Scott Wilkinson

At CES last January, LG announced a strategic partnership with Netflix, but no details were revealed. Now, it can be told that LG has been working on the BD300, the world's first Blu-ray player that can stream content directly from Netflix. There are currently 12,000 movies and TV episodes available for streaming, out of over 100,000 DVD and nearly 1000 Blu-ray titles. All streaming content is standard-def, and the final resolution depends on the speed of your Internet connection.

When I reviewed Sony's <A href="http://ultimateavmag.com/flatpaneldisplays/408sonykdl52/">KDL-52XBR4</A> LCD TV in April 2008, I was very impressed for the most part. With excellent color and exceptional detail on HD material, my only reservations were a slightly soft appearance on SD content and a black level that remained a bit elevated on real-world programs. (The black level mysteriously dropped on certain test patterns, even with all dynamic settings disabled.) Also, its list price of $4000 was pretty steep.

As many of you may know, I'm a regular guest on a nationally syndicated radio talk show hosted by Leo Laporte, aka The Tech Guy. The show is broadcast live from 11AM to 2PM Pacific time on Saturdays and Sundays, and my segment is right after the 11:30 news on Saturday.

Robert is just getting started in the whole home-theater game, and he has some basic questions: