High Definition Televisions

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Originally Posted by shidoshi

So, wait, first you say that black bars are bad, and then you say getting rid of the black bars on widescreen DVDs is no big deal. Which is it exactly?

Widescreen is the future. Pretty much every DVD release now has a widescreen transfer, and as time goes on more and more TV shows are switching over to being broadcast in widescreen. Anybody who purchases a new TV and purposely avoids getting a widescreen unit, with the exception of a prohibitive cost, is crazy. Widescreen becoming the standard for home television is only a question of when, not if.

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no...watching a movie with bars is different than playing a game with bars. When you play a game with bars on the side of the screen, the way the screen scrolls with those bars feels like my character isn't moving across the entire screen. Like say, I hold right for a few seconds to move my character right across the screen and with the black bars it feels like I need to hold right longer to get my guy across the screen... (just one example of my personal experience) I'm sure I'd get used to it or whatever, and I haven't talked to really anyone else who had this problem except for me, but that's all that matters since I'd be the one using and paying for the TV. :P I'd rather not deal with it since I play a lot of old and 2D games and all I'm gaining with a widescreen TV is not having to see black bars when I watch DVDs...I'll cope.

Broadcast TV is still SEVERAL YEARS away from being all broadcast in widescreen. It'll be some years before MOST of the stuff you watch will be in widescreen and even longer until just about everything is being broadcast widescreen. When you say "as time goes on" we are talking about years here man...not a matter of months or a year or two.

As for pro callibration fixing those low res blurring problems on HD sets that is a damn good question I'd love to investigate. I'll need to ask some from the ISF about that perhaps since I plan on getting an HD version of the 36" Wega I have now (analog). I may be in trouble if there are some problems...and yeah, like someone mentioned if that is the case I might just get a monitor to play old stuff but I'd still rather use the main TV in my living room. That's just where I play games period. On a nice big 36" TV (any bigger is too big for me, but a monitor even 24 or so inches is just too small for me) with nice 5.1 rich sound. Picky picky picky...I know! I get enough complaints from the people around me. :P

Well, I finally have my TV, but man was it a PITA. If anybody's thinking of ordering something big from Best Buy.com, do yourself a favor and don't.

Short version: There were some problems with the delivery process, and as a result, I got the 34" model instead of the 30" model at a pretty good discount. I'll post some pics of the setup once I get it finalized. We ran through a bunch of games last night, from Viewtiful Joe to Smash Brothers, and everything looked fantastic. I picked up the wrong PS2 component cable at Software etc though, so I'll have to wait on the PS2 games.

The long version is below for anybody who wants to read it.

I placed my order for the 30" model on the 7th, for delivery on the 17th of December. I was supposed to get a call on the 16th to set up the delivery time. 9pm on the 16th, still no call. So I call up the "local" store (45 minutes away in another city) and they tell me the TV isn't in yet, and won't arrive till the 20th. They apparently only make deliveries to my town on Wednesdays, so they wouldn't be able to deliver it till the 24th. Problem is, I'm going to be on vacation. Ok, whatever, they'll deliver it on the 30th, day after I get back.

On the 18th, I get an email from Best Buy.com saying "Thanks for your order, our records say you've received your tv, have a nice day", etc. So I call their 800 number to tell them that no, I don't have the TV, they say call the store. I call the store, they say call the 800 number. I finally get somebody half decent on the phone at the 800 line, and he works out the problem. Bout the only helpful person I dealt with through the whole thing.

So off I go on vacation, and head back on the 29th. While in the airport, I happen to check my messages to see what's up. There's a call from BB on the 20th saying that the TV had arrived in the store and they'd call to set up delivery. Yay, everything's cool. Yet, it's about 8pm on the 29th, and there was no message about delivery time. I call the store up and hear "Oh, we don't make deliveries to bburg on Tuesday, we'll have to deliver it Wednesday." I speak to the manager, and he gives me the same story. Shrug, one more day, big deal right?

December 30th: I go off to a friend's birthday party that night, confident that the TV will arrive the next day. I get home around 11, and on a whim decide to check my messages at work. There's a call from the warehouse manager saying: "We're supposed to deliver a TV to you tomorrow, but it hasn't arrived at the store yet"

Naturally, I'm like "Uh, wtf?" And of course, the store is closed now. So I call them the next day and just straight up ask for the manager. Apparently my TV was sold to somebody else while I was gone, and he had to work it out with his GM, and he'd call me back in a bit.

At this point, I was about ready to say screw it and just go to like Circuit City, but I figured I might be able to get something out of the whole mess. I shoot off an email to BB customer service outlining the problem, and asking if they could help at all. I get back the following response:

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Originally Posted by Best Buy Customer Service

Michael,

Thank you for contacting Best Buy with your comments. I'm Semi-Conscious-Email-Biscuit with Customer Care.

We are sorry that your experience with online ordering was frustrating.

Best Buy strives to make each experience you have with us to be as positive and as fun as possible, and we are disappointed if we don't live up to that expectation.

Thank you for sharing your comments with Best Buy. Please do not hesitate to contact us with additional questions or concerns.

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Right.

I never hear back from the manager that day, so I call the store yesterday and told them that I needed a resolution to the problem now. After some discussion, it came down to I could wait until next Wednesday for the 30" model with a discount, or I could get the 34" model for about $200 bucks more (which is about $300 less than it sells for), and have it delivered that afternoon. I just sold an arcade cabinet I'd fixed up, so I had the extra money for it, so being an impaitent American, I went with that option, which was delivered that afternoon.

I have an early HDTV, Proscan/RCA 36" 1999, which has some really convenient featuers such as 2 VGA inputs but requires a transcoder to get 480p. What's really annoying is that the XBOX and GC do not output 480p from the dashboard so I can't see what's going on unless I plug them into the 480i input. :\ I guess it's more the manufacturer's fault than the console makers but that's quite annoying and probably not an issue with newer sets.

Shou: Yeah, newer HD sets will automatically switch to the proper display mode, if it supports that resolution.

I've never gotten an answer on how much professional calibration helped a HD tube. If you've got a HD projection screen then, I've heard, it's majorly important as they lose about 1/3 of their brightness in the first 1000 of use. Then it sorta levels out, which is the point at which its adviseable to get the pro calibration.