I suspect the only reason you see serial ports and protocols on these devices is that the same LCD display model inhabits both the commercial and the residentical SKU. Then the marketing gurus enter and whether to meet some government specification and obtain some bonus or because they think it will affect consumer purchasing decisions they have the software changed to reflect this "important marketing point." Only no one stopped to figure out how the circuitry or code affected the serial port and chip set as that would involve engineering time. Almost as bad is VUPOWER's post which suggests that there are different secret handshakes for different models and woe to whomever sends the wrong set of commands to the wrong display.

I found out yesterday that one of the high end video cards I love and use will probably not support vcr's connected to it. That was after spending 3 hours Monday trying to fix the problem, including purchasing a new VCR. It has to do with time base correction affecting sync as the signal is processed. They did not have any VCRs available for testing so put the unit out anyway and I suppose they felt that as 1/2 inch VHS is such a low fidelity video format who would use one with a high end display and video scaler? Never having worked for a manufacturer I have no idea how a decision on these feature sets is reached. Laziness and/or ignorence seems obvious as would the law of unintended consequences. I do understand that updating these manuals is expenisve. Cannot an up to date manual be placed in .pdf format and placed on the company's web site? I have read so many different solutions to this serial port issue with Sharp that I have no idea whom or what to believe. It can be disabled in the menu. You need to send specific sreial codes to disable enegy star. You follow VUPOWER's command set above--but only for that TV. I just wish one could reach someone at Sharp who had both power to affect some change on corportate policy.



Lord have mercy.

Alan