HDTV

Quite by accident I'm in the market for a new television. The old one "just quit". I'd really been hoping for another five years from it, to let HDTV technology settle down some, but no.

Televisions used to be simple things to evaluate: you picked them by size, and cost, and whether you wanted it to be a piece of furniture. Our last tv was a piece of furniture ("Console"), as had the previous one. It was clear at the time that CRTs were going away, and the console style was history--we bought probably the last one. It had already gotten stupid about its input, the coax had quit working 2-3 yrs ago, so we have been using composite-video input (red/yellow/white RCA cables).

Now, it seems you need an Advanced Degree (tm) to figure out what kind of tv to buy.And that's what we're here for.

There are four technologies where there used to be one (actually, CRT is still available, so that's five).

CRT: same old same old. you can get big CRTs, they work just like always, but they weigh multi-hundred pounds. Avoid.

DLP: Digital Light Processor. This is some funky semiconductor technology that actually dates back to the late 70s. There were demos of this just being shown internally at TI in the late 80s when I was working at TI. By applying microvoltages to what are tiny little mirrors on the surface of a semiconductor, they change shape and flex angle, reflecting light differently. So the tv has light bulb source, these mirrors (I don't know how many are on the chip, but it's a fair quantity), and then a rotating color wheel. Light from bulb reflects off the mirrors, through the color wheel (think of that old slowly rotating color wheel you'd see with a shiny christmas tree and it would change colors), onto the screen. The wheel spins about 10 thousand rpm. I've been told the next gen of tvs with DLP chips won't be using a color wheel, but I have not verified this. You'd figure eventually that thing wears out somehow. The minimum size on these seems to be 42 inches (just over a meter for the international readers).

LCD: a giant version of your thin/flat computer screen. The max size on these seems to be 40 inches right now. I was looking at 32, 37, and 40 inch units. These are good looking units.

Plasma: there's a charged plasma inside (plasma is a gas with electrons stripped off the atoms). Altering the charge applied from outside changes color and intensity. These units seems to start at 42 inches, and that's for the low-resolution versions. They all looked grainy to me, and the big ones are out of my price range. The color intensity of what you see is excellent--everyone likes that part. The old problem of early burnout is gone, I believe.

LCD Projection: A bulb is the light source, shines through several small LCDs (one per color), onto the screen. This is just like the little computer projector units, only larger, and self-contained instead of shining on your wall. The minimum size here seems to be 42 inches, to 70 or more.

There's also the really huge projection units that have been around for years. Not in my price range.

Think about what all inputs you need--there are rather too many of those as well, I think. Composite is the red/yellow/white trio you may already be using. Component is the other color combo, you might be using that, my impression is that this is better than composite. HDMI seems to be the newest one, but I think it's about to get replaced by something else soon. Then there's the antenna input, and the coax (analog cable) input, and maybe a PC/VGA input (play a computer game on the huge screen).

The next characteristic to think about is the signal resolution. CRT tvs are 480i. LCDs are 720p or 1080p; generally a 720p tv can display a 1080 signal (presumably by just dropping out pixels). Projection units are 720 or 1080, for both DLP and LCD. Plasmas tend to be the in-between EDTV. The "p" versus "i" means progressive or interlaced. Old tv is interlaced, it's not so good, and is the cause of weird flickering you see with fine horizontal lines. Progressive is better.

CRT tvs are: 640x480. EDTV is 840x620 or something like that; better, but really not worth your time. LCDs are 1280x720, or 1366x900 or something. High-res HDTV is 1900x1080.

So your best picture is going to be on the 1900x1080 screen with a full 1080 signal (and that 1080 is why the signal is called 1080). Of course, these cost more, but they are good looking. But you are going to have to pay a bit more for the content/signal. We decided against that.

Another concern for me was what about DVR? Right now, I have analog cable. It feeds the tv and my DVR unit, which has channel selection, converts analog into DV, goes right into my computer, where I can edit it down a little by cutting out commercials, and then burn a DVD. That thing isn't going to work if I switch to digital cable. Then I'd have to get the box, and pipe the coax output into my DVR unit. Not what I want to do.

In 2008, the tv broadcasters are required to switch over to HD broadcasts (I'm probably screwed re DVR at that point, having to buy something new). I presume that means 1080, but I don't know. My impression is that many are already broadcasting an HD signal on some other channel. I had hoped not be getting a new tv until after this had happened, but even then a lot of older stuff is still going to be CRT-resolution content, so you really want to be happy with how an older signal looks on the new tv. I've also read that you can probably receive those HD broadcast signals on a normal antenna, if you aren't going to go with digital cable--which we are not: higher cost, and we aren't interested in any of those other digital channels.

I really wanted to like the DLP units. There was a spec-wise nice unit available for $1600, with stand, but it just didn't look that good; seemed dark, real off-axis trouble. DLP screens seem to have trouble about off-axis image brightness: you really need to be watching them straight-on. At the almost last minute I saw a 1080 DLP unit that was in my price range, but it just didn't look that great; it seemed better than the others, and getting into 1080 right away would be good (ready for the future), I wasn't that impressed.

if Samsung offered a 3751 LCD unit, we'd have bought that--the 3251 and 4051 units look great, but 32 is smaller than I want to go, and the 4051 is out of my price range. We also liked a Philips 37 inch we saw, that was 2nd choice overall.

but we are going with the Sony KDFE 50A10 LCD projection unit. It looked best overall. Well, actually the 42A10 looked best, because it's 1280x720 at 42 inches, the 50A10 is 1280x720 at 50 inches--so it looks a little grainier. But overall these two looked best at the multiple signals we saw, and the online comments re both 42 and 50 were excellent.

