Several salespeople seemed eager to sell us an integrated HDTV, pointing out that we’d need the built-in HD tuner to receive and decode the off-air HD signals that would come from my antenna. Integrated sets cost a couple hundred bucks more than what are called monitors—sets that have the resolution to display HD signals, but lack the internal tuner. Manufacturer terms for these sets range from “HD-upgradeable” to “HD-compatible” but they all mean the same thing. If you have cable or satellite, you probably already have a separate tuner and an HD monitor is fine.

Liquid Crystal on silicon - The third type of digital TV technology is LCoS (pronounced “el-koss”), and despite attempts by various manufacturers, is only currently available from Sony and JVC. Like a hybrid form of LCD and DLP, the technology combines the advantages of both, but can also be a bit more expensive.

The integrated tuner’s added cost (and resulting commission) may have sparked the salespeople’s enthusiasm, but the built-in hard drive, or digital video recorder that many of these TVs include sparked mine. The DVR can record TV shows like a VCR but has many other advantages, too, like constantly recording live TV so that you can press pause when the phone rings.

Many integrated sets are also digital cable ready. I could get a CableCard from the cable company, plug the card and the cable line into the TV, and be rid of my cable box altogether. A quick call to my cable company, however, suggested that all would not be so ducky. The digital-cable-ready TVs don’t use the cable company’s on-screen channel guide, can’t access video on demand, and don’t always have dual tuners. This seemed somewhat useless. By law, the cable company is required to provide cards when asked, but the customer service rep mentioned that some TVs have problems accepting an area’s given CableCard—a fact I confirmed with a few neighbors. The cable company’s external dual-tuner, HD-DVR cable box has none of the same drawbacks as CableCard, but does cost a bit more per month.

If the cable company offered more local HD channels, all would be good. But mine doesn’t and its HD-DVR cable box wouldn’t decode off-air signals, which meant I’d still have to get an integrated TV and change inputs for cable versus off-air channels. I could just wait until more local channels were available on cable, but I hate waiting. Frustrated, I cancelled my cable service and signed up for Dish Network’s satellite service, instead. Their PVR-942 receiver not only includes an HD-DVR, but decodes off-air signals, too. The savings on the HD-monitor would offset the cost of the receiver somewhat, but the system would be simpler and my monthly bill would be lower.