Overall, that type of 40" television hasn't been all that reliable. The user reviews on Amazon.com bear that out. Of those, the Samsung LNR408D has been 'relatively' reliable. Unfortunately the user reviews on the Samsung LNR409D have been monopolized by complaints about Amazon.com itself when it came to their orders. Apparently Amazon pulled some sort of bait and switch scam on the customers.
User reviews of the Samsung LN-R408D on Newegg.com bear out the good reviews of that same unit on Amazon.com. Maybe they are still available from a reputable vendor. I personally have never had a problem with Amazon.com. They still have that unit and charge $2252.69 including shipping in the US. Of course, as always, stay away from the eternally dishonest NYC vendors that always turn up on the low price search engines.

John

Funny you should mention this. I just went throught the process of researching these (plus a few others) for my dad. He ended up buying the Sony Bravia S Series KDL-40S2000. We got it at Circuit City, which has a price match. The sales rep went on line and found the lowest price and matched it.

LCD's are especially great in a normal family room because there is no glare. You don't see the windows and lamps reflect from the screen. The HDTV (connected through a cable card) looks fantastic. The problem of "ghosting" (a problem associated with LCD TVs) is just about non existant in this Sony.

The sound is good, not great on the standalone set, but adding external audio to it makes it sound great. Also, LCD TV's have the "screen door effect", but outside of 6-8 feet viewing distance, it goes away.

The standard definition broadcasts (non HDTV) are not as good as an internal projection, but it is pretty good.

I would highly recommend the Sony.

Any more suggestions - My friend is planning on making a purchase on Friday! So far he is leaning toward the Sony.

Thanks.

Any more suggestions - My friend is planning on making a purchase on Friday! So far he is leaning toward the Sony.
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Yes, The Samsung HL-R5067W 50" HD-Ready DLP TV has really good reviews on Amazon.com and is in the sales flyer from Sears this week at a closeout price of $1999.88. . There is a 30-day return policy. Also worth noting is the Walmart 90-day return policy. I would check there to see if they have any of the televisions you are interested in as well.

John

Did you go to the AVS Forum as I suggested?? You wouldn't be able to read all the suggestions between now and Friday ...

Just wanted to drop in here briefly and mention that we just love our Mitsubishi 62" DLP set. I know, it's a different brand and size, but I think the technology (DLP) is really cool. There is an artifact that you can train your eyes to spot, though, based on the fact that a single mirror chip is doing the work of R, G, and B through the use of a color wheel and rapid refreshes.

When the 1080 DLP sets came out some months back, I went and looked at 1080 and 720 sets side-by-side. Up close you can easily see the screen door effect on the 720 set, while the 1080 didn't have any. But the fact that the 1080 didn't show any pixels tells me that the optics are the limiting factor on those sets--after all, if the fuzzy optics mask individual pixels, then the benefit of the increased pixel density is lost. In any event, from normal viewing distance (10' in my case) there was no difference noticeable to me between the 720 and 1080 sets. That implies to me that with a 40" set one can't tell the difference from, say, 7'.

A DLP set will, of course, need a bulb replacement in 4 or 5 years or so. On the plus side, there will be no burn-in and no fading over time.

I went to view the 1080P Mitsubshi DLP sets at my local audio/video shop and they had some kind of demo (don't know what) that was as good as the new Sony SXRD stuff. The brightness/contrast was superior to the 720P sets as the resolution. They also had a projection setup in 2.35 x 1 that was very good but not as bright. I noticed right off the resolution was hugely better.

JJK

Maybe so. I'll have to swing by the TV area at Fry's the next time I need something.

The time I was there, it sure wasn't obvious to me then. Maybe it was the material being shown, or the format of that material...

I just purchased a Panasonic TH-50PHD8UK Plasma Monitor from Costco last week. Should arrive in a week or so. I would shun away from Samsung if I were you. There are a whole lot more brands out there that are better and cheaper than the Samsungs.

Couple of quick thoughts...

I recently owned a Samsung plasma for about one week. I took it back because I couldn't stand watching standard def on it. It had terrible definition in darker areas and faces had the "clay effect"...drove me insane. Read through the AVS forum and you'll find out which sets are better at displaying dark colors with definition and which ones suffer from clay face. Very important issue to watch out for....especially on standard def stuff.

I ended up getting a Sony HD CRT projection set. I couldn't be happier! Ended up with a heck of a deal plus they let me get on the web (mistake) and I found a lower price from an authorized Sony dealer. Standard Def looks great (great definition and no more clay face!) and HD is...well...HD. DVDs look awesome as well. CRT based HD sets don't seem to suffer from the lack of definition in dark areas etc that you *sometimes* find in plasma/lcd etc. They are getting better with each set they push out but some brands can't seem to get it together. Again, read through AVS and you'll get an idea of what brands to avoid etc.

If you didn't know, Sony will let you buy just an extended warranty through them. I found this out before I bought my Sony so I saved some extra bucks turning down the brick and mortar extended warranty and going right through Sony for it. I like having the extended warranty through the manufacturer (and cheaper was nice).

