TechNudge Live - Opinions and Reviews for the Informed

I've been hearing reports that consumers are giving HDTV a "luke warm" reception during this holiday shopping season. I realized that more than just the price tag is keeping this shopper from opening up my wallet to fork over the dough. Here are some of the reasons that folks should wait a few more months, and hold onto their old fashioned sets a little longer.

Price Drops

Nothing can kill a sale faster than a falling price. Why buy this week when your coworker is going to tell you how much cheaper he bought the same item 3 weeks later. The free fall in prices gives us all a reason for hesitation, and reinforces the notion that procrastination pays. More stable prices would get people to jump on the TV bandwagon with some more confidence that what they were paying is worth it.

Technological Confusion

If the manufacturers set out to create a confusing mess, they've done a wonderful job. Add in the number of misinformed among Best Buy's Geek Squad, or Circuit City's IQ Crew, and we've got a real confusing mess that the average consumer just isn't willing to put in the effort to understand. It has gotten so bad that even Wal-Mart shows a CNET video on their in store displays talking about flat panel TV's (and encouraging the higher end gear coincidentally...).

There's already confusion between plasma vs. LCD vs. DLP. Add in that digital television is not always high definition, and such lesser standards like EDTV, and mix with ATSC tuners and the consumer is heading to the Wikipedia, and not the cash register. People want to understand what they're buying, and from the questions I'm asked just standing by the display, I'd say that most don't have a clue.

Disc Issues

The next issue is that the next generation disc is also in a format war. HD-DVD is off to a very slim lead against the Blu-Ray standard. The cost of the players is also way beyond what consumers have been paying for DVD players. The high definition discs are also up there in price. Some have decided to chuck the whole thing and just go with an upconverting DVD player. As consumers figure out that their DVD's are not high definition, they realize the new TV will just magnify the defects and are not compelled to upgrade to a new TV.

Black Bars

The Hollywood purists keep insisting on the 16:9 format, so called widescreen, to preserve all the film information. While that's bad enough as it makes the picture too small on my 20 inch TV, even on a widescreen TV, the bars still remain. I witnessed this first hand on a Sony 26" LCD at Target the other day. While I thought it just needed to be adjusted, when I looked through that television's manual, it said that while it could stretch a broadcast to fill the screen, on widescreen movies, the bars would remain at the top and bottom. They really need to do something about this as I thought that these TV's were really built to accommodate this format. Again, let's wait for this to get worked out.

HD Signal Issues

First, there are not that many programs available in the HD format. For those that are, we need to be able to get them to the set. Sometimes that means an extra charge from the cable company. Those lucky enough to live near a metropolitan area for an over the air broadcast still have to detect the signal that isn't running at full strength while analog broadcasting is still active. What results is that most HDTV owners only watch a minority of their programming in HDTV, and the rest is regular TV quality.

Tune In

The tuner rollout is not helping either. Up until March 2007, only sets larger than 27" are mandated to have a digital tuner. So why would I purchase a 23" TV that will require a 70's style cable box to get a digital signal? Again, this reinforces the notion to wait.

New Technology

The real technophiles are always the ones that are willing to part with the serious cash. However, with the new tech on the horizon, you always wonder if you might want to wait for the next big thing. For TV's it looks like lasers. I know I'll be watching the CES out in Vegas to see what direction the manufacturers are taking. After plunking down thousands, this TV has to last for more than a few years.

Conclusion

After going through the above, it becomes clear why those TV's are not flying off the shelves for Christmas this year. Given some more stability in this segment, a little more maturity in the technology, and more digital broadcasts, obviously there will be wide market penetrance. Stay tuned, as next year may just be the time when this all comes together for the majority of consumers, and they get this new technology in their living room.

--Jonas