TV Buying Question LED or LCD?

[Atreides]

If you're going to be playing games at least 75% of the time then I guess Plasma would be okay, but as monitors go I still prefer LCD. I have my old bedroom TV as my current monitor, a 32" LCD, but I couldn't imagine it being a plasma especially considering I leave it on all day long lol.

[orson]

You'd be surprised how nice the LED TVs are now for contrast and refresh rates. You won't be able to notice the difference unless you're a technophile. It's very hard to tell the difference between a plasma and LED under the best of cicumstances. As ratings go LEDs tend to have more vivid colors and better depth of field. The main advantage is that plasmas are still better in the cheaper range of TVs. Either way you buy a LCD (especially LED backlight) and you'll end up saving the money over the course of ownership through your power bill.

One thing definitely though is if you're getting into 3D TV you should be buy a plasma or if you do go LED make sure you buy 240hz otherwise at 120hz or less you're actually only running at about 1/2 the displayed resolution. Plasma can display pixels far faster so it can keep a constant pixel rate even with active shutter technology.

[Atreides]

there is still no way an LED can provide anywhere near the same contrast range for the same amount of money. Even with locally dimmable backlit LED-LCDs you're still going to have some bleeding, "gray" blacks/oversaturation, and unless you're talking about the really expensive ones, motion blurring.

I still think LEDs have a long way to go before buying one constitutes something other than spending more money to compromise on something that will be an issue in virtually 90% of what I plan to use the TV for.

As for 3D TV i would definitely wait to buy one period. It may look nice in theaters but even the expensive top of the line 3DTVs look like shit.

[Reality]

Vivid colors arent natural colors, this is why LCDs are always running torch/dynamic mode in B&M stores, because ignorant customers think its a better picture when it really isnt, plasmas and CRTs will always have the most natural looking picture, and you dont need to be a technophile to see it especially if the two sets are side by side

[Darus Grey]

The main advantage is that plasmas are still better in the cheaper range of TVs. Either way you buy a LCD (especially LED backlight) and you'll end up saving the money over the course of ownership through your power bill.

Considering a $700 plasma has better performance across the board than even a $4000LCD(and then it's just "comparable", not "on par", and most of that increase is from proper factory calibration...could calibrate the plasma too)... the only way you could constitute that as "Saving money" is if you purposefully wanted to buy a shit TV ....why...I don't know.


The MAIN advantage of LCDs is that you can buy them under 42 inches, if you need to, where Plasma starts at 42.

Back to topic:

I personally wouldn't recommend ANY tv as a computer monitor simply because for anything BUT playing games, the dot-pitch is fucking terrible and just looks ugly. But if you specifically intend it for console and PC gaming instead of a main monitor, either work.

I'd be very very informed about the input lag of whatever set you buy, because PC monitors don't have any kind of image post-processing(typically), so PC games are designed around close-to-0 levels of input lag.

[kareface]

That's why it's recommended to break in a plasma for 200-1000 hours when you get it, basically sacrifice a couple months off it's lifespan to simply not worry about it, people rarely keep them that long anyways.

Don't take most of what I say as if it's directed at you, I'm just gonna mention this for everyone's benefit. The "break in" period has been wildly exaggerated. It's just more likely to create a problem if you do something that would cause burn-in during the initial use of the TV. Stuff like burn-in disks are pointless. As long as you don't do something like leave a movie paused on the screen for the first day you have it plugged in you should be fine. This is just another one of those things that makes it's rounds. Talking about bad rumors, there are places you can send your speaker cable in to "break it in" too. They can also tell you which direction you need to plug in the cable. AVphiles are beyond stupid sometimes, lol.

PS: People who live near the Seattle area and want basic audio or video calibration let me know. I've got lab calibrated hardware and most of the time it just sits in my closet.

[orson]

You're just not correct in what you're saying apart from the initial investment. Ya plasma are considerably cheaper atm but LED TVs are rated just as highly as plasma.

http://led-tvbuyingguide.com/ledtv/led-vs-plasma.html

This site might be called LEDTV but it's a host of sites that does testing on every single type of TV. For most purposes except for minor advantages like viewing angles LEDs are equal. Also a LED TV will produce brighter lights as well which from what I've witnessed produces amazing depth of field that plasmas can't (unless some of the newer plasmas are up to this point.) The brightness doesn't wash out colors like it used to either. Also @Reality vivid colors (you're thinking washed out colors) can be very life like, a bright light such as a sunset or similar vista will look more realistic on a LED.

This is a moot point until the price of LEDs become comparable to plasmas really because most people just look at the initial cost of investment anyways. I'm guessing though just due to the cost of manufacturing and power consumption LEDs should be comparable in price fairly soon. Either way at this time I still agree that getting a plasma is better bang for your buck unless you can find an LED with 240hz refresh and with-in $200-$300 dollars.

