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It is now becoming increasingly hard to buy a traditional tv in a large size, because all the main electrical companies are making their large screen televisions in widescreen. There is a wide range of television technology available these days. Below our recommended resources are reviews and a basic guide to the various technologies.

Recommended Resources to try

• Comet - Supply a wide range of Televisions and Televisions's.
• Currys - Offers an extensive list of Televisions at cheap prices.
• Digital Direct - Established high volume online retailer of TV’s.
• TV Cables - They sell a wide range of cables and accessories for home cinema.
• CW Digital - HDReady LCD, LCD TV, LCD TV with inbuilt PVR.
• TV City - Provide digital TV, HDTV, flat screen TVs.

The main type of screen types are,

• CRT Widescreen TVs
• TV and video combis
• Traditional CRT Tvs
• Portable TVs
• LCD screens
• Plasma TVs
• Rear projection TVs

A few things to consider are,

Plasma screen tvs are the latest technology of television released and in 2003. They are still very expensive to buy. The main feature of them is that they are very thin and can be attached to a wall like a mirror or picture. Plasma screen panels are made up of thousands of tiny gas chambers that illuminte phosphors to produce colour when charged by electricity. They come in the usual (16:9) Widescreen format for viewing films in the format originally intended by the director. When buying a plasma tv it is important to get a good Pixel resolution, because the higher the number of pixels displayed on the screen, the higher the picture resolution will be.

Rear projection tvs are the biggest televisions in screen size available to purchase. They are designed with a flat screeen and the screen size goes upwards from 40 inches. The sound quality of these televisions is usually not it's best function, with nicam stereo sound usually standard. They are mainly designed to be used in conjunction with a home cinema sound system. You should mainly be looking at the quality of the picture from a rear projection tv, and with it having a flat screen you can expect less screen reflections. With less distortion in the corners of the picture you can watch these TVs from a much wider viewing angle. Rear projection tv's are still the cheapest way to get a big screen for low cost.

Nicam stereo sound has been available on televisions since the late 1980's when it used to be an expensive addition to a television set. Nicam stereo sound was included on television programmes by the BBC, ITV by about 1989 and the only by about 1995 could nicam stereo sound by heard on all programmes such as Coronation Street. These days (2003) nicam stereo sound is usually standard on most televisions apart from the real bargain basment / cheap televisions. Currently (5/5/2003) nicam stereo sound will be standard on widescreen televisions up until about the £350 - £400 price range when widescreen televisions are included with dolby virtual and surround sound.

Virtual dolby sound is now becoming standard on a range of tv's and it is gradually taking over from nicam as the standard sound system for average priced tv's. Virtual Dolby TVs adjust the way the sound emerges from the two stereo speakers on the TV so that your ears are fooled into thinking they are hearing sound from behind them even though there are no rear speakers there. This delivers a better sound than a Nicam TV but is not up to the quality of Dolby Pro Logic or Dolby Digital 5.1. We have seen tv's for a low as £300 now coming with virtual dolby sound as standard and it does look like it will replace nicam stereo sound very soon.

Top end televisions are now coming with dolby digital 5.1 sound as standard. Dolby 5.1 delivers five separate full channels of sound: left, right, centre, rear left, rear right, plus a sixth channel devoted to bass. The ".1" of Dolby Digital 5.1. Dolby Digital 5.1 is available from DVDs, Sky+ boxes as well as PlayStation 2 and the Xbox. Along with dolby digital 5.1 sound you should also check for the Power output (RMS), because the higher the watts the tv produces the better the quality of sound should be. Many home cinema sound systems are now available on the market to produce dolby digital 5.1 sound.

100Hz flicker free is also a good feature to look for. It uses digital processing to double the frequency rate which removes all traces of flicker and makes the image more vibrant. Standard TVs use 50Hz scanning which can cause flickering on a big screen. This means that a widesreen television with 100hz flicker free technology has a better picture quality. Some television brands also have an enhanced version of 100Hz flicker free technology which minimises large area flicker and additionally reduces line jitter. This makes the whole picture more stable with smoother motion and generally greater clarity especially during fast action scenes.

Posted on 07 / 01 / 2006

Sony PFM-42X1N Plasma Screen

The tv has been a great purchase, and I have no regrets. So what are the good points?, it really compliments my room and looks cool, produces a beautiful picture, great controls, no problems setting it up with my home cinema and set-top box - so it works great with terrestrial, digital and DVD. Which my Sony Home Cinema installed it's a superb setup, and I am glad I decided to pick Sony as a brand.

User Rating -
Albert Dixon

Posted on 07 / 07 / 2003

Philips 14 inch CFT Screen

You have probably seen this saying on tv quite a bit “Let’s make things better” because this is Philips famous saying. We needed a portable tv for the bedroom which had a 14 inch screen and because Philps has been around for quite some time now, I felt they would know what it takes to make a quality tv. For a 14 inch tv it is well equipped with features such as a scart socket, FM radio, NTSC compatible, Remote control and Text memory for later recall of text pages. At £115 it wasn't too expensive and after 3 months is working fine, hopefully it will last as long as my old Hitachi tv which kept going for 25 years.

User Rating -
Kenny Moore, Essex

Popularity
Value for money
Ability to find on the Net
Better value than high street

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At the moment it is possible to find televisions such as a 32inch widescreen for cheap prices such as £300 and lower. Some of these cheap televisions even come with dolby surround sound, instead of nicam stereo. The Comet website compares it's televisions prices with other leading UK websites, so you can expect a cheap price there.