Hi Quantum,
When you say lower quality picture??? When I walk into Laser/Comet even Currys I am amazed at the quality of the pictures on LCD. Fantastic defination and clarity compared to my present digital tv. What am I missing, is it really that bad??
cheers
It's all about resolution, a top HD siginal is 1080p, which is: 1920 x 1080, a slightly lower HD signal is 720p which is: 1280 x 720. Apparently most people can't tell the difference between these 2 in a normal living room environment unless the T.V is 65 inches or bigger, personally I can.
Some HD TVs can only display 720p, so check that out before hand. But the real issue is that standard U.K T.V is 576p, which is 720 x 576, now when you stretch 576p to 1080p, especially on a fixed resolution device like a flat screen, you simply get a lower quality picture. The other issue is that LCD in particular is actually a lower quality picture than CRT, this is just fundamental to its technology at the moment, but it is improving a little bit at a time.
In all likelihood, what you see at places like Comet or Currys is an actual HD Movie being played, which requires a computer outputting an HD Signal to it, an HD DVD or Blu Ray Player or a Sky HD subscription (which costs an extra £10 a month on top of a normal subscription, plus it used to cost £300 for the Sky HD Box, but they may have got rid of that extra cost, I'm not sure). Also be aware with Sky HD, there are only a limited number of channels which are actually HD, a couple of the movies, a couple of the sports, a few nature documentary channels, SkyOne HD, BBC HD (very limited stuff on this) and maybe a few more.
Most people take their brand new large flat panel T.V home to find the picture looks almost exactly the same if not a little worse, because they simply haven't done their research and the shops have managed to trick them in to thinking the T.V can magically improve the current picture that they have.
