The choice for any HD screen almost invariable gets down to whether LCD or Plasma is the best medium for your screen. At the moment, I have to say that there are more pluses than minuses for Plasma. For example-Plasma TVs are generally speaking,faster than LCDs at present (but this may change) and are therefore better if you want the whole monty Theatre experience. LCD televisions are rated at 120HZ  or 240HZ coming soon, all plasma TVs are 480HZ. This refers to refresh rates that minimize blur when watching scenes with rolling fog, ocean waves or smoke. So if you’re particularly into the film Master & Commander with Russel Crowe, then you’d better get a Plasma!

You’re now getting down to the fairly obvious stuff, but in the excitement to get a new plasma TV, you may be beguiled by a silver-tongued assistant, or by a rogue fake review to go for something quickly and leave good sense behind. I’ve been on sites where upon clicking on the specs for a plasma TV you’re thinking of buying, it will offer you 10% discount and free delivery if you buy in the next 120 seconds. I reported them. Not sure whether it will do any good though!

Now start a list of the bells and whistles that the short list of units come with.  Check which ones are present in which sets, but only after you have rated then for a) whether they are desirable or essential, and then how often you are likely to use the facility or application in the foreseeable future.Apart from the fluffy stuff like internet access, a crucial one is how many and what type of inputs/outputs. What equipment have you got/are likely to get- can it accommodate them all? Handheld mobile? Wi-Fi? PS3? Wii? Home Theater Blu-Ray set-up? Lap-top? Set-top Box? DVD? Wow!

These are all important, but not necessarily disastrous if you make a mistake. You can get cable splitters to create two inputs or outputs where there is only one provided. But it may impair overall performance.

A common trap is to think that you will use every feature of the most complicated and full-featured set a lot of the time. No. How many times have you got a new app for your phone, and you grew bored with it after just a week? I have a friend who has an all-singing all -dancing set with all of his hardware plugged in to every port. When I go round there to watch a simple DVD, it takes him about ten minutes to get all the settings right, once he’s found the right controller, by which time I’ve gone out for a beer!

Do you remeber when the first kind of flat-panel TV hit the market more than 10 years ago?  They were small, and had a built in flaw in that if you left the same screen on for some time, it would burn into the screen and be visible all the time when the screen should be showing just darkness. Plasma displays have come a long way since then. They’re much more durable now, and the burn-in buggeration has gone.. Plasma TVs are not generally available in sizes less than 42 inches, and their picture quality in the best models still outperforms the best LCD picture quality–although the gap is closing. However, plasmas are much less efficient than LCD TVs.

For the most part, when buying a plasma TV there is no “best” brand, only the one(s) that you like best. That have the features that you want. You can’t really go wrong with any of the major brands, such as Pioneer, Panasonic, Sony, Samsung, etc. They are all, overall, of good quality;but each may have its individual strengths and drawbacks.

Here are some tips and wrinkles when going out to buy a plasma. First, is your viewing room very light? If so, you may have a problem in that Plasma screens tend to be more reflective than LCD, and you may have a problem with glare and light reflection on the screen which will impair perfomance (or at least your perception of performance!)

Do you want “full” HD or not? That mean you have to decide whether you want 720 or 1080 vertical lines of resolution. 720 units have fewer pixels on the same size screen and are generally only available in 50″ or smaller screens. 1080 is the current broadcast HD and “Blu-ray” standard. You’ll find 101 people telling you that you must have the higher resolution- otherwise why bother with HD?  Rubbish. Try a test- if you sit 8 feet or more from a 720 unit of 46″ or less, you’ll see no different quality picture than 1080. The best way for you to decide is to go look at the same program on the two TVs side by side at a local store. Obviously the 720 plasmas are a lot cheaper than the “full” HD. Buy what you want- don’t get bullied into buying the top of the range if you don’t need it!

You may have seen a lot of discussion, not to mention hot air, about blackness on the screen.  Phrases such as True Black, Deep Black and even the Spinal Tap line “None more Black” have been bandied about. But there’s a point to it. Some screens, mostly old LCD screens, are rubbish at displaying blacks. I know. I had one. Horror movies in old drak houses looked like they were shot in a mid-grey fog rather than pitch black. Blackness matters!

Apart from viwing a screen in the appropriate conditions and with the appropriate film on, you’ll have to look at the specs. The higher the ratio the more “real” the picture appears. 800:1 is the lowest. New models offer 30000:1 ratio (or better). Higher contrast ratios generally mean better “true blacks” in the picture. Blacks which are too gray reduce or wash out subtle dark details and muddle shadows and other “grey” color information.

I hope this is helping- more in Part Two!