Decisions, decisions. Buy a hybrid or dust off the old 10-speed? Blackberry or iPod?

You've already made one decision. With the digital TV transition looming, the temptation of Blu-ray and all the high def programming available, and all your friends, co-workers or family buying big screen HDTVs – your annoying know-it-all neighbor already has two, and won't quit bragging about them – you're ready to take the plunge. Maybe you have a three-year-old 480p EDTV you'd like to move to the bedroom and upgrade your living room to a 50-plus inch HD flat panel. Great news. Unfortunately, you now have another decision.

LCD or plasma?
As your ponder the decision, the question you're mostly likely to swallow your pride to ask that annoying know-it-all neighbor is "Which is better?" That's the wrong question. Neither type of HDTV is inherently "better" than the other. Choosing between plasma or LCD depends on how big an HDTV you want and where you're going to watch it.

Bright lights, big TV
Let's start with your TV room. If you're like most folks, your living room or den is brightly lit, with shining rays from the afternoon sun streaming in through a big window – and right onto the TV screen. Or maybe while you're watching TV, your spouse reads while the kids play on the floor, all under glaring room lights. If one or both of these scenarios describes your situation, than you want LCD. Unlike plasma HDTVs, LCD panels reflect very little light, enhancing the picture's contrast and color in well-lit rooms.

Improving an LCD HDTV's ability to shine, literally, in a bright room, is a new technology called LED backlighting. LEDs are light emitting diodes, the same technology used in thosetiny indicator and power lights you on see on myriad electronics and appliances. On LCD HDTVs such as LG's Full HD 1080p LG90 HDTVs, LED backlighting enable precise localized dimming – each liquid crystal pixel can be darkened or turned off completely.

In practical terms, LED backlighting allows darker parts of scenes to be darker than bright parts of the same scene. LED backlighting also increases contrast ratios and boosts black levels, making the picture pop all the more in a brightly-lit room. LG's LG90 1080p LCD HDTVs with LED backlighting, for instance, produce an unprecedented 1,000,000:1 contrast ratio.

If you're concerned about energy use, either for environmental reasons, costs or both, selective LED backlighting means the entire screen isn't lit all the time. This means your LCD HDTV, generally speaking already more power efficient than plasma HDTVs, uses even less juice.

Smart Sensors and the LCD That Refreshes
Another better picture/less power LCD HDTV technology is LG's Intelligent Sensor. This deceptively simple feature automatically adjusts the picture based on the room lighting conditions. Intelligent Sensor senses the brightness and color characteristics of your ambient room light and adjusts several picture settings, resulting in a picture is better suited to your room lighting and improving detail by more than 100 times.

Since backlighting is lowered in a dark environment, a 47-inch LCD HDTV on for eight hours a day can use 62 percent less energy, which translates to a power bill savings of around $170 annually.

Also improving your LCD HDTV picture is another new technology, 120 hertz (Hz) refresh rate. All TVs have a so-called "field" rate of 60 frames per second – similar to film's 24 frames per second – referred to in the digital TV picture biz as "refresh rate." LG's TruMotion 120Hz technology doubles this refresh rate, pushing its pixels to react faster and smoother with less blur and fewer digital artifacts in quickly-shifting scenes.

Thanks to this 120Hz refresh rate, LG's In Plane Switching (IPS) LCD panels respond quicker to color changes, which also improves picture quality at different viewing angles and smoother motion.

Finally, where you live may be a deciding factor. Plasma HDTVs use a glass substrate envelope with rare natural gases compressed within, sort of a gas sandwich if you will. Changes in air pressure, like at high altitudes, and plasma HDTVs can begin to hum – yes, hum, usually annoyingly out-of-tune humming, like old neon signs.

Looks as good as it looks
Even more basic than LCD vs. plasma is location, location, location. Where in your room do you plan to place your plasma or LCD big screen HDTV?

Perhaps you have an existing TV cabinet where your aging 27-inch analog tube TV now resides. LG's LG70 and LG60 series 32-inch 1080p LCDs will nestle nicely into the space soon to be formerly occupied by your old 27-inch analog TV. Once you start considering a 42-inch or larger flat panel HDTV, the question of room décor begins to enter the purchase conversation. For fashion-conscious home owners, a big screen TV should be seen and, well, not seen.

Short of hiding it behind that big family portrait painting, you want an LCD that's as good looking off as it is on. For instance, instead of a plain old black rectangle, LG's LG90 and LG70 series LCDs are molded in a unique teardrop design, with a high-gloss black finish and color accents for that sleek and stylishly modern 21st century look.

Flat screen HDTVs are, of course, flat, usually around 4-inches thick. But even a couple of inches can create claustrophobia in previously cozy and carefully coiffed quarters. LG's 1080p 47LGX and 42LGX Super Slims are a strikingly slender 1.8-inches thin. You not only get a supermodel skinny LCD, but LG's LGX and LG60 series 1080p LCD HDTVs have a smooth scarlet-colored rear, creating a graceful silhouette perfect for mid-room placement.

Heard But Not Seen
One of the ugliest parts of a flat screen HDTV is its speaker, usually a perforated slab slung along the bottom bezel. A better solution is the new invisible speaker system found – or, actually, not found – on LG's LCD HDTVs. Tuned by renowned audio expert, Mr. Mark Levinson, this unique hide-in-plain-sight system incorporates speaker actuators around the perimeter of the entire otherwise normal-looking frame bezel. No traditional speaker drivers, no unsightly speaker grills.

Not only does this invisible speaker system get you a tonier TV, but minute actuator vibrations turn the entire front bezel into one giant speaker, creating a virtual wall of sound and resulting in a wider sweet spot.

Plus, LG's new Clear Voice technology automatically enhances the sound frequency range of the dialog, creating clearer on-screen conversation that overcomes all background noise swells.

So, LCD or plasma? If you've got a bright room, energy concerns, no desire to see speakers, live in the mountains and know what mauve and taupe are, well, you now have one less decision to make.

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