PLASMA or LCD TV's?
This is a very sought after answer. My personal preference is Plasma. Only a matter of a year or so ago LCD was still catching up to plasma in picture quality and plasma was catching up to LCD in reliability. I'd have to say they're on an equal playing field, with quality of picture and reliability now. The only difference is plasma is better "bang-for-buck", however LCD consumes half the power of an equal sized plasma. It really comes down to personal preference. You can't go wrong either way as long as you try and get yourself a FULL HD 1080p in the attempt to future proof your purchase for 5 or 6 years.
I want to buy a Home Theatre system, what are my options?
1. Buy a "home theatre in a box" package (with or without amplifier and DVD player)
Pros: They're normally reasonably cheap (anything from $200 to around $800). You normally get a full set of at least five speakers and a subwoofer. They're often designed to "look good" and blend into the decor.
Cons: They're normally very low quality in comparison to a decent system. They frequently aren't upgradeable and have limited features. They often struggle at moderate to high volumes
2. Buy everything individually.
Pros: You can get significantly better music and home theatre audio quality. You can pick something with a sound you like. You can make sure you get the features you want. You can make sure the speakers will "fill" wherever you watch movies.
Cons: They're typically far more expensive (typically anywhere from two to five times more expensive). They often look like traditional speakers, which may not fit in with your decor.
OK, so which should I buy? It all depends on your budget and whether you enjoy listening to music. If your budget is low but you want the full "home theatre", you're pretty much limited to a home theatre in a box system. If you don't listen to much music, there's not going to be much difference between a decent home theatre in a box system and a individually selected system at twice the price. There will be a difference, but it may not be enough to justify spending twice as much. If you do enjoy listening to music, an individually selected system will sound significantly better. Whether you think it's worth it is a different matter, but you should definitely at least go and listen to some quality setups.
Why should I get digital TV?
"The digital age is here" - Depending on your area. Digital TV is really the first major improvement we have had in TV since the introduction of colour to our screens and the uptake at the moment has been quite slow. As of now (May/05) around 80-85% of Australia has access to digital TV with people needing to buy a digital set top box to access the content.
I'll provide a brief explanation of the advantages of digital TV along with some general information about it. In the majority of area's DTV is up and running and all you need to do is buy what's called a digital set top box to access this content right now. Along with digital at the moment is the old analogue signal being broadcasted which is why you can still watch TV without a set top box. The analogue signal will continue to be broadcast until at least 2009 in metropolitan areas and possibly until 2013 for other areas.
These are the advantages of digital TV:
1. You will get an improved picture You will get better quality sound You will get a widescreen picture You will get access to special items like electronic guides.
2. You will get access to extra channels like ABC2, that's not all of them but the main ones that if you're going to switch would make you do it.
To give you an idea the picture of a SD broadcast is DVD quality, so it's a nice picture. I get asked a lot however whether or not the TV is compatible with Digital TV. All you need for digital TV is a set of RCA sockets, which are your red, white and yellow plugs. If you have these you can get digital TV on your TV via a set top box. However, most new TV's these days have an in-built digital tuner which means a set top box is not required for these.