And they're not too heavy about 75 pounds. The base/stand is about the same weight--you pretty much have to have one, and really for these two you need to get the matching stand, which costs about $300.

I recommend looking them over at a couple of different stores (because they'll have different signals they show, and different lighting). And check the online prices, and remember about the shipping cost, which will be around $200--which might make up the different between that price and your local store. and think about the extended warranty if you get a projection unit--the dirty little secret seems to be the unmentioned bulb life. My suspicion is that no one really knows what the lifetime is on the bulbs, and they aren't cheap (typically $200 or so, and you can't just buy them at Home Depot). And how long will they be in production? This worries my slightly.

Think about how much time you really spend in front of the tv, and whether you really want to spend the $ for a great big one. We have the tv on maybe two hours per day (depending of course on what's showing), and we really only watch a few channels: FoodTV, TCM, Spike (MXC)...I could swear there was another one, but maybe not. We do have plenty of DVDs, and older VCR tapes. I'm definitely looking forward to seeing Star Wars on a big screen: remastered high-res spaceships going kablooey on a big screen--that's what I'm talking about.

Having covered more Oblivion territory...

btw, I'm at sneak 100.

Something funky happened. I had gone through Fatback Cave, I did a lot of sneak, bypassing the Goblin warlords. No interest in taking them on, they don't carry anything interesting (except one), so I just grabbed loot in boxes. I killed all the goblin shamans, they at least have something interesting. Then I left.

Later I came back, and lo and behold, the cave is repopulated with loot and goblins, including the two guards outside, and the footplate-based trap is reset.

Huh? I thought once you cleared a place it stayed that way. Maybe a rat or two returns, but an entire group, AND the chests are refilled? Wow, and nifty! Maybe this means I can go back through other places where I got really neat loot. Not that you can sell it for anything much, or buy anything interesting. The only things I've found for sale that I thought were interesting are spells I can't use (3-400 magicka range). There's the very occasional special weapon for sale, but I already have better stuff. This was true in Morrowind too. Interesting weapons seem rare at merchants.

Money seems of limited value in Oblivion. Not much of great interest that you can buy. Spells, enchantments. Not something you do often, and as you can't get rid of spells afterward, I don't buy many; can't remember which ones I really like--and once I replaced "Ease Burden" with "Pack Mule" I'd like to forget "EB". Can't.

Alright, you can buy training, but since you have to level-up to get another five training slots, this isn't too exciting, and can't happen very fast.

Dungeon Siege got this right--merchants (of which there weren't many) had mountains of stuff, huge variability in all categories.

You will need/want to make yourself a ring of night-eye (you only need a petty soul for this). Makes caves/etc be lit up like daytime. Hard to beat that. And you want something that has long-range life-detection. And an enchanted silver blade, for hitting undead things like ghosts and will-o-wisps. and you need to make yourself an equivalent to Morrowind's "Soul Drinker". I think you can't make a jinkblade, so you really want to make your Mage's Guild staff be one of paralyze. Although that's not perfect either. I think not everyone can be paralyzed.

The non-availability of more advanced weapons regularly is pretty annoying. I'm still working with the Honorblade, which you can get pretty early, when it's a fabulous weapon. Many levels later, it's a little better (I think it starts out around 16 hp, 15 levels later I'm up to 20 hp with it--I ought to have a least a 30-hp weapon by now, maybe 40).

Addendum to Morrowind vs Oblivion

One of the things you find out quick in these games is that you reach a point, perhaps *too* early, where there's more loot around than you can carry. In "M", you will get access to the combination of "Mark", Almsivi/Divine Intervention, and "Recall". "Mark" creates a designated map location where you are standing (i.e., mark my location). Intervention teleports you to a Temple or wherever location (same one each time). Recall teleports you back to the "Mark" spot. Once you go get the game mod that puts a merchant at the various temple/etc locations you jump to, then you're all set. You grab all the loot you can, and overload yourself as much as you want, cast "Mark", call Intervention, sell everything, and cast Recall, to go back for more stuff or continue on from where you were. Works great, once you have the game mod. Otherwise, you can jump out with the loot, and drop, and go back, but you still would have to return and carry it all to a merchant, thus the need for the mod.

Far as I can tell, "O" doesn't have such a thing. Maybe I just haven't found it. Hope that happens soon...in Fort Grief and Veyond Cave, I had seriously good loot, very heavy, I had to make 3 or 4 trips back and forth to get it all dragged home and sold or stored. A bit time-consuming. I'd be happy if I could designate a single warp-to point, like my house (if I had one) or a favorite merchant. But because I don't, I don't really both with low-value loot. In "M" anything less than 1000 gold I don't even look at; I'm carrying about 1.5 mil, have another 2-3 mil in storage, what do I want with low-dollar stuff? I can make potions if I need to, but I don't, since I enchanted my armor to recover just about everything. The big gold is more for buying expensive enchantments.

This would also be valuable inside the Oblivion Gates. I was whacking plenty of Dremora in there, and they'd mostly have maces. Not particularly valuable, and too heavy to carry more than one of, but if I could jump out and drop them somewhere and deal with selling them later, and then jump back, I'd be willing and able to keep them. Normally when you grab the Sigil Stone at the eand of a Gate, the whole area is destroyed and becomes unavailable--and loot left behind is gone.

[Where this wouldn't work, and the reason I think "O" doesn't have this capability anywhere: the quest where you go to Fort Grief to rescue a guy is dependent on your just not being able to get out other than by completing the task. If you could do Almsivi Intervention escapes, the FG task becomes far less dangerous.]

I haven't investigated whether or not if I bribe a merchant upwards on friendliness how much better the prices get in my favor. It ought to work like that.

As others have written elsewhere, when you level up, other critters get stronger, and you get different critters.