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Best Brand for HDTVs

I sold tv for three years and I would definately say Samsung. Samsung series 6 and above. I have three samsung LED in my house in all perfect condition and I love them all. Honestly, I would not mind a plasma either.

Series 4 is their walmart level models
Series 5 is their entry level models
Series 6 is their upper tier models with the best picture (warning: series 6 usually have glossy screens)
Series 7+ are typically a waste of money, because they only offer better design or internet features

If you have a bright room, you want to go for LED/LCD. 120hz + is a must.

However, Plasma's are very good.

Avantages of Plasma is a true deep black and more realistic coloring. If you want your colors to pop out more vibrantly, you will want to go for an LED/LCD. Plasma are also cheaper for the size and money because they have been in the market longer. The only thing that I really hate about my LED is when I watch basketball games and the court is overly bright and unnatural looking, regardless of how much you try to change the settings. Sport games look 10000X better on a plasma, but I like watching movies and regular tv shows on my LED. If you have wild children and are afraid of them running into things, plasma's are built like a brick wall and have a very durable glass. Panasonic plasmas are the top of the LINE in plasma brands. In fact, panasonic hired many Pioneer Elite engineers when PE stopped making plasmas. Pioneer Elite models are still considered the BEST plasma's even to this day. 1080p is a must if you are planning to get a 50'' screen or larger, but remember you must have a source that can output 1080p! (such as blu-ray, most cable boxes output 1080i/720p)

Don't be mislead by 600hz plasma vs. 120/240 hz LED, they are completely different technologies. For plasma's, every tv is running at 60hz and the frames are duplicated 10X. WIthout going into nerdy detail, the plasma technique is more natural. This allows for a smoother transition in frames = smoother picture during sports for plasmas. LED's can create a "soap opera" or home movie effect, which I personally like.

Downsides of plasmas:
glare - if there is a window on the other side of the tv, glare will be a huge problem. However, keep in mind most people watch tv, past 7 pm which is dark outside anyways.
energy - sometimes considered energy hogs compared to LED technology
burn out - I don't care what anyone says, I've seen store displays suffer from image burn ins. There is anti-in out technology, like the when the tv recognizes when an image is sitting on the screen too long and will automatically shift pixels for you, but I've seen these fail many times.

You must very careful when selecting plasmas. DO NOT buy a Zenith, I never had so many returns in my life. Sony, Sharp, Toshiba do not make plasmas. Please for the love of god do not buy your TV from Walmart or a Vizio. Vizio uses second hard parts discarded by other tv manufactures.

IF you go for LED go for Samsung. Sharp is terrible brand, there is usually severe color bleeding and inaccuracies. I've also received many returns on Sharp. Sony usually suffers from bland color, and Toshiba is a big MEH. Ironically, many brands buy their LED panels from Sharp, but their processors are much more superior than Sharp.
IF you go for Plasma go for Panasonic.

Keep in mind that TV settings in stores are set to "extreme" values. THese store settings are not reccommended for home use. IF you go to Sears you can use the remotes to play with the settings. I miss selling TVs, I truly loved my job for a while.
 
We had a plasma for 6 years in bright rooms and it always did well. We recently upgraded to a 70" behemoth (the 80 was just being gluttonous) LED tv. While it is huge, and the picture is easier to see in the bright light, at times I wish we had just done the 65" plasma. The picture on plasma's is better. It is smoother, the LED gets moments when it looks "soap opera-y", it chops sometimes...nothing too big, and 99% of the time it is fine, but it is that 1% of the time that I miss my plasma.



I assume that the Soap-Opera-y effect happens because you have 120hz+ tv. If you go into settings, you can usually adjust the level of this or turn it off completely. On my Samsung, I have the hz effect set to smooth so I do not suffer from this.
 
I assume that the Soap-Opera-y effect happens because you have 120hz+ tv. If you go into settings, you can usually adjust the level of this or turn it off completely. On my Samsung, I have the hz effect set to smooth so I do not suffer from this.

Fantastic! I'll have to look into this. Thanks!
 
Vizio is the best choice unless you're willing to spend a lot of money. I am familiar with their fab, and they use state of the art equipment and world-class engineers. I have had my trusty Vizio for 6 years now, and not a single problem.

I've heard people having problems with them, but I will echo this. I love mine.
 
We bought a 50" Samsung Plasma. Funny that Clutch mentions price, because ours was at the cheaper end of the spectrum in comparison to a lot of others. Trying to remember, but I think we found the best value at Sears. Best Buy was about 5% higher in price. Christmas purchase 2 years ago and haven't had any problems.
 
We bought a 50" Samsung Plasma. Funny that Clutch mentions price, because ours was at the cheaper end of the spectrum in comparison to a lot of others. Trying to remember, but I think we found the best value at Sears. Best Buy was about 5% higher in price. Christmas purchase 2 years ago and haven't had any problems.

I guess Samsung isn't too high anymore, but I swear I remember them being high 4-5 years ago, a lot higher than others actually. They carry them in a lot more places now, too, so that probably helped dumb down the prices. I don't know, I'm certainly no expert.
 
I guess Samsung isn't too high anymore, but I swear I remember them being high 4-5 years ago, a lot higher than others actually. They carry them in a lot more places now, too, so that probably helped dumb down the prices. I don't know, I'm certainly no expert.

They have models that are specific to Walmart and Costco that use older parts to keep prices low. Not that there is anything wrong with that. Im not sure if Walmart carries a model higher than then 630, for example. Black Friday tvs are even made with even lower quality parts, so its pretty funny. If you want a good deal for a display, Sears has 991 clearance models for insane prices, like up to 75 percent off. Unless you have a friend that works there it is going to be very hard to find them
 
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