Iphone

Question: Hi all
I am not a big fan of a big screen TV's, but I would like to buy now a 42" TV and the choice now confuses me alot. Could anyone please let me know which one is the best HDTV, EHDTV, LCD blah blah ....... TV, I simply want to put it on the wall of my basement and enjoy few movies. With all those available different types of models, make and the difference in technology makes the choice hard.
I have a simple TV cable at home and I do not want to buy/upgrade to any high defination cable plans etc.

Iphone

Relatively simple if you ignore all the sales hype:

If you're not going to get HDTV service, then get an EDTV. EDTV ("enhanced" definition instead of "high" definition) as 480 scan lines => same as DVD's; so DVD's will look spectacular, as will standard definition television. Even HDTV looks quite good on this format. HDTV has 720 scan lines => so HDTV pictures will be sharper than on an EDTV; but standard definition and DVD's won't look any better (in fact, if you had an EDTV side-by-side with an HDTV, you'd probably prefer the EDTV for DVD's, since it's an exact match to the native picture).

As for the display technology, either a plasma or an LCD will look fine. The plasma display will be brighter; and if you're mostly going to watch widescreen movies it's definitely preferable. But if you plan on watching a lot of standard definition NTSC television at the normal 4x3 aspect ration, you may want an LCD screen. The reason is that plasma displays are subject to image "burn-in" => i.e. if the same image is displayed for a length of time (15 min or so) it will "burn in" to the display and still be visible (like a ghost image) while watching something else. The most common example of this is the black bars on the side of a standard aspect ratio display on a widescreen TV. Fortunately this is a temporary "burn in" ==> and can be "washed away" by displaying another image (e.g. a full screen with no video input) for an hour or so. Also, it is MUCH less of a problem with modern plasma displays than it was 3-5 years ago.

Bottom line: For a 42" wall hung display I'd buy a plasma EDTV display based on your comment about not subscribing to any HDTV services -- even if you later change your mind the picture will still look excellent. As I noted above, I don't think the "burn in" is nearly as significant with newer plasma displays as it was just a few years ago, so I wouldn't worry about it. But if you're particularly concerned, just get a LCD unit.

Note: After writing that I did a bit of googling and found these articles which you might find useful on the HDTV vs EDTV issue: Plasma HDTV vs. Plasma EDTV - Native Resolution explained at Plasma TV Buying Guide
HDTV resolution explained - HDTV World - CNET.com