I need suggestions for which new televisions are best. Have 27" Sony and am very happy, but...too small. Would like 32" - 36". Sony Wega looks impressive. Worth money? Are component inputs worth extra cash. Are Proscan and Panasonic reputable? I would like to stay under $1,500. HELP?

The Sony Wega TVs are very nice. They offer very good picture quality. They are, however, pretty expensive. You not only pay for the advanced technology, but you also have to pay for the SONY on the front.

Panasonic and ProScan both make some great sets also, and I would look closely at them before making your decision.

Part of the Problem of purchasing a TV is that the dealer you visit will almost never have all of the sets calibrated properly. (in some cases they will even make one set look worse than the others thru poor adjustment to make sure you don't want it)

Properly calibrated, even many relatively modest sets can produce a very good image.

Do yourself a favour and purchase a copy of 'Video Essentials' or the AVIA test disc and get comfortable with the process of calibration. Basic calibration is not that tough. Once you have narrowed your decision to 3 or 4 sets, run the test patterns thru them and quickly calibrate the Contrast/Bright/Tint/colour/sharpness adjustments.

You may be surprised with what you see.

Manufacturers spend a lot of money finding out what kind of picture attracts the most attention. They then adjust their sets to try and attract attention. Their settings bear little resemblance to a properly calibrated set.

Another thing to think about...for the same money as the Wega, you could probably find a pretty decent 50 inch. Nothing creates that home theatre feel like a big screen!!

Happy shopping...Derek

Derek brings up a good point.

My father-in-law was interested in purchasing a new big screen TV. We went into one store and looked at the various models. After he mentioned that he liked the picture on one brand rather than another I picked up several remotes on various sets and started to adjust the picture quality to see how other sets compared to the picture that he liked.

A sales person quickly ran over to where we were and took away the remotes, explaining that more expensive models have the better picture and that I was wasting my time and messing up their TVs. Needless to say we walked out.