Both 37" LCDs. Mum is on a budget but wants a 'flat' TV. No HD signal at the minute but may go onto Freesat "When it gets better".

The Toshiba is True HD the Samsung is not. Both come with a Free 5 Yr warranty. I heard Toshiba's aren't the best.

Which would you go for?

I was recently looking at a few Samsung TV's and very nearly bought one (forget which model).
Toshiba is a brand I've never been keen on and I've not seen many nice looking Tosh TV's either.

Instead, I opted for the 37LG5010 and I'm very happy with it.
37", 1080p, built in freeview if required (I don't use it as I have Humax PVR)
I paid £530 from Dixons but price does vary slightly.

Thanks for that! I'll check how much the extended warranty is a Dixons...

Considered plasma?

http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/forums/s...1#post27863574

I'd be lying I said we'd actively looked at Plasmas but the one mentioned on that thread is too expensive, even before service plans are taken into account.

Thank you anyway!

tosh r a gd make - have had a crt since 97 that still works fine. - my sis uses it..

oh and i hear panasonic tvs are pretty hot ...

My advice would be to not only see them together before you buy, but listen to them too. The Samsung units have a reputation for rubbish speakers/design and hence poor sound - not a problem if you are feeding a surround sound processor or AV amp but might be if you are relying on the TV speakers alone.

has anyone got an ingma machine to decipher, or at 38 too old for text talk?

I've always been impressed with Samsung panels more than anything else, but Toshiba are pretty good too, and for the same price, getting 1080p over 720p is obviously a bonus. Best thing to do is compare them by eye and see really. Especially if you can test a range of SD and HD material. Or buy both and send one back!

Agreed on the Samsung sound quality - they're not the best. I've had a couple of Samsungs and I wouldn't want to rely on their speakers (I connect external speakers, so not a problem for me). LG had good speakers on theirs from the ones I've heard though, and the picture quality is among the best - if you can find an LG I think I'd recommend them most.




Toshiba are a good make - (I) have had a CRT since '97 that still works fine. My sister uses it..

Oh and I hear Panasonic TVs are pretty hot ...


You're not being charged by the character, and you presumably have a full keyboard at your disposal, not just the 12 keys on a phone. Txt spk on forums is just plain lazy.

£600 at Empire Direct with 5 yr warranty, or cheaper at Littlewoodsdirect with 1yr warranty (and there's cashback and vouchers kicking around the web). It is the only 37" plasma on the market. It might not be for you, but have a serious look at - you might be surprised.

I bought mine for £569 including a five year warranty, that's why I suggested it apart from the fact the picture will be much better than LCD.

LG375010 1080p £530 at dixons

Whoever told you toshiba aren't good is talking out of their rear, Toshiba along with Panasonic and Sony are great sets, Philips and Samsung wouldn't be on my list. As for 720p against full 1080p well it's no contest.

Which wins the contest then?

If you have two TVs one with 1080 lines and one with 768 lines at the same price and the 1080 TV isn't a good deal in some way then the 768 TV will be the better TV. The only time the 1080 TV will be better is if you sit close enough to take advantage of the extra resolution.

I'd personally go for the Tosh. I've had a tosh for over 10 years. I have a huge 37" CRT Dolby Digital that is now at my brothers and looks as good today as it did when I first bought it.

I now have the 37XV505DB and got it from Amazon for £520 a couple of months ago. Once you get through setting the contrast, brightness, colour and backlight to a more subtle level the set looks the part. I run Sky HD through it, a media centre PC running 1080p for Blu Ray discs and DVD player also that upscales standard dvds. The HD picture alone is excellent and goes that one step further with a full HD 1080p picture. Also has Freeview and an "Exact Scan" option where you see the full picture and no overscan. 3x HDMI's also.

The sound is ok as they use the Onkyo system which has been used for a while now. It's bass is fine, and have an option to purchase an additional sub woofer if need be, but to be fair if I'm watching movies via the tv, I use my DD amp.

My other brother had a 32" LCD Samsung and the Freeview tuner in it is knackered already and the HDMI socket isn't too clever. However of course not all are the same, so he's been unlucky. He now has the Tosh 42XV505DB which inspired me to upgrade mine from the Tosh 32WL66. I am in agreement with B-29 about Toshiba tv's.

