How Important is Contrast Ratio for a LCD TV ? IS DVI useful in LCD TV? What else Should I look for in LCD TV?

Question

I am Planning to Buy a 32 Inch LCD TV. & I have a bevy of choices. I need answers to the Questions to decide which LCD TV to Buy? Is Contrast Ratio of 6000:1 really far superior to a contrast ratio of 1300:1? Does a higher Contrast Ratio make the TV viewing more Pleasurable? What about the different Connectivity Slots? I'll be thankful if I get some honest answers.

Answer 1

You are definitely correct, you have a lot of choices. The higher the conrast ratio the better, but really you need to ask yourself what you are looking for. If you are going for the best of the best, price doesn't lie.

Any LCD TV these days will be a plus to viewing TV, but if you don't have HDTV currently or if you dont have HD equipment there won't be any immediate benefit. If you do, there are big plusses.

The things I would suggest you look for are aspect ratio. 480p is the lowest, which is basically no better than what we have today. Every HD television as far as I know can show 480p, and it goes up from there to 720p, 1080i, and 1080p. I stands for interlaced, P stands for progressive and it just meands how the images are presented. Click the link in my sources for a real basic overview. 1080i is really the standard for now and the foreseeable future. 1080p is the top-of-the-line video format but nothing really goes that high. It is considerably more expensive, and with the amount of 1080i HD televisions out there, it will likely never become the only video signal available.

If you are going for the top, pick up something with 1080p, it can show all other video formats below it. Its supposed to be a little easier on the eyes, and a little sharper comapred to 1080i.

If you are looking to get a good tv for the price, pick up soemthing with 1080i. It can show everything except 1080p, and as I said before it is unlikely that anything will be broadcasted solely in 1080p, so there will be 1080i HDTV available for a good while. 1080i is visually very crisp and the difference between 1080i and 1080p is not that huge in terms of image quality.

As for connectivity, it depends on what you want to do. The tv should definitely have component in. Those are rca cables that seperate pictures signals into red, blue, and green. This is currently the standard for most HD equipment. Secondly, it should HDMI ports. These are increasingly becoming more popular for HD equipment. I haven't seen too much stuff with DVI other than some computer graphics cards and you can buy DVI to HDMI cables. If you want to use a computer with it, some LCD tv's have a vga slot, which is your basic computer monitor connector. It isn't necessary but a nice plus. Also, make sure it has standard a/v inputs. Last but not least, it should be equipped with an ATSC tuner which can receive digital signals. The US government has ordered all over-the-air signals to switch to the digital ATSC signal by 2009, so you'll need that. By now, all new tv's should have an atsc tuner. Check the wiki link for basic info on that.

So, in summary. best of the best 1080p capable LCD TV.

Best value, 1080i capable LCD TV.

Last suggestion: stick with major brand tv's, they have a better track record of reliability. Samsung really seems to be the best deal out there right now.

GOOD LUCK!

Answer 2

Contrast ratio is an important spec, but it can be deceptive. However, since each manufacturer will make the contrast measurement so that the best numbers appear on the spec sheet, it is a useful spec for comparison between sets. The higher the number, the better it is. However, once you get to 10,000:1, any increase would be hard to notice. But very few TVs are in that range, and certainly LCD hasn't got that far.

There is another issue, however, with the latest LCD (and DLP and LCos sets as well). They have dynamic brightness features which lower the overall illumination of the picture for dark scenes. LCD sets control the backlight, DLP and LCos have "dynamic iris" on the lens. The very high numbers you see specified for those sets include the action of the dynamic illumination. No single picture would have that contrast range. The spec should have two numbers: the "native" contrast ratio and "dynamic" contrast ratio. The first one (native) is the most important, since that will determine the appearance of any picture at any scene brightness. You definitely want that as high as possible. I suspect that 6000:1 number is a dynamic figure, while the 1300:1 is a native figure, in which case they cannot be compared. When comparing sets, compare native to native and dynamic to dynamic. Some of the newest 1080p LCD sets have 3000:1 native and 15000:1 dynamic contrast ratios. Those numbers are very good (about as good as LCD gets at the present time) and should establish a standard for comparison.

All new sets have HDMI inputs (which is the same as DVI plus audio). It is the best connection to use for picture quality.

Other than brightness, contrast ratios, and resolution, an important factor is screen uniformity. Look at scenes with large uniform color areas (such as sky or better yet, the background of menus) and see if you can see any variation in tone. Some sets are having a problem in that area.

Answer 3

assessment ratio is the version between your brightest whites and your inner maximum blacks. assessment ratio is rather significant in procuring a television. in spite of the incontrovertible fact that, the "quantity" that the manufacturers supply is thoroughly pointless. each producer judges there assessment in distinctive techniques. there is not any set wide-unfold in judging assessment. manufacturers comprehend that this quantity is rather marketable now and do each little thing they might to make this quantity look very severe. they have distinctive techniques that they might control the quantity. the least puzzling way is to teach each brightness putting (brightness, assessment, backlight) quantity all the way right down to choose darks and to teach all of them they way as much as be sure whites. those are colorations which you will by no potential see whilst watching w/ widely used settings became on. quickly, a producer might desire to assert that there set has a 50,000:a million assessment and there is not any wide-unfold that announces no it relatively is not. whilst procuring, in basic terms look at your contraptions area via area with vivid scenes and darkish scenes. those w/ superb whites and blacks have superb assessment, that's the only to purchase.