SolveYourProblem
HDTV Article Series
Buying
a High Definition Television (HDTV)
HDTV
Terms You Need To Know
Before Buying One
Before
you go shopping for that new High Definition Television
Set, there are terms that you need to know. It’s
a frightening experience to be looking for something that high
tech, yet not understand a word the salesperson is saying.
I know. I’ve been there! You need to learn the terms, know
the lingo, let the salesperson know you’ve done your homework;
you’ll get a better deal if you do.
Let’s
begin with the basics. What’s the difference between
analog TV and HDTV? Analog is what we have had for the past
50 years. It sends conventional TV signals to consumers and
is then broadcast on an analog TV. This was great when it first
appeared. It sends the signals continuously, but in doing so
creates changes in color and brightness.
Digital
TV is a broad term that covers High Definition Television
and other applications such as data casting, interactivity,
and multicasting. Digital refers to the circuitry that carries
the signals that have data.
Enhanced
TV is simply down casting. Down casting is a term
used that includes added resources downloaded to viewers. Live
interaction and downloading programs to special receivers for
reviewing later are two types of enhanced TV.
Pixel is another term that you need to be familiar with before
shopping for a new HDTV.
A pixel is a tiny square that has a sample of video information
that make up the overall picture on the television set. A pixel
per inch or PPI is the measure of the sharpness of the display
screen. The more PPI’s per inch the sharper the picture. Pixels
affect the resolution. The more pixels there are, the more
picture detail you have. High Definition picture formats are
comprised of 1080 active lines and each line has 1920 pixels.
Let’s compare that with today’s analog TV’s. The HDTV ends
with over two million pixels per frame. The analog only has
480 active lines, so the ration of pixels is about 200,000
as apposed to the two million for HDTV’s.
In addition, you will need to know that a digital
tuner will be needed to receive and display digital broadcasts. Some TV
sets will come equipped with the decoder and will be included
within the TV or a separate box will need to be bought to decode
the signals.
Dolby
Digital is the surround sound technology that movie
theaters use and larger home theater systems have. It works
with five speakers plus a low frequency subwoofer to produce
true-to-life sound. The sound can put you in the center of
the action when you are watching TV.
Letterbox refers to the image you get of a wide-screen picture
on a standard TV. It typically has black bars above and below
the picture. This maintains the aspect ratio designed for the
theater screen. Which is generally 16:9 or wider.
Many
cable companies provide digital cable. Digital cable offers
viewers more channels but is not the same as digital
television. A digital monitor is a set up box that can display
a digital signal through an added set-top box. Many HDTV’s
will have several items including a set-top box, a DVD player
and a DVR.
DVR is my favorite function of the HDTV. It allows you to
record a set number of hours without programming a VCR. It’s
much easier to use, lets the quality of the HDTV be seen and
can be watched anytime you want to see the program you recorded.
It’s perfect for the nights when there will be something on
TV that you want to watch but can’t be home to see it. With
DVR, you can fast-forward through the commercials, rewind to
review a part you didn’t hear clearly, and keep it on the recorder
until everyone in the household has had a chance to watch it.
Wide-screen is a term given to picture displays that are wider
than the standard analog TV. The National Television Systems
Committee has set the standard for a regular analog set for
4:3. A HDTV is set with a screen ration of 16:9. That means
if the screen is nine inches tall, it is sixteen inches wide.
If you were watching a show that was shot in wide-screen format
on, a regular sized analog TV you would notice the edges being
cropped. You see more of the picture on a wide-screen TV.
# # # # #
SolveYourProblem.com : 2007
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