HDTV Buying Tips

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HDTV Buying Tips
Deep Cover Geoffrey Morrison answers his own questions!
The Editors  |  Apr 01, 2004
Three HT editors don their consumer personas to find out how much the average mass-market salesperson really knows about today's most popular technologies. You've heard us say time and time again that the specialty retailer is the place to shop if you want personalized attention from a truly knowledgeable sales staff. Still, many of you insist on wiling away the hours at a mass-market retailer conveniently located in a strip mall near you. We can't really blame you. Convenience is a precious commodity in today's world. The question is, can you get a little knowledge and sound advice to accompany that convenience, or are you being led astray? We loaded up three of our editors with an arsenal of questions and sent them off to the Big Three retailers: Best Buy, Circuit City, and relative newcomer Ultimate Electronics. Their mission: Bring us back the goods and the not-so-goods from their buying experience.
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HDTV Buying Tips
Deep Cover Page the Second
The Editors  |  Apr 01, 2004
Three HT editors don their consumer personas to find out how much the average mass-market salesperson really knows about today's most popular technologies. You've heard us say time and time again that the specialty retailer is the place to shop if you want personalized attention from a truly knowledgeable sales staff. Still, many of you insist on wiling away the hours at a mass-market retailer conveniently located in a strip mall near you. We can't really blame you. Convenience is a precious commodity in today's world. The question is, can you get a little knowledge and sound advice to accompany that convenience, or are you being led astray? We loaded up three of our editors with an arsenal of questions and sent them off to the Big Three retailers: Best Buy, Circuit City, and relative newcomer Ultimate Electronics. Their mission: Bring us back the goods and the not-so-goods from their buying experience.
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Audio Separates Buying TipsAV Receiver Buying TipsBlu-ray Player Buying TipsHDTV Buying TipsProjector Buying TipsSpeaker Buying TipsHome Movie Theaters
Designing Your System
Steve Faber  |  Aug 31, 2007
Choosing components that work for you.
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HDTV Buying Tips
Disco-Rama and Other CE Sales Lingo You Need to Know
Michael Antonoff  |  Oct 29, 2012
Ever seen a TV set disco? Retailers see TVs dance off the shelves two or three times a year as manufacturers refresh their lines.

Welcome to the secret language of consumer electronics (CE) retailing. To the public, a set that discos should be mounted on a turntable so that the screen can be swung around by viewing partners from opposite directions. But to those who sell TVs, the term is shorthand for discontinued.

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Audio Separates Buying TipsAV Receiver Buying TipsBlu-ray Player Buying TipsHDTV Buying TipsProjector Buying TipsHome Movie Theaters
Elements of a Home Theater: All the Pieces You’ll Need to Bring it Together
Rob Sabin  |  Mar 27, 2013
Putting together a home theater can seem like a daunting task. So many pieces to think through and connect up! But if you care enough to do your homework and educate yourself, you’ll find it’s not as complicated as it looks. Here’s what goes into your typical viewing room.

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HDTV Buying Tips
Flat Panel Shopping Tips
Shane Buettner  |  Apr 30, 2007
Be Careful Buying A Flat Panel On The Internet
Flat panels, and especially plasmas, are big, relatively heavy and very fragile. Internet sites often offer the best price, but be sure you know who you're dealing with and what their return policies are should your TV be defective, or if you just plain don't like it. A flat panel is a big, expensive item to ship. A local retailer might charge more, but offer invaluable service should you not be happy with your purchase or have a defective unit.
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HDTV Buying TipsHDTV Tech
How Smart Are Current Smart TVs?
Al Griffin  |  Jan 24, 2014
There’s no doubt that Smart TVs have been getting smarter. While the earliest Smart TVs were limited to streaming movies and basic Web browsing, today’s models may encompass voice or gesture commands, the ability to “throw” your favorite photos to the screen from your smartphone, facial recognition for customized user menus, or even the ability to recommend shows based on your past viewing.
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HDTV Buying Tips
How To Buy a 4K TV
Mark Henninger  |  Apr 23, 2023
2023 marks the 10th anniversary of both consumer OLED TVs and Ultra HD TVs. In those ten short years we have seen the demise of plasma and 3D and curved screens. We witnessed the rise of HDR and high frame rates and the dawn of the gaming TV era. 4K has become dominant and 8K exists for those who want it. The focus of what makes a great TV has shifted from home theater to a broader spectrum of streaming, gaming, displaying art and other applications, but the fundamentals of what makes a great TV are largely the same: Color accuracy, gamut, contrast, and motion rendering need to be top-notch.
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HDTV Buying TipsHDTV SetupHDTV Tech
How to Buy an HDTV
Geoffrey Morrison  |  May 21, 2007  |  First Published: Apr 21, 2007
Have no fear. HTis here.

