Big TV's at home

I recently noticed an 80" Sharp screen at Sears of all places for $3999. The cheapest I see them these days is a couple hundred more.

But I am just wondering, how many people have TV's bigger than 60" who are on this forum? How many people want one?

I think my woman wouldn't want me to spend that much on a TV and would prefer it go towards a vehicle.

But curious if anybody else has contemplated 70" or 80" .. even specifically comments about the Sharp model.

Quote: Ahigh

I am just wondering, how many people have TV's bigger than 60" who are on this forum?

I use a data projector and an 80 inch projection screen. Great for watching Netflix or Amazon Instant. Trouble is, I need a throw distance of about 9 feet. Total cost, about $800

I have a 52" and its too big. I like it around 40". I have
to move my head too much with a 52, I try moving just
my eyes but it feels weird.

Mine is exactly 60". It was also really cheap (like, $800 or something). The picture is great, but, at that price, I won't mind replacing it in a year or two if some new technology (3D w/o glasses?) becomes affordable.

Quote: EvenBob

I have a 52" and its too big. I like it around 40". I have
to move my head too much with a 52, I try moving just
my eyes but it feels weird.

Your room is probably too small for a TV that size. You need to sit far enough away that you can comfortably see the whole picture in your field of vision.

72" Toshiba. Worth every dollar to me. Love it.

Quote: Ahigh

I recently noticed an 80" Sharp screen at Sears of all places for $3999. The cheapest I see them these days is a couple hundred more.

But I am just wondering, how many people have TV's bigger than 60" who are on this forum? How many people want one?

I want a really big one soon. But I'll wait until they are given away free with cereal ;)

Seriously, what I paid for my 32" inch LED TV seems like highway robbery compared to today's prices...

Quote: Ahigh

I recently noticed an 80" Sharp screen at Sears of all places for $3999. The cheapest I see them these days is a couple hundred more.

But I am just wondering, how many people have TV's bigger than 60" who are on this forum? How many people want one?

I think my woman wouldn't want me to spend that much on a TV and would prefer it go towards a vehicle.

But curious if anybody else has contemplated 70" or 80" .. even specifically comments about the Sharp model.

I've had a Mitsubishi 60" monster-sized TV for around a dozen years. I paid a left nut for it then........but it was well worth it. My wife is eyeing the Panasonic 65" Plasma (ST series I think) for around $2K. She researched thoroughly and believes that it's best value available. Since my wife is nearly always right, we will be ordering.

I have a 61" Samsung in the corner of my condo living room. Most of the L-configuration seating is about 10 or 12 feet from the screen. I bought it just over 4 years ago, and I still love it. At first, my wife thought it would be too big and just a man-cave thing, but before long she liked it a lot, too. By putting it in the corner, I didn't need a flat-panel plasma. Mine is a 1080p DLP.

I am thinking of springing for a color TV next time. If I can find one with a built in VHS player.

I have a couple of 73 inch TV's and the rest are 42-46 inch. I really don't even notice a difference when I am watching the smaller ones. To me it is all about the content. The only reason I would buy bigger ones would be if my room was large and the seat distance was great.

Quote: Buzzard

I am thinking of springing for a color TV next time. If I can find one with a built in VHS player.

betamax has better quality.

It's a shame that thin flat screen TV's today are not built to last more than 7-10 years. There are no tubes or bulbs that can be replaced. When it goes out, you have to toss the whole thing, since repairs are prohibitively expensive, and you may still have to deal with degraded picture quality. Consider that when you are putting several thousands of dollars into one set. Perhaps it would be better to bank some cash and buy a smaller one now, and another, probably bigger and less expensive one in 5 years.

Sony recently introduced a super-dee-duper high def monitor that has four times the pixels of the current 1080p market standard.

Quote: Ayecarumba

It's a shame that thin flat screen TV's today are not built to last more than 7-10 years. There are no tubes or bulbs that can be replaced. When it goes out, you have to toss the whole thing, since repairs are prohibitively expensive, and you may still have to deal with degraded picture quality. Consider that when you are putting several thousands of dollars into one set. Perhaps it would be better to bank some cash and buy a smaller one now, and another, probably bigger and less expensive one in 5 years.

