Right, you have raided the piggy bank and found out how much you don?t have but you are still hell bent on getting that brand new Flat Screen TV you?ve always wanted, so what?s next? Well unlike other guides I am going to recommend that you think long and hard about the financial implications first.
Now this might sound like heresy and no doubt all advisors will be counselling that you consider Picture sizes, LCD or Plasma, Aspect Ratios, Screen Resolution etc and these are all vital but none of it matters if you haven?t got the dough and you get suckered into spending more than you had planned to.
Consider just this one small fact.
You are about to embark upon possibly the third or fourth most expensive financial investment (after the House / Flat, Car et al) you have made and it is important that you understand the ramifications of what you are about to undertake.
Think well in advance and make sure you leave yourself with plenty of room to manoeuvre when it comes to the financials.
By this I mean that you are going to feel pretty hacked off if after a few months you are left thinking ?If only I had spent the extra few hundred pounds / dollars to get this feature and that etc when you set your budget too tight.
The thing is that without proper planning you could be left regretting the fact that you could have scored big-time with a ?sales bargain? for just a few hundred more at this stage in the proceedings or you allowed yourself into being talked into spending way more that you had budgeted for and now you can?t afford the electricity bills to power it!
The single most important part of the proceedings is plan and get it right now or live to regret at leisure!
So let?s get started with looking around at what is on offer at the moment and continuing the trend of giving you independent advice (not always what you want to hear but never mind) in this article we are going to take a look at what you should NOT spend your money on despite the best intentions of the sales guys!
We?ve highlighted three particular Flat Screen TV?s that you should steer clear of if you are looking for a decent TV and they are as follows.
The first one we recommend you steer clear of is the Evesham V32EMRO.
The V32EMRO is a 32in LCD TV and currently these TV's can be found for 600 pounds sterling or 1200 US dollars. The resolution of the screen is 1366 X 768 and with regards to being HD Ready the answer is yes. The Evesham has 2 (no RGB) scarts and the type and number of Multimedia interfaces the V32EMRO uses is HDMI and 1. The type of Tuner for this TV is Analogue and the Evesham is available from limited outlets only.
All these points being taken into consideration, how would we view the Evesham V32EMRO?
First up, we would look at the picture quality and our score here would be 4, and for the sound quality we would rate it at 4. Another useful aspect to review is the availability and number of relevant connections and our score here would be 4. As far as overall features are concerned we would give it 4 and the final individual verdicts would relate to the ease of use and overall value for money and our scores here would be, 8 and 4 respectively.
Finally our overall opinion would be to be honest there is not a lot to be positive and enthusing about this TV even allowing for the fact that it is relatively cheap. That factor allowing, it still doesn't represent good value for money (in our opinion) so thumbs down I?m afraid. The real fact is that Evesham actually have other sets that are infinitely superior to this one and this does let the side down I?m afraid.
Next up we think that you should avoid the Funai T27004.
The T27004 is a 27in LCD TV and the prices for these are around 700 pounds sterling or 1400 US dollars. The resolution of the screen is 1280 X 720 and with regards to being HD Ready the answer is yes. The Funai has 2 (2 RGB) scarts and the type and number of Multimedia interfaces the T27004 uses is DVI and 1. The type of Tuner for this TV is Analogue and the Funai is available from limited outlets only.
All these points being taken into consideration, how would we view the Funai T27004?
First up, we would look at the picture quality and our score here would be 4, and for the sound quality we would rate it at 4. Another useful aspect to review is the availability and number of relevant connections and our score here would be 6. With regards to the overall level of features, our view would be 4 and for ease of use and overall value for money we would give it, 8 and 4 respectively.
Taking everything into consideration our overall view of the package would be for the asking price of this TV, the picture quality is very poor and therefore our verdict has got to be thumbs down for this offering so go and part with your hard earned cash elsewhere!
Lastly we think that you should give a miss to the Sanyo CE-32LD6.
The CE-32LD6 is a 32in LCD TV and these TV's at present can be found in the region of 790 pounds sterling or 1580 US dollars. The screen resolution is 1366 X 768 and with regards to being HD Ready the answer is yes. The Sanyo has 3 (2 RGB) scarts and the type and number of Multimedia interfaces the CE-32LD6 uses are HDMI and 1. The type of Tuner for this TV is Analogue and the Sanyo is available from limited outlets only.
So how would we rate the Sanyo CE-32LD6?
Well to start with our score for the picture quality is 6, and closely tied in to the picture quality is the sound quality and our score for this would be 4. Taking a look at the number of relevant connections and their availability, our score would be 8. If we take a look at the overall "featureability" our score would be 6 if we then take a look at the ease of use and overall value for money then our scores would be, 8 and 4 respectively.
Taking everything into consideration our overall view of the package would be there is not much to recommend this I'm afraid despite however hard we tried. To be honest this TV gives the impression that all Sanyo were really trying to do was find some use for excess spare parts. Very much a case of "what do we do with these electronic bits - Oh I know lets build a TV and see how much we can offload."
It is essential to remember that the prices we use in these reviews are guides and are taken as an average across the industry and it is entirely conceivable and possible to find an occasion when you could be met with prices that are cheaper but also on occasions more expensive.
Stephen Morgan writes quite regularly on the Internet about TV and Home Entertainment issues and more on the above can be found at flat screen tv and also at http://hubpages.com/hub/Flat-Screen-TV--LCD-and-Plasma-Displays---Background-Information
