We have reached the long awaited festive season, Christmas is a few days away and if you are like me, you are running late with your Xmas shopping. Once again HDTVs are amongst the most coveted presents thanks to new technologies like LED and 3D.
Buying a new HDTV is not as easy as it seems, with some advancements in the segment it is easy to get confused and end up buying high def TV that doesn’t fulfil your expectations.
Growth and technological advancements in the segment brought with them a vocabulary of their own with terms and confusing expressions that is worth knowing before you go out shopping for your next high def TV.
Gone were the days that we had to worry only about the size of our TV sets. Below you will find the most important jargons you must learn before you buy an HDTV.
Contrast Ratio: It is a scale or ratio between 1:1 and 10,000:1, which illustrates how much difference there is between the brightest whites and the darkest black a screen can display. To determine a good contrast ratio is very simple, the bigger the difference, the better the contrast ratio.
Refresh Rate: Is the number of frames per second a screen can display. Measured in Hz or cycles per second and again the higher the better. A fast refresh rate means better picture quality, reduced blurring and improved clarity. Plasma TVs lead the way here with a refresh rate of 600Hz, while LCD and LED still haven’t reached the 500Hz mark.
Pixel Response Time: Similar to the Refresh Rate, but in this case it determines how fast a pixel takes to react to a refreshed image. Pixel response time is measured in milliseconds and the lower the better. A fast pixel response eliminates blurring, especially in fast moving pictures like motor racing for instance.
CRT: CRTs or Cathode Ray Tube are almost extinct from the market these days. These are our good ol’ bulky and heavy TV sets. Worth knowing the term but I doubt you are going to hear it while shopping for your new HDTV.
Rear Projection: Also called RPTV, rear projection TVs are effectively projectors casting high-resolution images on the back of large screens, similar to movie theatre projectors, except contained in a television unit.
HDMI: The standard for digital input, HDMI is a digital connection for devices to televisions, capable of output of high-def video and audio.
DVI: The PC version of an HDMI cable.
LCD TVs: LCD stands for Liquid Crystal Display. LCD TVs have been around for quite some time now but it gained more exposure with the arrival of Full HD technology. LCD TVs are energy efficient and are available in wide variety of dimensions that can go all the way up to 108 inches. The only problem is finding a living room to fit it.

Plasma TVs: Using the same technology as Fluorescent lamps but adapted for TVs. Plasma TVs dominated the market up until a year or so ago when LED TVs pushed them aside. Plasma TVs best features include high contrast ratio and an extremely fast refresh rate.

LED TVs: Acronym for Light Emitting Diode, a semiconductor light source. LEDs are being used as new backlighting system for LCD TVs which allows them to be thinner, with lower energy consumption and a brighter display with extremely high contrast ratio. So all LED TVs are in fact LCD TVs. Confused?

This is how it works.
Instead of using standard CCFLs or Cold Cathode Fluorescent Lamps as its backlighting system, LCD TV manufacturers are using LEDs which are extremely energy efficient producers of extraordinarily bright light, do not use harmful chemicals like mercury and are being market as an “Eco-friendly” alternative to Plasma and “old fashioned” LCD.
There are two types of LED HD TVs - “edge-lit” and “full array” - The first reflects light into the centre of the monitor and the second lights the screen in a gird pattern. Edge lit LED TVs are the thinnest and lightest TV set models available on the market today while full-array LED TVs have the highest contrast ratio of them all.
3D TVs: This was definitely the year of 3D. The technology brought a spark of life to the HDTV segment and almost all HDTV manufacturers are including 3D capabilities in their TVs. Cutting a long story short, the tech is similar to the ones we have seen in the movies over the past year that was adapted to our homes.

High def 3D TV sets prices are still very high in comparison to other technologies but if have the money I recommend you go for it.
With that we covered all the main subjects about this new generation of Television sets and I hope it helped to clarify any doubts you had about HDTVs.
Did we miss anything? Or would you like to add your view to this article? Please do so using our comments section below.

