“What do you mean a plasma TV needs to be recharged?” I asked a dim-witted salesperson at the local electronics warehouse. He stumbled, admitting that he didn’t know, which wasn’t surprising, particularly since it’s a complete lie. I walked out, mildly disgusted, but mostly amused that retail stores could expect to sell anything at all with such minimal training of their staff. It was only the first store I’d visited on my quest to buy a new TV and I quickly realized it would take dozens more for me to figure out which TV to buy. That was when Editor Mike Wood suggested I log my travels, so that others might shorten their journey when shopping for a big-screen TV.

I was looking to replace my old big-screen TV, which had finally faded away enough to justify giving it to my son to use for his video games, in turn so I could buy a new TV. My son didn’t seem to mind the almost 3-D-like image, as the TV’s internal red, green, and blue tubes had drifted apart from each other. These are some of the shortcomings of cathode-ray tube, or CRT, technology. Sure, I could hire a tech to reconverge the colors, but that costs money, and while the picture was good in its day, it was time for something new. Even though the few remaining models of CRT-based TVs don’t cost a lot and the picture looks good from most of them, my wife always hated the huge cabinet. Promising her something slimmer helped support my cause to get something that would support high-definition signals.

Acronym Soup   Walking into our first retail store, my wife pointed to a plasma TV and said, “I want one of those.”  At least, I think it was a plasma TV. It was flat and hung on a wall, but could have been an LCD. Both technologies can be used in flat displays. While large screen (50-inches or larger) flat-panel sets are coming down in price, look good, and support high definition, they never seem to offer all three at the same time. After an extensive search, we decided that we didn’t want to break the bank or compromise simply for aesthetic reasons, so we looked at what Carlos, one of the more knowledgeable salespeople at the local A/V hut, called digital rear-projection TVs (digital RPTVs).

This group, he exclaimed, includes large-screen TVs that are based on technologies like liquid crystal display (LCD), digital light processing (DLP), or liquid crystal on silicon (LCoS—this is also referred to as HD-ILA in JVC products and SXRD in Sony displays). Screen sizes range from 45 inches on up, and cabinet depths are half of that of our old TV. If you can accommodate the depth, we found you could get a lot more for your money than with a budget-priced plasma.