HDTV

If you want the latest and greatest when it comes to home entertainment, you know your going HDTV. I bought a 42 inch Samsung not too long ago and I've never looked back, in fact I wonder what the hell took me so long!!! Ok, the basic questions; do you go LCD or do you go Plasma. I'll break them down for you pretty easy -

LCD - These are typically slimmer and lighter and the colors are very bright and vibrant. If you're looking for a small to medium sized TV these have really come down in price and are a real bargain now. If you want anything bigger then 40 inches, you'll be spending a lot of money, prices are still a premium for the bigger screens. Viewing angles on LCD are still a bit narrow, you'll need to sit pretty much right in front to get the best picture.

Plasma - Plasmas only come in bigger sizes, 42 inches and up, so if you want smaller, you'll have to look at the LCDs. The Plasmas have a wider range for viewing, and deeper blacks. The main concerns with having a Plasma is that there are concerns with image "burn in" where if an image is displayed for a long time, such as a stock ticker, the image eventually becomes permanant. Never sets are more resistant against this, some even coming with a time of screen saver.

Ok once you have one picked out, you'll need to get a HD cable box. Most companies offer them for free, in my case Time Warner. I also upgraded to the built in DVR which is like cables version of TiVo. There are 3 types of cables you will need to hook up your cable box/dvd player/satelitte etc to your HDTV.

Component, HDMI and DVI. Component is kinda like the old video cables that you used to you, you know the one that had yellow fo video and a red and white for audio, except now the video is split into 3 cables Red, Blue and Green. You'll need a total of 5 cables to get everything working. HDMI and DVI are very similar, the HDMI is a single cable that designed to specifically transit both audio and video in digital format. DVI converts the digital video signal, but you'll still need the seperate audio cables. My recomendation, get the HDMI cables. It's easiest and the picture comes out great.

Last bit of advice, don't worry about name brands, I see people paying $149.00 for "Monster" HDMI cables. I bought mine at the Apple store for $19.99. Enjoy your HD entertainment!