http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=us&cs=19&l=en&sku=A1363306
Sharp

or

http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/productdetail.aspx?c=us&cs=19&l=en&sku=A1226048
Sony

Off just the price and accessories, the sharp, and it comes with a blue ray player, which I think is kinda funny actually, considering with the playstation 3, a Sony product runs on blue ray, I would think they would invest into blue ray. However, if Blue ray technologoy doesn't take off and gets dusted just by High Defination(what I think will happen), then, the best bet would be the Sony. But, at least the Blue Ray player has backwards compatiblity, so, you do not have to dump your old collection in...... if it were me, I would go with the sharp, and look to sell the Blue Ray player!

Regarding Bluray vs. HD-DVD, I think both formats will be warring it out for quite a while. Although with VHS vs. Betamax it was inevitable (depending on region) that one would win out over the other, it is far less complex/pricey for hardware manufacturers to figure out how to do dual format disc players, meaning less requirement for one side to buckle in to the other and they can stick to their guns/principals for longer.

The TVs are more or less a coin-toss decision based on specification/capabilities, so I would just recommend looking around for more feedback/reviews from owners of each model (on and off the Dell site) for their experiences.

The Sharp has consistently good review except for the built in speakers. Many say they stink, but I am intending on getting a separate speaker system anyway.

I just don't know if they reviews are shills or not.

I am leaning towards the Sharp. But I am not going to buy until I see them next to each other side by side.

Thanks for the input.

For what it's worth, both my parents and I have Sony Bravia TVs (I have a 37", my parents have a 42") and we're all happy with them.

I suspect you'll be happy with either one; both are supposed to be good choices.

maybe try http://www.avsforum.com/
fwiw, to throw another in the mix, i went with the samsung =) best black level i have seen on an lcd. bravia was a close 2nd. for whatever reason, and i am sure it's personal, my eye does not like the sharp screen as much.

Well I did do some comparison viewing at the local Circuit City and Best buy.

I was actually unable to compare the units directly, so I had to use a Samsung intermediary.

That is to say,
The Sony 46 versus the Samsung 46, the Sony was clearly superior.
And the 42 Samsung versus the Sharp 42, the Samsung was clearly superior. And even in the larger 50 or so sizes. Neither store had the 46 Sharp.

Now, this could have all been just settings, contrast and brightness for example, but I did not have control over those during the demo.

Additionally, the 120Hz models of any of the TVs were clearly superior in picture clarity than those in the same manufacturer lines, notably Sony, which did not have it. But I don't think they are worth the 50% difference in increased cost.

The Plasma TVs gave off a notable heat wave, as well, as an observation. The LCDs had less radiant heat coming from the monitor. Never noticed or heard of this before. And I could not see any noticeable increase in picture clarity to justify the differential in price.

Another thing noted. Was that when watching Spiderman 3 on Blu Ray, as opposed to for example, Cars, Robinsons, or Ratatoie, there was very noticeable pixelation in the Spiderman vid(all Blu Ray vids). Absolutely none in the totally CG animated films, but was there in the half live action flick. Is this a transfer phenomenon? Or possibly the masters for the CG flicks were rendered at much higher than 1900x1080 resolution resulting in absolute detail?

If you are seeing noticeable pixellation, it is a result of a poor job of encoding (possibly due to space constraints), not a flaw with the format or codec.

In general, lossy compression works by selectively removing details that are unlikely to be noticed in order to decrease the amount of information that needs to be stored. This is done automatically with mathematical formulas, but there are parameters that can be tweaked. Noticeable pixellation means that they probably went too far in lowering the bit rate. (This applies to DVDs, Blu-ray, HD-DVDs, nearly all downloadable videos, etc.)

CG videos are likely to have more predictable frames, and so I wouldn't be surprised if it took less data to encode CG videos at an acceptable quality.

I know about lossy compression.

What I don't know is why a full length animated CG flick has absolutely none.

And a full length half animated CG flick has it noticeably.

What does a Blu Ray disc hold, like 32 gigs? There is no reason for that level of pixelation that I saw, with that kind of space.

And it wasn't the TV, I had the guy swap out discs in the demo units.

Actually, what I noticed was some form of sub pixelation. I am quite familiar with the macro 'little squares' type that you see normally. This was like little twinkly black dots on SOLIDS, in motionless frames.

I don't have any explanation for it.

Ok, I misunderstood--I wouldn't call twinkly black dots pixellation.

I have no idea what it is that you're seeing, then. What happens when you pause?

As much as 50GB on bluray, and it won't be maxed out (HD-DVD is quite a bit lower but still adequate) - may easily be cables or drive as much as the TV unless you tried the same cable/drive on another set.

The CG animation is likely to be much more easily (and more highly) compressible, meaning the lower data rate of transfer and ability of the hardware to error-correct before stuff must be sent to the set and displayed on screen is going to be better than with a fast changing highly detailed / high bandwidth requiring movie like Spiderman 3. This is more important than over-compression due to disk capacity.

Pausing it doesn't necessarily matter, depending on where the problem is, it still has to render then shunt nGbps of data down the cable for the set to display on each frame. Was it dual HDMI input? Digital DVI? Cables extended or worn?

I didn't notice artifacts of the type you describe when watching it myself, but I have a lower bandwidth setup (just a 1920x1200 lcd monitor with dvi-d) than big-rig sets might require.

This is why I will never own the perfect TV - lol - I have no idea what Annabella just said...

GO with the cheaper price. And yes, you will need a good HDMI cable but when you add it onto the sale, you have all that time to pay for THAT too.

From the dank recesses of the grave do I summon thee, thread! Rise and spread disease and pestilence through signature spam.

Ended up buying a Digital SLR instead of a TV.

TV is passive.

DSLR is active.

Still happy with the buying decision.

Nikon D300 with a VR 18-200 lens.

Fyyr, what's with the newcomer, different message, different name? Are you someone different, or did you forget your password or what? I'm confused.

Clearbrooke ~ Quellious

i belive that sony is a better deal i have one a flat screen hd and it is great..................:buttrock: