IMHO DLP, plasma, and LCD's are not ready yet.
They are the sexy newer technology, and the stores are pushing them hard, but there are entirely too many issue with them, for too little gained. I would spend you money on a rear projection, and put the rest of you money into a serious surround setup to really enjoy your TV. Without a good sound setup you are not going to get nearly the big screen experience you're looking for. Especially since just about all HD content is encoded with 5.1 surround.
I went to the CEDIA expo in Indy where all the HIGH-end equipment is shown, and the DLP, LCD, and plasmas while giving an excellent picture don?t handle blacks levels well, nor fast motion sports/video. If I was going to pay $100's-> $1000's extra for a TV, it would be better at everything not just better at some things, and WORSE at others. Watching a home run derby on a 60' plasma, and watching the image breakup and blur HORRIBLY when the ball was being tracked though the fast moving background of the stadium crowd did it for me.
I have a Hitachi 57s500, very nice TV.
Reap Projection has its issues also. Size is one, since all the parts are housed in the cabinet bellow the screen. You also may have to tweak a RPTV out of the box to get an acceptable picture.
Another issue is HD signal pixellation. The CRT's in RP TVs naturally blur this pixellation making it FAR less noticeable. Where the pure digital DLP, LCD, and Plasmas show every imperfection in the signal.
No stuck pixels, or mirrors, and no plasma leaks over the years to fade your picture.
The rear projection can suffer burn in, but there are ways to minimize this. Lower the contrast and brightness from the ridiculous torch mode levels they are shipped at. Use the stretch modes to eliminate having to use black/gray bars on the sides of 4x3 SD video source material. You can play games, just don?t play a game with a static image for more then a couple ours at a time, and VARY your viewing patterns. Some games now have translucent static images, and sports games (ESPN FOOTBALL for instance) changes the location of the score box as to not always be in the same location. I would recommend a xbox as it supports widescreen gaming at 480p, 720p, and 1080i(only enter the matrix so far).
And be sure to get the AVIA or Digital Video essentials DVD's to tweak the color and brightness settings. Then in 6 months or so of viewing and self-tweaking (use the sites listed below) I would get it ISF calibrated. A well-tuned RPtv will look fabulous.
And make sure you sign up for HD content from your provider (cable or DBS). SD (standard digital) can look TERRIBLE on a big widescreen TV depending on compression used by the provider, and the fact that is a lower resolution and bit rate source. The source material is EVERYTHING. You need HD, and a good progressive scan DVD player.
Seriously spend a couple of WEEKS at these sites, and visit the smaller mom and pop video stores. They may have dealer models, and a much better set up for viewing these TV's. The bright crappy lighting at CC, BB, and the like isn?t very good at making image quality comparisons. This is also the reason TVs are shipped with the contrast shipped at touch mode (burn in) settings.
AVS Forum
HomeThearter Spot
So much for a quick response. I just feel the newer technologies aren't worth it YET. If your a major cinematic, slow moving move buff then maybe, but I?m all about HD sports and fast action video/movies, and washed out blacks are a big turn off for me. CRT's are still the OVERALL king in my book. Spend the extra money as I said before, on complementing you system with all the other bells and whistles.
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