What To Look For In A New TV

Posted by Andreas Christodoulou

Description : 

Buying a new TV can be a lot more complicated than it used to be. With options including HD, plasma, LCD, and a large range of different specs in the term of pixels and Hz, it can be difficult to decide which TV is worth buying and which is just hyped up with fancy terminology. 

Because you are spending your valuable money and possibly taking out some in store finance to purchase a TV, it’s important to choose one that works best for you.

Choosing a Size

Size is important and for most of us; after all, bigger is better. Important considerations include that there is a limit between a ‘good size’ and a ‘good price’. As a general rule, usually any TV over a certain size will be more expensive and for most, that size is 42-55 inches. A 42” TV is actually one of the best budget TV sizes, especially considering that most are only a few hundred above 36” TVs while a 62” might be several thousand pounds in comparison. Budget verses Size is a crucial thing to consider so take your time and shop around to see what is the biggest size you can get for a reasonable price. If you settle on a bigger TV then you could always choose to apply for cash loans to help pay for the television.

What do all of those Quality Terms Mean Anyway?

Pixel ratio, video processing, what do all of those terms mean anyway? For most of us, bigger numbers can confuse us into thinking that we’re getting a better TV, but for the most part, a lot of it is really just hype. The standard HDTV TV only has about 40 pixels per square inch which is about 8 times lower than your average iPhone screen which is retina display. In this light, HD quality might actually be a little lower than you think anyway. New 4K TVs are already coming out but these usually only have about 160 pixels per inch. Terms such as 120Hz and 240Hz refer to video processing while terms such as 1080i and 720p refer to display resolution and maximum light output. Usually these factors are actually less important than simply calibrating your TV correctly to display well in your light conditions.

Plasma verses LED verses LCD 

There are multiple types of TVs but Plasma, LED and LCD are the three most common. Most experts recommend plasma as the most consistent quality TV in a room without a lot of sunlight, mostly because plasma provides the best contrast and screen uniformity. LED screens are best when paired with local dimming, and LCD screens can be extremely good as well so long as the colour saturation is correct.

Options

From 3D to smart TV, most televisions today are a lot more complicated than their predecessors. A smart TV can usually be connected to the internet, can often be used to play games and can be used to answer email or even log onto your social networks. Anyone with a game station probably has all of these features already, so it might not be necessary to purchase a smart TV. Many TVs now come with built in smart apps so you might not have the option to purchase an old fashioned TV without these options. 3D is usually vastly overrated, mostly because most people don’t actually use the 3D feature. Watching 3D requires you to purchase 3D movies and wear 3D glasses, so this can be a hassle that most people would rather do without. However, a 3D TV will play normal movies so it won’t limit your access to the television you love. 

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Any thoughts?

*by andreascy*

How To Build A Home Theatre At A Reasonable Price

Posted by Andreas Christodoulou

Description :

Many people these days have that magical room in their house known as the home theatre. Often referred to as a “movie room” or “media centre” the home theatre is now a highly popular place for families and friends to gather.

People inexperienced in the whole home theatre scene are often concerned at how expensive it could be to construct and how much room it may take up. But things have changed. People who have not upgraded their television in quite a while are still assuming the prices of flat screens and speakers are in excess of £3000. It is possible to spend that much, but that is only if you are looking at getting that brand new 50” OLED television that isn’t really worth it.

Make Sure Your System Fits Your Space

The first thing I did when I began looking for the speakers I needed was to size up the room that would become my home theatre. It’s easy to maximize the sound of your room if the space is smaller than average. The smaller the space, the less power needed to amplify the speakers. This means you can get a fairly medium powered receiver/amp and speakers that won’t require a lot of power. A lot of people will pack their room with huge over-sized speakers; you will definitely save a lot more money and have better sounding 5.1 using the correct speakers. 

Don’t Let That Salesman In The Shop Fool You

You can always end up spending more when you visit some of the large chain shops. Commission sales are what drives staff members to come rushing up to you as soon as you come through the door. Don’t let them try and sell you every useless item under the sun, they will definitely try. Make sure you find out EXACTLY what you are looking for before you walk into the shop. 

Speakers

Equipment can cost a lot of money; it’s in your interest to shop around before making any large decisions, I’ve found that quality is definitely worth investing in. I bought speakers from a local shop that sold speakers as separates. This means that I basically selected different front and rear speakers according to my taste, once I had decided on this I began looking for the ideal centre speaker.

