| Q: I bought a TV in the last few years. How do I know if it’s HD-capable or not? |
| A: With each passing year it gets harder and harder to avoid buying something HD-capable. You may own an HD-capable display and not even know it. Is it Widescreen? That would be your first tip. While there are a number of non-HD widescreen displays, particularly plasmas, most widescreen CRT rear-projection sets are HD-capable. This is particularly true if the set was purchased after 1998 when digital displays were introduced to the market. It’s possible that a 4:3 shaped set is HD, particularly if it offers a 16:9 mode. Mainly, the set needs to have a horizontal scanning capability in excess of 33 kHz or a native vertical pixel resolution that’s 720 or higher. Older HD-ready TVs will have a component (YprPb), five-wire RGB or a VGA-type connector, along with a label near the connector that says Wideband, 1080i or something else that would indicate that it’s a high definition input and accepts high definition signals. Newer displays offer digital connections like DVI and Firewire. Get the model number off of the back of the unit if you need to call the manufacturer. |
» Return to Digital TV readers' most common questions