There is a lot of confusion for most people as to what they should look for when buying a TV. With the plethora of acronyms, abbreviations, nomenclatures, technologies, and other multisyllabic synonyms for "huh?" this is hardly surprising. While we feel, as you would expect, that prodigious study of Home Theater magazine would educate you to make an informed decision, we also appreciate the need for a boiled-down version for those new to the home theater world—the Cliffs Notes version, if you will. Well, let us oblige.

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HDTV Buying Tips
How To Buy An Ultra HDTV
Al Griffin  |  Dec 21, 2016
If you’re considering buying a new TV, you can be forgiven for having questions, possibly many of them. Several big-screen TV technologies—Ultra HDTV, high dynamic range (HDR), OLED—have been introduced over the past few years. At the same time, some older ones, including 3D and plasma, have faded from prominence. There have also been changes on the connectivity front, with new versions of the HDMI standard added to sets to accommodate new, higher-bandwidth signal formats.
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HDTV Buying Tips
How to Buy Smart TVs
Al Griffin  |  Nov 20, 2012

Anyone shopping for a new set over the past year is likely to have encountered the term “Smart TV.” But what is a Smart TV? And why exactly should you want one? These are relevant questions because Smart TV is the latest marketing juggernaut to hit premium sets. Unless you make an effort to learn about Smart TV, there’s a chance you’ll end up paying for features that you don’t want or need.

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3D TechHDTV Buying TipsHDTV Tech
How to Choose a Flat Panel
Shane Buettner, Thomas J. Norton  |  Nov 15, 2010
It’s getting better all the time.

When we wrote this feature for last year’s HDTV Buyer’s Guide issue, the flat-panel HDTV market was much simpler. 3D was nowhere in sight, and much of our analysis boiled down to the pros and cons of LCD and plasma technology. This year, 3D is just one of the newer wrinkles in the market. The number of plasmas in the market isn’t what it was just a few years ago, but plasma is not only hanging on, the best plasmas still stake a legitimate claim to being the best flat panels available. With LCDs, manufacturers are aggressively using the backlighting techniques to market the sets. In fact, LCDs are getting more and more sophisticated and offering serious potential value. There’s a lot to learn, so let’s get going.

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HDTV Buying TipsHDTV SetupHDTV Tech
How To Choose: Flat-Panel HDTVs
Thomas J. Norton, Rob Sabin  |  Dec 08, 2011
Flat-panel HDTVs have undergone rapid changes in technology and pricing. There are now two types of 3D systems for you to decide between, screen sizes have continued to inch up, prices have come down, and the battle between LCD and plasma for image-quality supremacy has heated up, with the latest generation of top-line LED models challenging plasma’s long-held position at the top of the enthusiast heap.
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HDTV Buying TipsHDTV Tech
How TV Makers Spin the Specs
Michael Antonoff  |  Apr 04, 2013
When the technical specifications of a new but humdrum TV fail to come up to snuff, the model almost certainly will be priced less than the one with better resolution, faster processing, more connections, and so on. Whether it’s manufacturer or retailer, nobody interested in making a buck will promote the TV as “nothing special”—even if that’s exactly what it is. Sellers will likely spin the spec as “great value.” But not always.
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HDTV Buying TipsHDTV Tech
Just the Facts: Flat-Panel HDTV Shopping & Tech Tips
Rob Sabin  |  Oct 19, 2012
Looking for that perfect big-screen TV? Before you hit the stores, here’s everything you need to know in a quick-read format. Visit our How To Shop page for tips on shopping for Speakers, A/V Receivers, Blu-ray Players and more.
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