Sony recently introduced a super-dee-duper high def monitor that has four times the pixels of the current 1080p market standard.

This is not really a big deal. There is no way that I will keep the same TV for 10 years. 5 years is the outside max.

Quote: Ayecarumba

It's a shame that thin flat screen TV's today are not built to last more than 7-10 years.

Ayecarumba, what makes you say that? I've had a 42" Hitachi plasma in a living room for somewhere around 6 years and never had a problem. Probably not used as much as our other set, but enough and it still works great.

I have a 43". Love it, just recently stopped playing Xbox on the ol's 19in boob tube. Big difference.

I had a 52". Ex-wife has it now, and I can't say I miss it. Bigger isn't always better.

I still use 19" and 32" tube TVs. I'm not much for being on the leading edge of tech.

As far as "hugeness", one thing I wouldn't mind is one of those projection deals for my racing sims. It'd be much easier to use one giant screen than pump out the cash for a three screen setup.

Quote: Ayecarumba

It's a shame that thin flat screen TV's today are not built to last more than 7-10 years. There are no tubes or bulbs that can be replaced. When it goes out, you have to toss the whole thing, since repairs are prohibitively expensive, and you may still have to deal with degraded picture quality.

For the record, my Samsung LED TV failedafter a little over a year. I sent it to an authorized Samsung repair shop, which fixed it for about $75. I don't recall what they foudn wrong with it, but it has kept working since without fail. I think that was about 3 years ago or so...

$7,300 for the 90". After going to CES, I think I want one of the 90" ones, and would settle with an 80" to save $3,000.

Costco has the 80" cheaper than google shopping FYI. You have to add it to your cart to know the price though.

90" model



https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&tbm=shop&q=80LE632U
https://www.google.com/search?hl=en&tbm=shop&q=90LE745U

Just saying I want one, though, doesn't mean I am getting one. I think I might rather get the Sony NEX-FS700U.

I've got a sharp 70" and I love it! It's great for watching sports.

Quote: AxiomOfChoice

You need to sit far enough away .

Why would I do that? I buy a TV to fit the room,
not the other way around. Bigger is most definitely
not always better.

Quote: EvenBob

Bigger is most definitely not always better.

I tried out some of the HDTV glasses (image in lens) at CES the other day. They were much better than any big screen I've ever experienced. Although, it sure would look strange, seeing everyone in a room sort of staring out into space; reminds me of scenes from Caprica.

Quote: GH

I tried out some of the HDTV glasses (image in lens) at CES the other day..

Its all matter of perspective. Buying a huge TV so you
have to sit 15' away from it is nuts. Having a 40" TV
that you can sit 7' away from accomplishes the same
thing. I like it better, the TV doesn't monopolize the
room.

Quote: EvenBob

Why would I do that? I buy a TV to fit the room,
not the other way around. Bigger is most definitely
not always better.

Right, that's my point. If you have a small room you do not want a big TV. If your room is too small for the TV then get a smaller TV!

I consider everything larger than about 55" with 1920x1080 resolution to be pretty useless, except if the distance is overly large.
So it's big. But so are the pixels. And with pixels as big as a finger, where's the image quality?

They need to up the resolution. Without that, large screens are wasted. They just look cheap, in image terms. And speaking of that, the best image quality is usually found between 32" and 55". Larger than that and you start getting uneven backlight brightness, visible pixel gaps and overall focus on quantity over quality.

Size sure helps for some movies, but there are projectors and IMAX cinemas for that. For most part, I'm personally more sensitive to image quality than to image size, as long as it's enough to fill a reasonable FOV. Plasma quality has really plummeted in recent years. In LED-backlit LCD, you need to look for full rear backlight, local dimming and advanced panels.

These are all very intelligent points. And I agree the dot pitch at about 18" away is where I typically hone in with my 40" Samsung I have connected to my computer.

I've been using 40" displays as my main computer setup since 2009 now, and I love it. But 80" quad-HD for a computer display would be better!

Some people that I know are suggesting that high resolution stuff at the show is just not needed. I think the price will have to come down to $4000 or under to make sense. You have to have a cost per pixel in the $0.005 per pixel I think before the masses really want to buy it. That's just my wild guess.

