[gardeners] OT long: bulk reply re High-end TV

Bob Kirk (gardeners@globalgarden.com)
Sun, 16 Jul 2000 00:31:38 -0500 (CDT) 

>buy the cheapest one that has a picture you like.

   Heh. Unfortunately the Wega sets are it (one flat-screen Panasonic a
tossup, but no less outrageously priced). Never owned a TV myself and been
spoiled too long by Mac video on sharp monitors. It helps I'm not spending
my own money, but hers isn't so unlimited as to roll over the hard choices.
  (and monitorphile or not I'd be willing to gave the old TV set a home,
but it really is on the way out).

>>Get thee to a Public Library and find Consumer Reports.....

   Why don't I ever remember them? Our public library appears to have this
bad habit of doing bulk vs incremental discards, and online CR wants a $3-4
membership fee to peek at the most recent reviews of such sets (street
price $550-700 and he's balking at $3.50? Yeah, that's >my< money ;-)  
  Seriously, I'll take a look in Topeka - going over to see if Circuit City
might be further up the queue when it comes to getting stuff that mostly
isn't even on the shelves yet - and if Topeka library doesn't have the
magazine definitely will check the website.

>>>go shopping for some at the local stores you want to maybe buy from.

   In fact I'd sooner buy from Sears because out in central KS it's the
best service deal around. $149 for 3 years? !! That would hardly buy
mileage from anyone else - especially if they "have to go back to the shop
for a part". Or don't they work like plumbers?

>>>For the elderly it seems the main considerations are volume control....
>>>Controls --- with big buttons or easy to read and understand....

   Actually this whole high-end project started with her obviously needing
something I could run through an old amp & some desktop speakers right on
the coffee table so she could at least understand audio.  Hell, >I< can't
understand it when those 2.5" speakers are cranked so you can hear them in
the street - but here's hoping a better TV will sound good enough to avoid
that particular hassle for awhile.
   A really basic remote with huge buttons wouldn't be a bad idea at all
(assuming they even sell such a thing), regardless what kind of starship
console actually comes with whatever killer set I end up getting her.     

>>>Be sure to stand back at the approximate distance she would normally
>>>watch.... >>>If at all possible take her to it or it to her.....

  Yeah, why does everybody make it so difficult to do that?  Which in many
cases would only require turning them all 45 degrees so you could look at
them down the aisle - but I did try.  Certainly for these prices there must
be the option of returning stuff, but at ~100 lbs each I'd rather get it
right up front: those totally flat tubes are one major chunk of glass.

  Thanks for all responses on & off-line. I can talk a pretty good game
about almost anything, but if I actually knew anything about this topic
(that I trusted $500 worth) I wouldn't have asked.

bk---

Gonna drive out a few miles on the remote chance the predicted Aurora
Borealis is even visible, let alone worth seeing on a full moon night.