SamyGO: replacing television firmware

Posted Nov 14, 2009 22:47 UTC (Sat) by Trelane (subscriber, #56877)
Parent article: SamyGO: replacing television firmware

Alternate firmware was the main reason I bought a WRT router. I'd not thought about TVs, but if it's relatively foolproof to use alternate firmware (the "bricking" comment hit home), I might well consider the price and equipment upgrade when it comes time for us to upgrade to HD.

Cool catch; thanks!

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SamyGO: replacing television firmware

Posted Nov 15, 2009 2:57 UTC (Sun) by yokem_55 (subscriber, #10498) [Link] (7 responses)

These are really high end TV's. The cheapest I could find start out at
~$1200. Frankly, at this point, one could get much better functionality,
with less money by getting a "cheap" LCD TV and hooking it up to an HTPC. No
worries about bricking the device, and a far more flexible hardware
platform.

SamyGO: replacing television firmware

Posted Nov 15, 2009 3:19 UTC (Sun) by elanthis (guest, #6227) [Link] (6 responses)

The TVs are also freaking gorgeous. My Samsung Plasma isn't even two years old yet, and I don't even watch much TV, but I drool every time I'm in Fry's and see the high end Samsung LED TVs. Thin, light, low power, crisp and brilliant images, and good overall design. I'm so tempted to "accidentally" drop my current 42" HDTV so I have a valid excuse to go guy a new 56" 1080 LED Samsung. ;)

SamyGO: replacing television firmware

Posted Nov 15, 2009 21:51 UTC (Sun) by Los__D (guest, #15263) [Link] (5 responses)

Strange idea... Replacing a plasma with LCD is like replacing Linux with Windows... :p

(ok, I have no idea how good Samsung plasmas are, but I'd NEVER trade my Pioneer plasma for any "LED" TV).

SamyGO: replacing television firmware

Posted Nov 16, 2009 1:52 UTC (Mon) by cventers (guest, #31465) [Link] (1 responses)

I have an LG 52" 720P Plasma and a Samsung 52" 1080P LCD... I much prefer the LCD. (Keep in mind, "HD" cable only runs up to 720p here, so it is a 1:1 comparison). Plasma also has problems with burn-in.

SamyGO: replacing television firmware

Posted Nov 17, 2009 22:20 UTC (Tue) by rahvin (guest, #16953) [Link]

I'm no expert but the cost difference and the tendency of the more cost competitive plasmas to be 720p rather than 1080p (like most LCD's these days) had essentially eliminated the plasma market (and coincidentally the DLP market as well). I had also understood that most of the manufacturers had dropped their plasma production and were focusing solely on LCD's these days.

SamyGO: replacing television firmware

Posted Nov 19, 2009 5:46 UTC (Thu) by roelofs (guest, #2599) [Link] (2 responses)

Strange idea... Replacing a plasma with LCD is like replacing Linux with Windows... :p

Um...he said "LED", not "LCD". Big difference. ;-)

Greg

SamyGO: replacing television firmware

Posted Nov 19, 2009 6:50 UTC (Thu) by Los__D (guest, #15263) [Link] (1 responses)

Uhm, no. A "LED" TV is still a LCD TV. The only difference is the backlight source.

For full LED backlight, the difference from old-style can be quite big through making dynamic contrast being an actual advantage, instead of a liability. With edge LED, which 90% "LED" TVs has, it's not completely the same backlight-bleeding, no-blacks junk, but not that far off.

When/if we see real OLED TVs, it will probably be another matter. Until then black levels, contrast, screen update (do NOT get me started on "100/200/400 Hz technology") and general quality are all completely in the hands of plasmas.

Only advantages for LCDs are brightness/anti-glare (if you have a really bright living room, or strong lightsources in front of the screen) and power usage, and maybe small-screen resolution, but 1080 on a 30" set is a joke anyway (unless you sit 1 meter from the screen). Burn-in is a non-issue in modern plasmas.

SamyGO: replacing television firmware

Posted Nov 19, 2009 12:37 UTC (Thu) by Los__D (guest, #15263) [Link]

To be fair, there's one more thing about plasmas that can be hugely annoying to those sensitive to it: phosphor trails.