[kareface]

You're just not correct in what you're saying apart from the initial investment. Ya plasma are considerably cheaper atm but LED TVs are rated just as highly as plasma.

http://led-tvbuyingguide.com/ledtv/led-vs-plasma.html

This site might be called LEDTV but it's a host of sites that does testing on every single type of TV. For most purposes except for minor advantages like viewing angles LEDs are equal. Also a LED TV will produce brighter lights as well which from what I've witnessed produces amazing depth of field that plasmas can't (unless some of the newer plasmas are up to this point.) The brightness doesn't wash out colors like it used to either. Also @Reality vivid colors (you're thinking washed out colors) can be very life like, a bright light such as a sunset or similar vista will look more realistic on a LED.

This is a moot point until the price of LEDs become comparable to plasmas really because most people just look at the initial cost of investment anyways. I'm guessing though just due to the cost of manufacturing and power consumption LEDs should be comparable in price fairly soon. Either way at this time I still agree that getting a plasma is better bang for your buck unless you can find an LED with 240hz refresh and with-in $200-$300 dollars.

They really aren't. The black levels & pixel switching time will not compare, it's just a limitation of the technology. You might be able to get color reproduction that's on par but deep blacks really make or break a good display. Their rating system doesn't matter if in reality the displays produce very different results.

[Darus Grey]

Don't take most of what I say as if it's directed at you, I'm just gonna mention this for everyone's benefit. The "break in" period has been wildly exaggerated. It's just more likely to create a problem if you do something that would cause burn-in during the initial use of the TV. Stuff like burn-in disks are pointless. As long as you don't do something like leave a movie paused on the screen for the first day you have it plugged in you should be fine. This is just another one of those things that makes it's rounds. Talking about bad rumors, there are places you can send your speaker cable in to "break it in" too. They can also tell you which direction you need to plug in the cable. AVphiles are beyond stupid sometimes, lol.

PS: People who live near the Seattle area and want basic audio or video calibration let me know. I've got lab calibrated hardware and most of the time it just sits in my closet.

For typical use where you're varying content a lot you're right in that it's more of a precaution than a necessity.

Not sure I'd claim them as "pointless", since break-in does clearly have an effect. For my arcade I bought plasmas, and in my circumstances that means 8-10 hours a day of fight game lifebars on the screen.

When I first got them they'd stay on the screen for two weeks after a game-night, after I did about 200 hours they'd go away in a day, and then after 500 hours about 20 minutes.

It's less about needing it to "protect" it, more about simply getting it to a point of not worrying about it.

I know my use of them is at the extreme end, because the actual content rarely if ever changes(same fighting game, or different one with the lifebars in near the same place anyways), so for me break-in is more of a necessity.

But you're right that for the average user they don't need to do it ever, long as they vary content normally(unlike me, who basically plays the same game for 5000 hours consecutively).

And yes, I've lived through the days of the $2500 power cords like you have, lol.

[Boyiee]

If I'm planning to use a tv as a computer monitor and gaming I should stick with LCD or LED-LCD, but what size is too large/small, considering I'll be using it for TV too? I plan on mounting it on the wall so my face wont by right in it, but I also use a dual monitor setup. Seems more logical to spend 500+ on a non-3d tv than 500+ on a 24inch 3d monitor setup.

[Amele]

If I'm planning to use a tv as a computer monitor and gaming I should stick with LCD or LED-LCD, but what size is too large/small, considering I'll be using it for TV too? I plan on mounting it on the wall so my face wont by right in it, but I also use a dual monitor setup. Seems more logical to spend 500+ on a non-3d tv than 500+ on a 24inch 3d monitor setup.

how big is the room you're planning to put it in?

in a typical small, city apartment (so rooms in the area of 12'x10' being 'biggest room you have') a 26-30" screen will be fine if it's mounted on the near wall, and about a 36" would be fine on the far wall.

http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/image...192561996_.jpg (h/t amazon.com)

you're a gamer so your tolerance for apparently too large screens may be increased slightly by monitor use: e.g., a typical 'large' computer monitor today is in the 25-30" range and most users still sit within about 1.5 feet, if this is you, just half the distances on the list to get an idea.

[Boyiee]

Yeah I'll be about 36-48inches away when using it as a monitor and up to 10ft away when its a tv, so I guess a 32-40inch works perfect. Thinking 40inch is too much buttttttttt whatever I can put it in the corner or something. Currently using 2x 26inch monitors.

[kareface]

For typical use where you're varying content a lot you're right in that it's more of a precaution than a necessity.

Not sure I'd claim them as "pointless", since break-in does clearly have an effect. For my arcade I bought plasmas, and in my circumstances that means 8-10 hours a day of fight game lifebars on the screen.

When I first got them they'd stay on the screen for two weeks after a game-night, after I did about 200 hours they'd go away in a day, and then after 500 hours about 20 minutes.