The main problem with buying separate speakers is that they vary in color shape and size; it’s difficult to keep the speakers coordinated. I would however, definitely pick separates over an all in one speaker kit. All in one kits are usually great for the budget but not so great for sound quality, unless you’re spending upwards of £1000 I would not suggest it.

If you are upgrading your home theatre, always look out for shops that will allow you to trade in your previous speakers to then put towards your new ones. You may also want to use an online auction site such as eBay to get rid of your old speakers, or even buy your new ones!

Televisions

The television is one item to be careful of. There are hundreds on the market and they range from 300 to 3000+. You must first decide on what the room is primarily going to be used for, Movies? Gaming?

If gaming is a big factor for your setup and you’re looking at getting the £400 budget Samsung LCD or whichever brand, make sure you check what latency the screen has! 

This is usually referred to as “response time” and it can greatly affect how fast your control inputs feel coming through to the television. The smaller the response time the better. The minimum response time for gaming would be around 8ms, any more than that and you’ll be at a disadvantage. LCD televisions can have quite a large response time where as Plasma is known to be a lot smaller but it’s not always the case.

Projectors

Projectors are coming down in price these days so make sure you have a look at those, but don’t forget to include the cost of the pull down screen! Projectors can be a great way to maximize the size of the screen. You can get fairly decent HD projectors now at quite a good price. Projectors can be quite hard to watch in the daytime due to daylight shooting through the window. I had to put up blinds and thick curtains to be able to see the screen. One other thing about projectors is they have a lamp life, the bulb inside the projector can only be used for a certain amount of time before it effectively becomes useless. When I last had a projector its bulb could cost up to £400 for a replacement, so keep that in mind.

Although people assume it to be ridiculously expensive, building a home theatre doesn’t have to be. Just make sure you research what you’re looking for and check the specifics of all items!

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*by andreascy*

NHK and Panasonic announced a 145-inch Ultra High Definition Plasma Display with 34 million pixels

Posted by Andreas Christodoulou

Description :

NHK has announced a 145-inch Ultra High Definition plasma display, with 16 times the resolution of a regular Full HD display. This follows the 85-inch LCD display announced by NHK last year (Source DigInfoTV).

This prototype was co-developed with Panasonic. It has almost 34 million 0.417 mm square pixels, 7,860 horizontally and 4,320 vertically, and a frame rate of 60 fps. 

This display uses a new drive system to stabilize the picture throughout the panel, by scanning several pixels simultaneously in the vertical direction. Even in a panel with about 4,000 scan lines, this achieves a stable picture without flickering. 

"Even when viewed from 1.6 m away, this Ultra High Definition display makes you feel as if you're looking at a real scene. It doesn't use 3D technology, but the picture is so realistic, you feel truly immersed in the scene." 

This is the world's first Ultra High Definition plasma display. As the pixels of a plasma display are self-emitting and the display therefore doesn't require a backlight, it has superior viewing angles, responsiveness and color reproduction. 

"One major feature of this 145-inch Ultra High Definition display is that it gives a very even image at such a high resolution. Another big feature is, because it's Ultra High Definition, it efficiently shows 8K x 4K pictures, which have a huge pixel count." 

"At present, we think this system will be used in commercial settings first, such as theaters, rather than in the home." 

This new plasma display will be on show to the public from May 24-27, at NHK's Science & Technology Research Laboratories in Tokyo.

*by andreascy*

The Hottest thing on earth : X- Rays heat metal to 2 million °C

Posted by Andreas Christodoulou

Description :

With the help of the most powerful X-ray laser in the world researchers of the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory of the U.S. Department of Energy have heated a piece of aluminum to a temperature of two million degrees Celsius (3.6 million degrees Fahrenheit). They also managed to verify the temperature achieved. This work could be an important step to a better understanding of nuclear fusion processes that go on in the cores of stars and giant planets like Jupiter.

Up to now it was possible to create plasmas out of gases and study them with conventional lasers, but doing the same thing with solids that laser beams cannot penetrate is new. The Linac Coherent Light Source (LCLS) is capable of generating very short X-ray pulses. The researchers used these to create a little ‘plasma cube’ with vertexes of about 10 µm and a temperature of two million degrees Celsius.

*by andreascy*