Fantastic picture but is it worth the price?

My wife and I bought this Sharp Aquos on Memorial Day weekend from Best Buy for $1999. We really couldn't fit anything larger on our wall than a 40" TV. We went to the TV stores and examined the Sony, LG, Samsung and Sharp. We had read raving reviews about the Samsung and the Sharp. The thing I found the most odd about the Sharp was that at every electronics store, it seemed to be set off to the side so you could not directly compare it to the Sony or the Samsung TVs. It was almost as if they didn't want to sell it.

I did a lot of research online and talked to a lot of salesmen. The main thing I was looking for at the time was 720p resolution. Now it would be 1080p resolution. I immediately discarded any TV that didn't have at least 720p and 1080i resolution.

The Sony Bravia appeared awful in the store. We hated the picture. It majorly paled compared to much cheaper brands such as Westinghouse and HP in the store. They were on a huge sale making them very price competitive. I asked the salesman why they were marked down so significantly and his response was, "Look at the picture." We marked the Sony Bravia off.

Every salesman at every TV store basically told us to steer clear of Westinghouse, HP and the other cheaper brands. They said those TVs were fine for a second viewing room but not as your main TV. They just do not compare to the others for brightness and display.

Plasma TVs appear brighter and more colorful in the store. Quite a few of my friends got into the flat screen TV rage long before me and bought Plasmas last year. While the color and brightness are almost a must if you have a well lit room, the definition is not the same as the LCDs. Watch a HD sporting event on a Plasma and then watch it on a high dollar LCD. You will see a world of difference in the details.

We ended up debating between Samsung and Sharp. Most of the salespeople were pushing Samsung. It was their best selling brand. I have had numerous regular Samsung TVs in the past and had no complaints with any of them. I have also had a Sharp in the past that was equally reliable.

My wife was shopping with me and I asked her to go around and pick the TVs that she liked the most. I did the same and then we met back to compare notes. Oddly, we both narrowed it down to the same 2 TVs as our top choices. Samsung and the Sharp. The Sharp was actually about $100 cheaper than the Samsung we liked and it was also completely black. It went better in our family room with our furniture.

You picked a TV because it went with your furniture? No solely but it was probably the determining factor for my wife. I had elminiated probably 20 other TVs before we got down to these 2.

The TV was out of stock so we had to wait a week to get it and have it installed. Thank god I had them install it. Those guys were there for 4 hours and had to rig a stud in the wall as there was none where I wanted to hang it. Expensive as heck for the wires, the wall mount and installation.

Here is a critical tip. You cannot buy a HD TV without buying the correct HD cables. You want at least 2 HDMI inputs. That was one thing the Sharp had that almost all the other competitors did not have. We wanted to see our DVDs in HD and our cable HD channels. If you don't use these cables, the picture is noticeably poorer.

How do I know? I tried to go cheap at virst and by the component video cables. Picture was nice and improved over our old set but nothing like it was in the store. The installation guys brought HDMI cables with them and switched them out for me. Picture was dramatically better. Best Buy's cables were like $100 a piece so that was a huge hit. Ended up ordering other cables from www.crutchfield.com for about 1/3 less, switching them out and returning the old ones to Best Buy. You have to get the right cables though. Otherwise, you are wasting your money on a big screen.

Mount it on the wall so your kids and pets don't knock it over. Went to a friends house who has a much larger version of the Samsung we were looking to buy. His is 60". Sits on an entertainment table top thing. Looks nice. He has a 4 and 5 year old son. Where were over watching a NFL game. Kids were playing tackle football in the floor. One swift kick from the leg of a child and I noticed the TV was shaking. I can so see there huge 80 lb lab running after their cat behind the TV and knocking it to the floor. It didn't happen but the kids did throw some toys that hit the TV several times. Wall mounting would have raised it higher and prevented that.

Here is the deal. The Sharp Acquos has a better picture than any other TV I have seen. My friends have Panasonic (which was insanely expensive), Samsung, Sony, LG and Visio. I have compared the picture to all of them. Even when they come over to my house, they agree the Sharp has a slightly better picture. The colors are brighter and more crisp. Watching sports in HD just seems to have more definition. Now some of their TVs are more than 1 year older than mine and these things improve dramatically with each new model.

With that being said, is it worth the price? A friend of mine bought a 37" LCD HD Visio at Costco a few weekends ago for $899 or $1,100 less than what I paid for the Sharp. While the picture is not as good as the Sharp, there is not a dramatic difference. I watched the Philly at New Orleans playoff game on it. I hardly think the difference in picture on the Sharp is worth $1,100!

My recommendation - check the specs on whatever you are looking to buy. Go for the one with the highest contrast ratio and the highest P rating (1080p at least). Then whittle it down by price. If you get a great deal on a Samsung, Visio or Sharp, go with the cheapest one.

By far the worst ones that my friends have are the HP, Westinghouse and Pioneers. Those are awful looking. However, it may be the way they hooked them up. They are cheap bastards so I am assuming they went cheap on the cables.

One thing to keep in mind about shopping for a new flat screen, is that the picture in the store will look nothing like the picture at home. Please keep that in mind. The signal in most stores is spread so thin over so many TVs, the picture looks weak on almost all of their TVs. Do pay attention to where you are going to mount it, how much direct sunlight will hit the room and screen and whether your pet cat will have easy access to reach the TV.

Why the last sentence? Well our cat finds the picture so life like on the Sharp that it attempts to attack moving objects on the screen. Our cat has not been de-clawed. For some reason, the screen has been very scratch resistant on this TV as the cat went after the screen at least 3 times and luckily never scractched it. I have also found his little paw prints on the screen when we clean so he touches it regularly. If you have kids or pets, I would highly recommend investigating which TVs have the most scractch resistent screen. Not sure who other TVs fair, but this one has held up well.

We've had this one for 8 months. We love watching movies and sports on it. We have had zero problems with it. My boss has the larger version for a few months longer than I have had mine. He does have an issue with the channels fast forwarding and not stopping but he believes it has to do with some remote control device they had installed.

If you have a wall stud where you want to mount your TV, do it yourself. It will be easy to cut a hole in the dry wall and screw the wall mount to the wall. Make sure you have a level and double check it a million times before securing it completely. If you have no stud, pay the insane installation fee. Make sure you clarify they will make it work regardless of the problems they run into.

Shop for deals. Best Buy runs those no interest for 24 and 36 months deals all the time. Why pay $2000 now when you can pay $75 per month at no interest?

Oops! I almost forgot a big tip. I bought a stupid surround sound system to go with this TV. BAD IDEA! The speakers on the Sharp are more than adequate. I have no need for the surround sound system. The speakers on the TV would have worked just find unless you want to watch MTV and blast it out.

Go to your friends' houses and look at theirs. Make your own decision as to which one looks the best to you. Please remember the picture in the stores are worthless. It will look much better in your house than it does in the store. If it doesn't, take the dang thing back.

Don't buy one the first weekend you go shopping. Stop, think and then buy. You won't regret it.

If you have kids, you will save a ton of money skipping movies at a theatre. We really didn't watch much TV on the weekends before we got this. Now we do. I've gained 5 lbs since getting this horible device. It will make you a couch potatoe.