I'm about to jump into the new century. A few questions.

[markw]

My current "big screen" TV is a 32" Proscan CRT I picked up in early 2000. The most up-to-date video inputs it features is S-video. As it is, it does what it's supposed to do quite well with no problems.

Now, I've been looking at these new fangled thin screen units and I see where big (or at least bigger) screen LCD units are dropping to where I can justify jumping for 'em. Say, 32" or 37", but I've seen 32" for < $800, which is where I'm looking.

To start with, I don't have HD coming into my house yet. I may hold off for a while, so TV will be in 4:3 for now. But, we do watch a lot of DVDs which have a wide screen presentation.

My questions involve Progressive scan: The salespeople at our local big box stores couldn't agree on anything. Three different stores, three different answers. So I thought I'd poll the population here.

1) My two newer DVD players, both Toshiba, offer this with component video and say it will work with a TV that supports progressive scan.

The new 16:9 TV will offer component inputs. Is there anything else I need to look for, aside from those three inputs, in order to avail myself of any benefit it may offer? Remember, I don't expect much for TV but I'm looking more so for improvements in wide-screen DVD presentation.

The cable will feed directly into the TVs internal tuner and I expect it'll ll be in the tried and true 4:3 format until we jump into a full-blown digital cable system that offers HDTV. That's another post for another time.

But, will the vertical black bars on the sides of the LCD cause any problem in the long run? I hate it when the picture is stretched to fill the screen.


thanks in advance, guys.

 

[MDS]

All HDTVs are progressive scan so there shouldn't be any problem having the DVD player output progressive. The only thing I think you would need to verify is that the TV can accept 480i input in case you want to set the player to interlaced (if it does a better job of deinterlacing than the tv).

All of the tvs I have seen accept 480i, 480p, 720p, and 1080i at the component inputs. Some of the prior model Sony LCDs had one jack that would only accept 480i while the others accepted 480p and up but they did away with that nonsense on the latest models.

 

[AVRat]

Regarding the black side bars, the newer TVs have decent stretch capability so that it’s almost unnoticeable. A 32” widescreen in 4:3 mode seems quite a bit smaller than a 32” 4:3 TV.

BTW, I just noticed today that display prices have really dropped!

 

[astrodon]

Since you live in New Jersey, chances are that you would be able to pull HD over-the-air with an old-fashion indoor TV antenna. So by all means, jump into the HDTV world and do buy a widescreen version, you'll be disappointed with a 4:3 set, if not immediately, then in the not too distant future.