Choosing Best Digital TV: DLP vs LCD vs Plasma (part 2)
Guidance in choosing the best digital television

By: Bruce Bahlmann - Contributing Author (your feedback is important to us!)

Created: December 21, 2006

Article Continued from ... [1] - [2]

Resolutions: 720p, 1080i, 1080p

High definition digital televisions generally offer a minimum resolution of 720p which is quite good and highly detailed over either standard US or European television quality. While it is beyond the scope of this article to explain the details of these resolutions, it is sufficient to convey the fact that 1080p is the best high definition picture available from any source currently. In 2006, digital televisions began offering support for this resolution at a premium price, but pretty much all televisions in 2007 and beyond should offer this resolution as a standard feature. You should seek the best possible resolution from your set. While there are very few noticeable differences between 1080i and 1080p, you will want support for 1080p when you one day invest in a Blu-ray disc player and a subscription from Netflix.

Trends Among Leading Manufacturer Products:

Selecting a digital television provides consumers a list of choices among quite a number of consumer electronic company products including Dell, LG, Panasonic, Phillips, Pioneer, Samsung, Sony, Zenith and a host of other re-branded products. For simplicity, only the leading digital televisions are listed in Table 4.0  and ranked in order of the highest quality picture.

Table 4.0 Screen Manufacturer Rankings

There are some interesting technical notes about particular manufacturers when it comes to large displays. Pioneer is well known for its superior color processing technology in its plasma displays and Panasonic for its best in class darkness reproduction in its plasma displays. These two manufactures are the two veterans in the flat panel display market with very mature plasma products in our "best in class category". Samsung is also no stranger to the plasma display market and still has some very good products in this market, however it is shifting its focus to LCD and is evolving its own color processing technology (DNIe). While DNIe is getting better, it is still several generations behind Pioneer's best in class. Sony was a late comer to the Plasma display market and abandoned the market all together in 2002 to focus on LCD and DLP - and as a result was one of the first manufacturers to attempt to build a near entertainment quality LCD (not bad for what is otherwise a computer display). However, unlike the CRT market where Sony patented Trinitron which allowed them to build best in class CRT displays, they have trailed the leading edge of plasma, LCD and DLP - unfamiliar territory for Sony. Sony's latest versions of its LCD and DLP have gone "back to the basics" of what Sony really knows (color processing and tuners) in attempt to incorporate older CRT color processing technology it pioneered in its top of the line XBR and consumer grade WEGA models. While Sony's 2007 LCD and DLP models do approach entertainment quality, they are still missing the "real life" look of plasma and no color processing (even as good as XBR was) is going to fix that! Meaning, all things being equally good, plasma just reproduces more life like pictures than LCD and DLP.

You may not be able to clearly gage the differences of these digital televisions in the store as often they have been manipulated by sales staff to help sell inferior products or adversely changed by unskilled consumers. If factory settings are applied on any of the products listed above and proper sources or scenes are displayed which allow them to perform to their maximum capabilities (such as multiple colors in challenging dark and bright daylight conditions or sporting events at less than optimal conditions) you will see how important it is that your digital television have good or exceptional picture rating. Often times, stores just cycle programming that that looks pretty much good on every type of screen. For the best possible test, bring a copy of the Blu-ray title The Fifth Element and sample through both light and dark scenes looking for detail (especially in the darker scenes). If you don't have a Blu-ray disc player or the disc, bring some DVD with lots of night scenes. These will generally expose the major differences between LCD and plasma displays of all types. Blu-ray has the additional benefit of exposing how well the display handles a quality high definition signal at movie cinema resolution (1080p). Note, that before you go to any store to examine these, first go to each manufacturer's website and read more about its current products. It is suggested you even write down these model numbers and/or print specs and a picture of the unit. The reason for this will become obvious when you walk into the store which displays many similar units including new and older models. The newer models may only be displayed in the window to attract buyers but on the floor all the sales are on last year's model. Only in the case of Pioneer and Panasonic products, is it suggested that you ever consider buying last year's model. Pioneer models from 2005 and beyond are exceptional - and the newer ones are even better (impossible as that must sound). Buyers should be aware that only Samsung 2007 and beyond LCD models which have 5000/1 contrast ratio should be considered. The Samsung LCD models with only 3000/1 contrast ratio perform very poorly at the extremes of brightness and darkness - this goes for both the US and European models.

Its NOT too Late: Return your Digital Television to Upgrade

Satisfied with your purchase? Sometimes the easiest thing is to just do nothing. However many quality shops allow you to return or exchange your digital television if you are not completely satisfied (but check out their policies before you buy). If this is the case, when you unpack a less than highly rated digital television be VERY careful NOT to tear open packaging and keep track of every shred of packing, ties, and documentation just in case you are not completely happy with it. If your digital television doesn't rank in the top 6 of Table 4.0, chances are you will not be 100% satisfied and you may want to return it. However, some bargain shops only offer the inferior models and don't offer any of the top 6. You may only be able to exchange your purchase for some other model from that same store or pay a re-stocking fee in order to get some of your money back. As a result, it is suggested you only buy from a shop that has both cheaper models as well as those from the top 6 to permit you with the most options should your selection not work out as good as you think.

Conclusions

DLP is clearly a opportunistic technology with a limited life span. DLP represents a last breath of life into an otherwise dying projection television technology which is competitively priced cheaper than either LCD or plasma for larger displays - however inferior in every category other than allowable screen size. LCD is at least 4 generations (or 2-3 years) of improvement behind the currently performing plasma and perhaps 2-4 generations from having a screen size of 50 or even 60 inches that performs uniformly good at the same price point as much better performing plasma displays. It is estimated, that by 2009 or 2010, LCD will be able to closely match color and contrast of 4th generation plasma screens. As of this writing (late 2006), most new plasma screens are in their 8th or 9th generation. While the bias of this article is clearly on plasma, overall it just a much more mature display technology than LCD in terms of satisfying "REAL entertainment quality picture". LCD will need to re-invent itself to approach the performance of ever improving plasma which define the standard by which all other digital television displays are currently compared.

Article Continued from ... [1] - [2]

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• Buying into high definition television - What you need to know before you buy
• Choosing the best digital television: DLP vs LCD vs Plasma - Guidance to choosing the best digital television
• DTV converter box review and where to buy - Untangling the choices in DTV converter boxes, here is a short and sweet cheat sheet
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• HDTV Plasma Vendor Directory - Directory of vendors offering plasma sets
• HDTV Programming Directory - Directory of available HDTV content
• Home Design Reference - Guide to resources for designing your home HDTV system

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