Bought an HD-TV: Waste of Money

[Trekker4747]

My sister has the DVR service (she has the same cable provider I assume I think they have a monopoly in this area) and I believe she's said she can record two things and watch a third. I dunno, maybe if I can't get this damn VCR to tape at all maybe I will end up wasting the money. I really try to be frugal, I was raised that way, but my entire life revolves around TV/Movies...

You can record two things, the third you watch either has to be through the TV (not the DVR) or something already recorded on the DVR. (This is how most cable-company DVRs work. I believe AT&T's service's DVR has FIVE tuners!)

It's 2010, dude. It's time to give up the VCR and enter the 21st century.

 

[Squiggy]

My sister has the DVR service (she has the same cable provider I assume I think they have a monopoly in this area) and I believe she's said she can record two things and watch a third. I dunno, maybe if I can't get this damn VCR to tape at all maybe I will end up wasting the money. I really try to be frugal, I was raised that way, but my entire life revolves around TV/Movies...

If you're recording HD television onto a VCR cassette then you're sort of missing the point of HD.

 

[Trekker4747]

My sister has the DVR service (she has the same cable provider I assume I think they have a monopoly in this area) and I believe she's said she can record two things and watch a third. I dunno, maybe if I can't get this damn VCR to tape at all maybe I will end up wasting the money. I really try to be frugal, I was raised that way, but my entire life revolves around TV/Movies...

If you're recording HD television onto a VCR cassette then you're sort of missing the point of HD.

It's kind of like taking a fillet mignon, grinding it into hamburger and then duplicating a BigMac recipe.

 

[Misfit Toy]

My current plan: I still have an old analog cable TV in the bedroom, I will put my good VCR over there and use that one. I'll just have a problem if/when I want to record from the higher channels.

I think this is probably a good compromise for you. I LOVE my DVR, because I love recording and rewatching in HD, but if you don't mind the lower picture quality, you can make this work.

 

[Mr Light]

Fortunately the GF and I don't work night jobs anymore so we're home every night cept Thursday. So basically the VCR is for when two shows are on at once or if it airs in the middle of the day/night. At that point I'm not really concerned with image quality, because the show I care about more I'll be watching. Well after 30 minutes of futzing with the cables, I finally got my good VCR hooked to my bedroom TV and my crappy VCR hooked to my HD-TV (haven't seen if it will record yet it probably won't). So I'll just have to think about what digital channels I would want to tape and how often.

 

[Trekker4747]

Fortunately the GF and I don't work night jobs anymore so we're home every night cept Thursday. So basically the VCR is for when two shows are on at once or if it airs in the middle of the day/night. At that point I'm not really concerned with image quality, because the show I care about more I'll be watching. Well after 30 minutes of futzing with the cables, I finally got my good VCR hooked to my bedroom TV and my crappy VCR hooked to my HD-TV (haven't seen if it will record yet it probably won't). So I'll just have to think about what digital channels I would want to tape and how often.

With a DVD you can record (at least) two things at once and you only have to program it once. Set it for a "season pass" for, say, "House" and it will always record House whenever it comes on. Even if House changes time slots. You can set it to record only new episodes, new and repeats, episodes aired in syndication, etc. It has all of the functionality of a VCR and then some, plus it is digital quality.

 

[Snaploud]

Fortunately the GF and I don't work night jobs anymore so we're home every night cept Thursday. So basically the VCR is for when two shows are on at once or if it airs in the middle of the day/night. At that point I'm not really concerned with image quality, because the show I care about more I'll be watching. Well after 30 minutes of futzing with the cables, I finally got my good VCR hooked to my bedroom TV and my crappy VCR hooked to my HD-TV (haven't seen if it will record yet it probably won't). So I'll just have to think about what digital channels I would want to tape and how often.

A DVR would let you skip all those commercials for the other shows you watch during the week.

 

[Mr Light]

Whaaaaaat. Who would use technology like that to avoid watching commercials! You realize if people don't watch the commercials then companies won't buy the ad time and the shows won't exist!

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

^ The commercials are already there. So the shows have already been paid for. There's no way for the companies to tell if we actually *see* the ads, so therefore we have every right to skip what we don't want to watch.

 

[Mr Light]

Well we got the BR Player in the mail today and popped in The Transporter. It's a pretty sharp image but not as real-life-crystal-sharp as the tvs in Best Buy. Also the digital cable channels are looking better now, either from getting used to it or the fact that I pushed the desk and couch further away from the tv

 

[RoJoHen]

That is a good point to mention. These TVs are designed to be viewed from specific distances. It's not gonna look good if you're right up in front of it.

 

[Trekker4747]

Well we got the BR Player in the mail today and popped in The Transporter. It's a pretty sharp image but not as real-life-crystal-sharp as the tvs in Best Buy.

There could be a number reasons for this. The first one being how well the movie was transfered to BD from the source. Some studios to cash-in with less-popular titles just squirt out whatever they can onto the newest medium to make the quick buck without going through the trouble of mastering it to suit the medium.

Another could be the settings on the tv. This could be anything from having to manually adjust the color/tint/brightness/etc. settings or changing the "preprogramed" settings. Some TVs have different settings for different media like "Sports", "Cinema", "Basic", etc. For the frormer just play around with the settings (there should be a way to reset them to factory defaults if you screw them up too badly) for the latter check the TV's manual to see if these pre-sets exsist.

Be lucky you don't have an old rear-projection set like I do and have to mess with the convergence settings. Oy, that's a pain!

But to really get a feel for how well your setup's picture is buy (or borrow) a "hot" newer release. Star Trek, The Dark Knight both look gorgeous in BD.

 

[RoJoHen]

"Iron Man" looks pretty remarkable in Blu-Ray as well.

 

[Trekker4747]

"Iron Man" looks pretty remarkable in Blu-Ray as well.

I was trying to think of another movie to mention, but yeah that's another one that looks good in BD.

 

[RoJoHen]

I think the Transformers movies look awesome in Blu-Ray as well. I can actually tell which is which!

 

[Trekker4747]

I think the Transformers movies look awesome in Blu-Ray as well. I can actually tell which is which!

As much as I hate those movies, I suspect they look really good on BD too. Probably any big movie that was in theaters in the last 3-4 years or so is going to look the best on BD.

A movie like The Transporter probably wouldn't have gotten the best BD treatment. They probably just touched up the DVD release, stuck it on the BD and called it day.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

I think the Transformers movies look awesome in Blu-Ray as well. I can actually tell which is which!

As much as I hate those movies, I suspect they look really good on BD too.

Oh, they do. Definitely.

For a time there was the animated 1986 movie on BR as well, but it was only available as an import from the UK (Amazon). Sadly it's no longer there.

 

[Haggis and tatties]

"Iron Man" looks pretty remarkable in Blu-Ray as well.

The Thing, Casino royale, Stargate the movie, Star trek the movie, and all the Trek movies, all amazing in BR, and one thing that look very very impressive on BR was Star Trek TOS......i was blown away by just how amazing this looks in BR.

It was almost like watch Star Trek for the very first time.

 

[Mr Light]

So this is annoying. 75% of everything I watch is either on Comedy Central or Cartoon Network. Both channels constantly say in the corner "available in HD!" but apparently my cable provider doesn't carry either. Sigh.

 

[Scout101]

wow, who is your cable provider? I have Cox, and have had all those channels for a long time now. Actually, outside of listening to one of the music channels when cleaning or whatever, don't remember the last time I had to venture outside of the 700s (my HD channel range)