If in doubt, as Praxidike said, get to your local Comet, Currys etc and compare some tv's. Of course it all depends how they are wired up, some use scarts and even the dreaded RF, however they are getting better and have loops for HDMI cables now, but depends on the material that they are showing. Also bear in mind that it's unlikely that these stores will have changed the picture settings and probably have the brightness, contrast, backlight on full which seems to be the norm for manufacturers to set their tv's up on. So you will never see a tv in a store at it's full potential unless you go to a dedicated Hi-fi store such as Richer Sounds etc who would be happy to set the tv up for you as I've experienced.

I'm busy currently backing-up my dvd collection to the DVD Library feature within Windows Vista's updated Media Centre and is great. One click and you are there watching a DVD, no fiddling about changing discs.

i have a 42 x 3030 and am more than happy with it

This sounds like a very reasonable price for a 1080p set (it is 1080p, rather than 1080i, right?). What is the motion blur like on the telly, for example when watching football or F1?

The Tosh XV505DB range is 1080p also for about a tenner less. I can't comment on the LG, but have seen this model in the stores and not a bad looking set.

However, through no fault of the LCD's and Plasma's, any F1 or football, particularly via any ITV channel is poor, blurred, washed out etc. It's all down to the compression on the channels and the bigger the set, the worse it looks. Loads of people have complained at the picture quality on their sets, but it's the broadcasters that are at fault not any HD tv. However having watched most sports via Sky HD, the picture is crystal clear with no motion blur at all. Colour is very precise and any text on screen is razor sharp. One thing I did when I first got HD was compare the two pics by watching Sky Sports 1 HD for example, and going to Sky Sports 1, and noticing the differences. Thats the beauty of HD.

The problem I found after watching HD tv is how shockingly poor some of the SD channels really are. ITV are an example for the reasons mentioned above, may of the late 100's and 200's channels on the Sky EPG also suffer from poor bit rates due to the amount of channels crammed on a satellite transponder. So don't be surprised if some channels look worse on your tv, but it's not a fault with the tv. Blame the broadcasters. Hats off to Sky for the amount of HD channels, and I can't wait for them to all the new HD movie channels this month / November.

In regards difference between 1080i and 1080p don't expect too much of a noticeable change. Fast moving action is better granted, but sometimes you won't notice that much difference. I'm not fully up to speed with the difference between interlace and progressive so look it up. There are plenty of threads hidden in the depths of DS awaiting to be dug up if need be.

Many of the SD channels are very poor however note that some TVs do handle SD much better than others.


Sky only transmit 1080i anyway so whether the TV will handle 1080p is irrelevant for Sky viewing, you will get no motion handling advantage whatever from a 1080p set. If what you really mean is does the TV have a panel with a display of 1920x1080 or one of the lower resolutions then that depends on how close you sit to the TV compared to it's size.

It's only a better deal if it's a cheapo 1080p against a high end 720p ,as for having to sit nearer to see the benefit of 1080p, yeah right

You can put a roll eyes up symbol if you like but it's a simple fact of maths that the visible linear size of the pixels is inversely proportional to the distance they are viewed from. If you can't resolve down to the pixel level on a 720 or 768 panel then you will get no benefit from going to a 1080 panel.

Rubbish, You realise the 1080p means lines ??i'm off to get a 405 line set then, it must be just as good or a 110 film camera as it looks just as good as my 10MP camera from a distance.

Saying rubbish and putting up the roll eyes makes you look silly when you are clearly wrong.

If you are sitting far enough away then the 405 lines will be just as good as 1080 or 10,080 lines - it's simple enough, at a farther distance pixels just merge into each other. Most people however sit close enough that 405 lines will look awful hence the upgrade to 625 lines and then on to HD.

Have you bad eyesight, the TV industry wrong bobcar right.

It's not just me, anyone who understands this knows that the required resolution depends on both TV size and distance and that beyond a certain distance for a particular TV size you get no benefit from increasing the resolution.

If you don't believe me then do some research on visual acuity. Either that or ask your maths or science teacher.



(This diagram may help you somewhat if you're too embarrassed to ask your teacher) http://s3.carltonbale.com/resolution_chart.html