Well my TV finally died. We are wanting to buy a flatscreen to hang on the wall. I was thinking around 40+" or so. We have a limited budget of around 2k or so. Has anyone bought one lately, and what did you pay, brand, size, ??

thanks

there are 3 things to consider: size, price, and picture quality, and you can't come out ahead in all three at once.

generally the bigger you go, the more expensive you go.  it gets MORE expensive for a good picture in your new big TV.  Usually with a name brand you will get a good picture.  Samsung, Panasonic, and Sony have the best pictures, but also the highest price.

Go to every electronics store in town and look at the different models.  you will need to strike a balance between the 3 factors, and may end up having to expand your budget to get what you want

I bought one smaller than your requirements. It's a 32" high-definition Philips LCD flat-panel in 9x16 widescreen and I love it.

I bought it at Coscto for $1400 plus tax.

Philips TVs, IMHO, have an excellent picture for the price.

ETA: Don't get a Philips plasma, they've got some problems. And Sony phased out the plasmas too, for some reason..

Looks like my budget needs to be higher.

I'm going to suggest you seriously consider going a different route.

Flat screen, fixed pixel displays are not the best way to go at this time, if you do buy one now you'll be buying towards the end of the generation technology wise, there are much better technologies on the horizon than plasma and LCD, which both have significant drawbacks.

As I see it, there are basically three really good choices in TVs right now.

1. Get an inexpensive philips 30 or 34" HD widescreen CRT TV, the 30" will cost about $350 and the 34" about $6-700.

2. Get a sony CRT for about twice that much for the same size, but knowing you have the best picture quality available at any price. Ask any hardcore gamer or videophile about how to get the best picture quality and they'll tell you a Sony hi-res HD CRT.

3. Get a huge rear-projection CRT if you have the room, they also have better picture quality than the flat screens you can hang on the wall, and they cost MUCH MUCH less, for $2K you can get the biggest, best CRT you can fit in your living room.

The only downside to any of these TVs is that they're big and heavy and you can't hang them on the wall, in every other way they are equal to or better than the fixed-pixel displays, they have faster refresh rates, better contrast, display true blacks, don't burn in or burn out pixels, and because they're not fixed pixel displays they look better when displaying SD or DVD sources, and obviously they are MUCH cheaper for the same size and picture quality.

With a $2000 budget I would buy a 34" Sony widescreen HD CRT, no question in my mind at all, and you'll have $800 or so left over for a super surround sound system, DVR, DVD burner, player, etc., or maybe just buy another AR.

When you decide checkout www.crutchfield.com.
You don't have to pay any sales tax, and they'll ship you a TV that size for free.

Toshiba 72" HD DLP.Its only $5000   Which is not bad at all for the TV

You can get a 50" DLP for $1500 here;

http://www.outlet.philips.com

They also have several 42" flatscreens for under $2K and the CRTs I mentioned for $344 shipped for the 30" and up.

You might find this informative.

Philips 42in plasma from Costco $1900 plus tax

42" plasma flat HDTV Pixel Plus 42PF7320A/37

All kinds of cool features and hookups


Here is a good arfcom thread

www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/

My brother picked up a 40 something inch flat panel plasma from a site, it was refurbed and had two warranties on it. He saved close to $2k buying it like that than on the store shelves.

If you want big picture, small footprint, and cheap, a projector is the only way to go.

Quoted: If you want big picture, small footprint, and cheap, a projector is the only way to go.

That is something else to think about. My wife and I bought one for the kids to watch movies on at night time on the side of our garage. I have two sheets of 4x8 coroplast that I hang on the detahed garage that we have, set up some sound and the dvd player. Kids love it. in the basement when they have sleep overs, we set it up down there. You have to be careful and not forgetful of the filters on the fan's, heat kills the projetors very fast and expensive bulbs are not cool. Keep it in the open and well vented, if you get a projector, spend some money on a small fan, the types used in computers to keep it cool.

Quoted: If you want big picture, small footprint, and cheap, a projector is the only way to go.

Yep. If you can control the light, the Panasonic AE-900 is great. You can get them for about $1,300.

www.projectorcentral.com/ae900_plvz4.htm

www.projectorcentral.com/panasonic_ae900.htm

www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=586260

ETA: www.projectorcentral.com/Panasonic_Home-PT-AE700U.htm

2. Get a sony CRT for about twice that much for the same size, but knowing you have the best picture quality available at any price. Ask any hardcore gamer or videophile about how to get the best picture quality and they'll tell you a Sony hi-res HD CRT.

Agreed, and you'll most likely get 15 or more years of great use out of it.  The Sony professional model Trinitron TV's at work are all over 15 years old but still have a better picture than any LCD, DLP, or plasma TV I've seen.  I know because I've had all of those in the same room side by side with them.  I've run a calibration LaserDisc on all of them every so often the past decade and while the Sony's have lost some brightness they still outperform the other TV's and it's not enough that it can't easily be corrected by adjusting the black level.

Whatever you do don't buy plasma.  The nine month old one we got from a customer for free that was run 24/7 for six months with the default brightness settings is burned in badly with the CNN headline news screen, and it is too dim to use even with the lights off (with light leakage from an open door and through the closed blinds).  If you do buy plasma make sure you buy a calibration DVD like the one from Avia and turn down the brightness so that it isn't overdriven.  The plasma displays burn-in much more easily than a real CRT.  The defaults on the plasma displays I've seen were all overdriven.  Of course people still buy those things because they want trendy rather than good.z

Quoted: 2. Get a sony CRT for about twice that much for the same size, but knowing you have the best picture quality available at any price. Ask any hardcore gamer or videophile about how to get the best picture quality and they'll tell you a Sony hi-res HD CRT. Agreed, and you'll most likely get 15 or more years of great use out of it.  The Sony professional model Trinitron TV's at work are all over 15 years old but still have a better picture than any LCD, DLP, or plasma TV I've seen.  I know because I've had all of those in the same room side by side with them.  I've run a calibration LaserDisc on all of them every so often the past decade and while the Sony's have lost some brightness they still outperform the other TV's and it's not enough that it can't easily be corrected by adjusting the black level. Whatever you do don't buy plasma.  The nine month old one we got from a customer for free that was run 24/7 for six months with the default brightness settings is burned in badly with the CNN headline news screen, and it is too dim to use even with the lights off (with light leakage from an open door and through the closed blinds).  If you do buy plasma make sure you buy a calibration DVD like the one from Avia and turn down the brightness so that it isn't overdriven.  The plasma displays burn-in much more easily than a real CRT.  The defaults on the plasma displays I've seen were all overdriven.  Of course people still buy those things because they want trendy rather than good.z

thanks for all the information guys!