It's less about needing it to "protect" it, more about simply getting it to a point of not worrying about it.

I know my use of them is at the extreme end, because the actual content rarely if ever changes(same fighting game, or different one with the lifebars in near the same place anyways), so for me break-in is more of a necessity.

But you're right that for the average user they don't need to do it ever, long as they vary content normally(unlike me, who basically plays the same game for 5000 hours consecutively).

And yes, I've lived through the days of the $2500 power cords like you have, lol.

After the break in period, anything done to the TV has no bearing on whether a burn in disk was used or not. Burn in disks are only really useful if you plan to get through the burn in period quickly. So in that sense you are right why you say they have some worth. There just seems to be this myth floating around that if you used a break in disk, somehow months later you're less likely to burn-in an image. The break-in period is because new PDP's run hotter during their initial use. The phosphors are more excited and put out a lot more heat, which is one of the main causes of burn-in. Once the period is over the phosphors will have settled in to their normal state and it makes no difference what the conditions were like before that period. As long as you don't burn an image in during that period, after that point everyone's on the same footing.

[Reality]

even after completely aging the phosphors for the first 1000-2000 hours, things like fighting game health bars/clock, FPS HUD's can still cause phosphor aging prematurely in those parts of the screen which, isn't burn in, but ultimately has the same effect (those parts of the screen will be dimmer than the rest of the screen)

you just have to be more careful with plasmas, but the price you're paying with being careful is a beautiful picture

[kareface]

even after completely aging the phosphors for the first 1000-2000 hours, things like fighting game health bars/clock, FPS HUD's can still cause phosphor aging prematurely in those parts of the screen which, isn't burn in, but ultimately has the same effect (those parts of the screen will be dimmer than the rest of the screen)

you just have to be more careful with plasmas, but the price you're paying with being careful is a beautiful picture

This is true, but it's not difficult to correct for things like this. There are many functions which reduce of not eliminate the problem for most people. Unless you play the same game with a high contrast HUD for countless hours you should be fine.

[Reality]

I saw Pixel Shift mentioned earlier in this thread, and let me tell you:

Pixel Shift is damn near worthless, because large static images on the screen that have large solid colors or logos are largely unaffected by Pixel Shift

So if you're watching, say, ESPN2. The ticker on the bottom, with the ESPN logo in the lower corner, pixel shift will merely shift it to the left/right by only a few pixels, which means there will still be parts of the display that are still displaying that same color and brightness level, it just smears it out more to the left and right

Pixel Shift is useful when you need to shift small objects on the screen, say a HUD in a game that uses thin lines that will move completely when the screen shifts it's pixels

[kareface]

I saw Pixel Shift mentioned earlier in this thread, and let me tell you:

Pixel Shift is damn near worthless, because large static images on the screen that have large solid colors or logos are largely unaffected by Pixel Shift

So if you're watching, say, ESPN2. The ticker on the bottom, with the ESPN logo in the lower corner, pixel shift will merely shift it to the left/right by only a few pixels, which means there will still be parts of the display that are still displaying that same color and brightness level, it just smears it out more to the left and right

Pixel Shift is useful when you need to shift small objects on the screen, say a HUD in a game that uses thin lines that will move completely when the screen shifts it's pixels

You know you can adjust it? If you have vertical burn in problems you can adjust the shifting to match, and you can control how it's implemented. It depends on the display, some of the more advanced settings will be in the service menu.

[Holly Short]

Sorry to bump with my own question, but since I know nothing on this subject figured I'd get clarification:

If I am just looking at a TV for console gaming/blu-ray's/tv watching, I should get a plasma?

I have a 24 inch LCD for my computer needs, but if I decided to upgrade I should get an LED for my computer?

Thanks.

[kareface]

Sorry to bump with my own question, but since I know nothing on this subject figured I'd get clarification:

If I am just looking at a TV for console gaming/blu-ray's/tv watching, I should get a plasma?

I have a 24 inch LCD for my computer needs, but if I decided to upgrade I should get an LED for my computer?

Thanks.

LCD is fine for computers. You would only need an LED lit LCD if you were doing photoshop work. As for the plasma question, it really comes down to how bright your room is and how much do you do that could result in burn-in. If the room is really bright than an LCD might be a better option. If you play a game that leaves a pattern on the screen for an ass ton hours (hardcore MMO levels) on end it might be a better idea to get an LCD. Those are the only 2 good reasons to get an LCD over a plasma in my opinion.

[Holly Short]

I see.

No, I would not be playing any super long term games on the TV. Mostly just a few hours here and there, any MMO-ing will be on the PC.

Not sure if this matters much, but I never turn the lights on unless I am reading really. I'd prefer to game and watch tv/movies in the dark.

Have a recommendation of which Plasma brands and LCD brands to look at?