Also, if you know anyone who subscribes to Consumer Reports, look about two months back. They had a huge section on plasma/lcd/dlp/crt televisions. I let someone borrow mine so I can't look right now for ya.

Pros and cons all around but isn't that how it always is? lol

Good Luck!

I am looking at the Dec 2005 Comsumer Reports right now. I have summarized their recommendations as follows:

1. Buy the largest size your budget will allow. Their surveys showed that satisfaction increased with screen size. Viewing distance minimums 5 feet for 36 inch or smaller. 6 to 9 feet for 40 inch to 65 inch.
2. Stick with a wide screen set over a 4:3 for obvious reasons
3. Don't rule out sets lacking built-in digital tuners. No reason to pass up HD-ready sets because you still need a cable box or cable card or satellite box for reception. The only plus to integrated HDTV's is that they can receive broadcast signals, including HD via antenna, an option few users use. Even with a cable card you still need a cable box to get an interactive program guide, video on demand, or pay-per-view via the remote.
4. Reliability. CRT's have a long enough record to establish reliability records which Consumer Reports has. There is less information about the newer TVs. Initial records show equal reliability for LCD and plasma for the first year, but it is too soon to know about later years. CR found no repair issues during the first year of use for Panasonic, Samsung, Sony, Sharp, and Toshiba LCDs or Panasonic and Sony plasma sets.
Rear-projection TVs using CRT have been MUCH MORE repair-prone than conventional CRT televisions with double the rate of repair for 5-year old sets. For the four brands they tested the results were comparable in terms of having an inordinate number of repairs. Those were Hitachi, Mitsubishi, Sony, and Toshiba.
Microdisplays using LCD, DLP, or LCoS have been even MORE repair prone than CRT projection sets during the first year of operation. Toshiba DLP sets were less repair prone than most. The most repair-prone were the JVC LC0S sets. There have been recalls.

Ratings summary:

LCD TVs

They hadn't tested the newer screens at that time so the ratings only go up to 32-37 inch TVs. The top two were the 32 inch Sony LCD Wega KLV-32M1 followed by the 32 inch Panasonic Viera TC-32LX50.
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Plasma TVs

50-inch:
Panasonic TH-50PX50U followed by the Pioneer Purevision PDP-5050HD

42-inch:
Panasonic TH-42PX50U followed by the Panasonic TH-42PX500U

42-inch Enhanced Definition Sets:
Panasonic TH-42PD50U with no close second.

Panasonic was the performance leader across the board for plasma TVs
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Rear-Projection TVs

HD Microdisplay Sets:
56-inch Sharp56DR650 followed by the 50-inch Sony Grand Wega KDF-E50A10 followed by the 52-inch Toshiba Theater Wide HD 52HM95

HD CRT Sets:
57-inch Sony KP-57WS520 followed by the 51-inch Sony KP-51WS520 followed by the 47-inch Panasonic PT-47X54. All three have automatic and manual convergence and are (as stated above) less repair prone than the microdisplays.

Hope that helps.

John

I used to subscribe to Consumer Reports, but over the last twenty-five years, their testing has gotten less and less thorough, and their recommendations have become more based on issues unrelated to the actual functioning of the device.

If you go back and look at the old reports from the 1960s, you will find amazing tests, written up in great detail, where they would test toasters with dozens of different types of bread, testing when the toaster was completely cold, and then testing what happens when you toast ten slices in a row without stopping, and whether it did something different with thick bread or dark bread, etc. And then they repeated this with each toaster. By contrast, with modern-day reviews, you now get a summary that all the toasters did a pretty good job testing toast, but one is more hazardous than the other if you stick two metal knives into the darn thing while putting one foot in a metal sink filled with water.

Too bad, because they used to be the Gold Standard, and I'd pay good money for a subscription if they ever returned to that high caliber of testing.

That is a pretty ridiculous assumption coming from someone who doesn't even read the magazine. Their testing is very thorough and they explain the parameters by which they tested in detail.
Selling short the only magazine on the market that not only thoroughly tests consumer products and services, but also maintains reliability records for automobiles, appliances, etc and has a readership of 4 million subscribers is baseless naysaying.

If I didn't think it would be helpful to Birdcat, I wouldn't have spent an hour summarizing and posting it for him since you can't really link to the article without an online subscription.

John

"3. Don't rule out sets lacking built-in digital tuners. No reason to pass up HD-ready sets because you still need a cable box or cable card or satellite box for reception. The only plus to integrated HDTV's is that they can receive broadcast signals, including HD via antenna, an option few users use. Even with a cable card you still need a cable box to get an interactive program guide, video on demand, or pay-per-view via the remote."

This is exactly why I went with the commercial Panasonic Plasma TH-50PHD8UK. No bells or whistles. Just a plain plasma monitor with enough inputs to get you started. My only beef is that it doesn't come with a stand either, but i'm hanging it on my bedroom wall anyway.