Originally posted by: 91TTZ
What's the big deal about LCD HDTVs?
Over the past few months I've visited friends, checked out stores, and stayed at hotels that had LCD HDTVs. They seem to be very popular, and admittedly are taking over. But from what I've seen, their picture quality falls far short of my Sony CRT HDTV. A little more than a year ago I bought one that wasn't the highest model, but has the same tube as the XBR (It's not the XBR because it doesn't have quite as many inputs).
A friend of ours recently got a new 1080p LCD HDTV and invited us over to watch Planet Earth. They were raving about how great it looks, but as I was watching it I couldn't help to think how much better it looked on my TV. After we left, my girlfriend even said that it didn't look as good as when we watch it on mine. On theirs, when it showed a view from a helicopter going over a canyon and icebergs, the picture seemed to lack colors at the very high end (whites) and in the shadows. If that TV was all you had to go by, you'd think that it looks normal, like it's supposed to look. But on mine, you can see details in the shadows and the highlights. The color range seems to be quite a bit better. Their resolution was OK, it was mainly an issue of color depth. I've noticed the same thing on LCD computer monitors, they just don't seem to have the color range that CRTs do.
Another friend has a 720p HDTV, and on his the quality was much worse. Not only did it have the usual limitations on color range, but his resolution was noticeably worse when watching Planet Earth (everyone loves that show). He tried telling me that the difference between 720p and 1080i was impossible to notice, but at the same time when we went to Best Buy, he kept asking why some of those TVs looked sharper (they were the 1080p models).
Does anyone in here have a CRT HDTV or have any personal experiences with them? Yes, mine is bulky, yes it's heavy, yes it takes up a lot of space. But the picture quality on it leads to a letdown when I watch almost any other.