Right now you can get solid 40" displays for a computer (that are actually HDTV sets) for $600. The really cheap ones are way lower. But I think $4000 is where a quad HD 80" set is going to sell really really well to computer enthusiasts. Anything higher, and the TV guys aren't going to care until they have content for it (years) and the computer guys are just going to be happy with cheaper setups that have thin bezels and multiple 40" (or thereabouts) displays.

Even the really small quad HD stuff I saw at the show was MSRP over $5,000. I have no idea what the 110" QuadHD screens are going to cost, but I am assuming they are all six figures.

Quote: P90

They need to up the resolution. Without that, large screens are wasted. They just look cheap, in image terms. And speaking of that, the best image quality is usually found between 32" and 55"..

You just hit on it. Resolution is everything, thats why I
like 40". The 52" I have is OK but its just not as sharp
as the 40". I have a 25" in my office thats 5' from my
nose to the screen. The resolution and sharpness are
killer and I watch it far more than the 52.

Quote:

if the diagonal of the screen is D, and it is HDTV (1080x1920), then your eye will not see the pixels as long as you sit at least 1.5 D away. Thus, if you have a 30 inch diagonal, then you can sit 45 inches away, and even closer if your eyesight is worse than 20-20.

“Here's the calculation. The resolution of the human eye is about 1 minute of arc. The sine of that angle is 0.0003. Pixels closer than this will not be resolved. “If you have a TV with a diagonal measurement D, and the height and width are in the ratio of HDTV (1081/1920), then the height of the screen is very close to D/2. There are 1080 pixels in that distance, so the average spacing of the pixels is D/(2*1080) = D/2160. Thus, for a 30 inch screen, the pixel spacing is 30/2160 = 0.014. The number of pixels per inch is about 70. There are more pixels per inch for small screens, and fewer for large screens. If you are observing the screen from a distance R, then your eye resolution (with angle A = 1 minute of arc) will be R x sine(A) = 0.0003 R. This distance must be bigger than the pixel size, so we set 0.0003 R = D/2160. That gives R = D/(2160 x .0003) = 1.5.

http://www.nytimes.com/2004/12/23/technology/circuits/23POGUE-EMAIL.html?_r=0

Thanks for the quantitative info. Thus, for my 61" Samsung I mentioned earlier, we should watch from at least 7 feet 7.5 inches away. All viewing positions exceed that, so it looks great.

Strictly speaking, 1 MOA or 0.3 mrad is the resolution for 1 line. That is a pair of black and white lines, each 0.5 MOA. For lower contrast, checkerboard pattern, or single dot, the resolution is reduced. So it's mostly fair to say that about 1 MOA is adequate for average contrast images, but it's not at all like you aren't going to see anything smaller.

Between 0.5 MOA and 1 MOA, you will mostly only notice additional useful detail in text and patterns (i.e. high contrast), but you'll clearly notice the difference in sharpness. There are also additional advantages in color convergence, moire reduction, edge detection, accuracy in motion.

It's not necessary to have 4K content to benefit from a 4K display. CRT displays exhibit a natural anti-aliasing effect, so native image resolution works best for them; FPD lack that effect. An image upscaled with a quality algorithm on a FPD twice the resolution, particularly with extra processing for finer noise, will usually look noticeably better than at native resolution.
The benefit is considerably smaller than that from native 4K content, but it's there.

Although there's plenty of metrics apart from resolution. Black depth, max brightness, global static contrast, local contrast. A really good TV at 40" will still set you back about $1,200-$1,500, up to $2,500 for 46". Of course 4K still has a way to go to get its price in place. I'm looking more towards reasonable sizes such as 60"-70", since past 80"+ you might as well consider a DLP projector.


Speaking of 4K content distribution, it's encoded with AVC generation codecs, rather than 20th century legacy MPEG2, so a feature-length 4K film at standard bitrate takes 20-25 GB - same as a modern bluray (which is really overprovisioned for 1080p in capacity). Follow-up codecs are intended to further improve on compression, and for the while being DL blurays at 45+ GB should provide a little more capacity for longer movies typical today or stereoscopic exercises.

