Trying to pick a TV...

Video Asylum

TVs, VCRs, DVD players, Home Theater systems and more.

This is probably going to be a long post, so bare with me here...
My fiancÃ© recently moved into her new apartment. She is going to graduate school, and got a position as an assistant hall director. So actually her apartment is in a dormitory, but the apartment itself is quite nice and decent sized. It will be a good start to life when we get married in October. We will probably be living there for the next two years, possibly three.
So now I finally have my home theater system set up in a proper environment. Bose speakers (hey, I like the ones I have), Onkyo TX-SR700, Velodyne sub...pretty nice set up. I even got a nice black audio rack from Sorice to store my components. The living room area where we have our home theater is about 15x15'...we sit maybe 10-12 feet from the TV on a couch, which is the main seating. There are some other chairs to the right and left of the couch...so kind of a U-shaped seating arrangement. Mostly concerned with viewing from the couch...other seats will be secondary (like if friends are over, etc). Very happy with the sound...watched T2: Extreme Edition on DVD last night and we were blown away by the sound. Itâ€™s very involving for movies. It will be better for music once I get my NAD stereo power amp back from the repair shop (itâ€™s been there for over two months, but thatâ€™s another story).
The only area where the theater experience is lacking is the TV...we are currently using my fiancÃ©â€™s GE 19" TV she has had since college. You know the kind...only has a cable coax input. Not bad for a dorm room, or bed room...but pretty small for a room like this. So obviously we need a new TV.
Currently, Charter Cable provides free cable for the entire campus, which is nice. It's regular cable, not digital or anything like that. I e-mailed them about the possibility of HD in the future, and they stated that while they plan to bring HD to the area eventually, they have no plans at this time. I suppose this eliminates the need for an HDTV at this time.
I want to at least get a 27â€ TV. Ideally I would like something in the 32-36â€ range. The problem is that there is already an entertainment cabinet in the room. It is actually three separate piecesâ€¦two bookshelves, and then another cabinet with a TV slot in the center. All three pieces are the same height. They actually look quite nice together. They are all light cherry, which matches my Bose speakers quite well. However, Iâ€™ve measured the TV slot in the middle piece, and itâ€™s going to be hard to even get a regular 27â€ set into it. This means we will probably have to take out the middle piece, put it in storage, and get a TV with its own stand.
Iâ€™m trying to narrow down what TV set I should get. Does anyone have an idea of what size would be optimum for a 15x15 room? Obviously bigger is usually better, but I need to be realistic too. It would be difficult to get a large RPTV into the dorm, after all. One of my other dilemmas is that if I go with a direct view, I will need to get a stand. Matching TV stands usually run another 200-300 dollars. Would I be better off getting, say, a 42â€-ish RPTV? Or would the picture be much worse than, for example, a 36â€ direct view?
As far as my budget, Iâ€™d like to stay under about $1200 for both the TV and any necessary stand together. I can stretch my budget a bit if required, though. My other final concern is that most of the TVs out there nowadays are silver colored. Whatever happened to good old black TVs? With the light cherry furniture in our room, coupled with my light cherry speakers and our black components and black audio rack, a silver TV would stick out like a sore thumb. We would make do with a silver TV, but black would look a lot nicer. Maybe it wonâ€™t matter once we have the TV in place, but I know she would probably be happier with black.
Whewâ€¦it feels good to get all of this off my chest. As you can probably tell, Iâ€™ve been wrestling with this for several months now. Hopefully a lot of you can give me some input and get me headed in the right direction. Some ideas on specific models, and also what retailers to visit would be helpful. Iâ€™ve been looking at Toshiba TVs, but am open to other brands. I want something reliable that looks great for DVDs and standard cable, with component video input for sure. 16:9 enhanced mode and a flat screen are definite pluses as well. PIP would be nice, but not necessary. Iâ€™m not looking to buy used.
As for retailers, Iâ€™ve looked at Sears a lot, and hear they are one of the best places to buy a TV from. Plus they are in the area. Other places in the vicinity are Rex, and American. We could go to Best Buy or Circuit City, but I kind of want to avoid the â€œbig boxâ€ type storesâ€¦Iâ€™ve heard too many bad stories, and want to deal with someone competent.
Any and all input appreciated.
Thanks,
Mason

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Topic - Trying to pick a TV... - Invader3K 09:02:08 08/14/03 (1)

The 42" Toshiba widescreen would be a nice choice - Dalancroft 09:19:34 08/14/03 (0)

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