry.
Tigerblade;225904 wrote:…and then buying HD movies is more per disc than regular DVDs.I forgot to mention that my existing Netflix account can be configured to send me Blu-ray DVDs if I prefer… at no additional cost!
mfenech;225919 wrote:The development you mention was the one I was referring to, and was announced before CES, I believe.Technically it was the Saturday before (one day before Bill Gate’s keynote). The HD-DVD consortium ended up cancelling their big CES press conference shin dig at the last minute as a result.
mfenech;225919 wrote:Many of the newer receivers have built-in HDMI switching. People want a cleaner setup, even if it’s not the the most direct connection.Ah, that makes sense. This is an older, non-HDMI receiver, so I’ll be going HDMI to the TV, then Optical audio out from the TV to the receiver.
mfenech;225919 wrote:Go here and put in your numbers. Actually says you’ll have a 38″ viewing area for standard def TV..sorry.I saw that site, but the 38″ viewing area ONLY applies when viewing non-HD programming (4:3 aspect ratio). This of course, makes sense. I had seen both sites, and in fact they agree. But when you look at the proportional illustration of the relative viewing area at wide screen, there is a substantial difference. And seeing the thing in person, I can tell you it’s HUGE next to our old TV.
I’m officially signed up at avsforum as (what else) BigBlueBall.
I think on page 28 of that thread someone posted their calibrated settings. I’m on the Plasma forum and follow the Samsung plasma threads. Good luck with your TV. 🙂
Just do add a little bit –
Some DVD players can Upconvert standard def DVDs to 720p (or 1080p I guess, wouldn’t be much of a difference), and that will make an SD DVD look much better than with just a regular DVD player. I know mine will only upconvert over HDMI–not component, so you should look into that, I don’t know if your xbox will do that or not.
I got a Sharp Aquos 32inch 1080p for christmas.
It is hooked up to my PS3 which I use mainly for watching Blu-ray movies or DVD’s I don’t think blu-ray is superior or anything to HD DVD but there’s something about it that has a draw factor (not sure what it is) vs. HD DVD. My PS3 also upconverts DVDs to look like HD.
I love HDMI because it is just one cable for video and sound I don’t think you get better picture or anything versus something like Component-S.
HD on cable/satellite is only broadcast in 1080i at the moment.
Thanks guys. For now, I’ll use my Xbox 360 for DVDs (not sure if it upconverts or not, but I’ve watched movies on an Xbox 360 with my old roomates HDTV, and it looked ok). Hopefully that will suffice for now, and I’ll look at upgrading to Blu-ray at some point in the future.
I can download HD moves from Amazon Unbox to my TiVo HD, and also via Xbox Live to my Xbox 360, so I will have a couple ways to get HD movies until then. Maybe if the downloads work well, I may not need a Blu-Ray!
I only with I could get HD movies from Netflix by downloading…
Fanatic;225924 wrote:Sweet tv, dude! Can I come to your Superbowl party? :pOh, why not? I sent you a PM.
Oh, and I ended up bidding on an Xbox 360 HD-DVD add-on at eBay… and won! Yes, I know Blu-ray appears to be winning, but I figure I will get a Blu-ray player when the prices drop, and I can still watch HD-DVDs from Netflix until then!
I ended up winning the slightly used HD-DVD player with Microsoft’s universal remote and three HD-DVDs for less than $100. Not too shabby! 🙂
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