Another newbie and his questions :)

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Hi all, thanks for having me. Well, I've been researching Plasmas, LCDs, HDTV, so on and so forth for the past week now and I have got to say: This has turned out to be way more complicated than I expected!!

Anyway. I have started down the path of HTPC, looking to have a single unit (as much as possible anyway) that 'does it all'. Yeah yeah, I know that probably will not be the case, but it's a nice thought anyway. This is kind of a long term project of mine, wanting to be able to play games, surf the web and perhaps code all in the lounge room. So I am here for some advice and to talk about my observations so far.

At the moment I have been to a variety of stores (JB, Hardly Normal, Myer, Kmart - all the mainstream outlets really) and been unimpressed by the service and knowledge of MOST of the staff. However, there was one guy at one of the harveys that appeared to be quite knowledgable and interested in this field. (No offence to any sales staff, this is just my experience.)

LCDs:

LCDs really seem to at a point where they need another year or two. Many of the units I have observed (LGs, Sonys) had some form of Juddering when panning. These were mostly the 37inchers, and this is a shame as they would probably be excellent for general PC use. I fine this and the pixeling to be deal breakers. Color gradation was pretty poor at times also.

Plasmas:

The Panasonic 50" and 42" blew me away when I saw it. Absolutely brilliant picture quality, and the LGs weren't too far off either. Hitachi had an equally nice set. I have been reading this forum for about a week now, and have learnt that burn-in really isn't the panel destroying beast that many had led me to believe. I've read the articles from Pioneer and Panasonic on this as well, so I have eliminated those from the equation.

The only thing holding me back from making a purchase now is two things:

Samsungs 10000:1 constrast DLPs. Anyone have info on their arrival date in Australia?

And: lack of true 1080p support. I'd really like to have a panel with this resolution, but the cost looks to be prohibitively expensive for the time being.

Panasonic 42" plasmas can be had for $2999 now, and that seems like a great deal. So I've been really tempted to go for one of these beauties. I wouldn't mind having to upgrade again in two years, but wouldn't want to be seeing something I like more within the coming year! Haha. Sure, I know that if you'll wait you'll never get one, but still.

At the moment I have a bog standard Hitachi CRT. It has GREAT picture quality, but isn't flat nor anywhere near HD. I was thinking I can either wait and get the HTPC first, or get the TV first on credit and pay it off while getting the HTPC together, that way I can use it for DVDs in the meantime via my laptop.

I am still yet to see a Windows PC running on a Plasma, so I am thinking of taking my laptop to a few places and wrangling them into letting me hook it up, if only to see a desktop running. I wouldn't mind some kind of Picture-in-Picture for surfing the net and watching TV/DVDs at the same time!

My questions are these (if anyone would be so kind as to answer them):

Is anyone else here runng a HTPC setup? If so, on what display? And how does it look? Is text legible?

What about games on larger screens? Is there a noticeable blur in the display?

That's about it for now. Thanks for reading my (longish) post! I hope you are having a good day wherever you are.