Higher resolutions call for less bitrate per pixel for the same quality, since there is less actual information per pixel to encode. Hue and chroma are not resolved below about 3 MOA, so there's no need for 4:4:4 at 4K; only the luma component needs to be sampled at full resolution. This means that only twice more data needs to be stored, not four times as much. Extra color depth (also overdue) increases it to about 2.5 times.

Between that and improved codecs, existing storage and distribution methods are well sufficient for handling 4K video. There has been a near-total neglect of relevant ASIC development, however, so the only way to play it back now is with relatively expensive general computing hardware.

The move to higher resolutions is being executed very clumsily this time. First the TV industry locked itself in with the asinine HDMI standard, more archaic and limiting than pre-existing DVI. Then it completely ignored the intermediate 2560x1440 resolution despite its wide acceptance elsewhere. Now comes the payback: moving from 1080p to 4K will be a lot more painful than the two 1080p->1440p->4K moves combined would have been.

Quote: DRich

I have a couple of 73 inch TV's and the rest are 42-46 inch. I really don't even notice a difference when I am watching the smaller ones.

So how many TV's do you have? It sounds like 5-7. Do you have a setup-box or TIVO Quad or premier for each one? Do you have a MoCa network? I have heard that one of the most popular items for people with money to burn is an outdoor TV.

I know you weren't asking me, but I have 8 flat screen LCD TV's that are 40" or larger in my house. I generally prefer the 40" and being close.

The one place I could use something larger than the 55" I currently have is at the craps table. But I think three 55" or two 55" and one 70" would be best.

It was quite an effort to get the woman and family behind me on the LCD screen behind the craps table. If I can convince her, I may move to a 3-LCD setup with two 55" on the outside and one larger in the middle.

I think 40" is my favorite size when I can get close enough. That's what I use for computer displays in the house.

67 inch Samsung that I will be 10 feet in front of today and tomorrow for the NFL. Also a 40 incher that I get relegated to when Dancing with the Stars is on. Two older 27 inch tube sets for company when visiting.

I luv the marketting here. Bigger is better, but you have to move further away to see the full screen. :oP

Please readjust your furniture to the correct distance, but DON'T TOUCH DAT DIAL !!!! lmfaorotf

Quote: Ahigh

I think 40" is my favorite size when I can get close enough. That's what I use for computer displays in the house.

That seems really large for a computer display. Does anyone else on this forum have display over 27" that they use for their computer?

Quote: pacomartin

That seems really large for a computer display. Does anyone else on this forum have display over 27" that they use for their computer?

XBR 929 at 55" landscape main and Dell 30" portrait secondaries.

I really think 40" is the sweet spot for a general purpose standalone computer display. The pixels become noticeable at larger sizes if you look closely. I got used to live with it, so yes, the letters are made with pixels, just turn off any cleartype toys so they don't blur. But in any video, in games, image processing, it looks great. You never notice the pixels unless you try on a static image, and then it actually helps with editing. I put text content, buttons, etc on side displays, and then a 55" main works perfectly.

In a short while, they should make HDMI 2.0 that supports 4K unlike the current version (nominal support only) or start using DP. New Bravias are already 4K, just need the interconnect. Put that in, and you're golden.

Unfortunately it's not as easy to span across multiple displays with different resolutions as one would hope. You need to use SoftTH for perfect results, and that's DirectX 9 only, besides the performance suffers with tougher titles. Most 2.39:1 movies can be viewed comfortably when spanned, but for a few top titles it gets in the way.


With display size, ultimately it's all about the geometry - providing 1:1 angular image size and eye comfort. If you were to maintain 1:1 at 90 degree FOV with a 27" display, it would have to be just 17 inches away from your eyes. That isn't remotely healthy, you'll ruin your vision. A more comfortable 2 feet would be 55 degrees. Most movies use 90-120 degrees in wide shots, and you can't change it. In games, 75 degrees is still comfortable; horrors do 60 for an unnerving claustrophobic feel.

A larger 55" display allows for a 75 degree FOV at a comfortable meter, a 90 degree FOV at almost a yard. That's very different. We're not talking about VR here, but it becomes possible, with some effort and psychology, to get into what's happening and take it seriously.
From a work perspective, it's even simpler: every steradian that isn't filled with useful information or controls is a steradian of wasted space.