Audio Video News

  Who knows what the future may bring? Pioneer has announced its plans for the beloved Kuro line of plasma televisions, but those plans still seem so...unpredictable.

Will Panasonic really incorporate enough of Pioneer's tech innards to make the co-produced sets competitive? Will Pioneer's foray into LCD panels (some of which might even end up branded as Kuro) really yield tempting results? At this point, its hard to say. That's why, for Kuro-fans beginning to think "now or never," its time to go shopping.

And from what we can tell so far, even all the increased attention to the Kuro sets and increased consumer desire to get them while they last hasn't bumped up prices. In fact, they seem to be lowering.

For example, look at the luscious PDP-6010FD - Pioneer's 60-inch wonder. According to PriceScan.com, the average selling price of this unit had stabilized in the last few weeks before the Pioneer rumors and announcements at about $4,500, after dropping from around $5,100 over the holidays. Pioneer's list price for the unit is $6,500.

It is too early to tally the average selling price for last week and this week, but we've found a number of tempting deals. Keep in mind that online prices change constantly and your mileage may vary, but Buy.com is letting it go for $3,386 including shipping. Should that remarkable deal disappear, consider 123buydirect.com's offer of $4,075 including shipping. Beach Camera's got it for $4,105 with free shipping and no tax. And all these deals have appeared since Friday night, when the cheapest we could find was $4,268 from Amazon.com seller 6ave Electronics. Happy Kuro hunting. -Rachel Rosmarin

PriceScan.com